StephenFreskos
Member
I'm new to the forum but have been using it for work related technical troubleshooting for quite some time now. I'm actively involved in energy efficient lighting retrofit design and construction and have managed millions of dollars worth of lighting upgrades. Not bragging, just a little background.
New fixtures: 1st Source T8 High Bays 4' - 4 lamp fixtures, with GE 74476 ballasts model #: GE432-MVPS-H, ballast factor 1.16, Program / Rapid Start, parallel wired, running on 120V. These ballasts have the Multi-Volt Technology auto-sense circuitry. I've used around 5,000 of these ballasts now.
Problem: Lights in certain fixtures in this room will completely shut off, then turn back on about 1 second later. It's fast enough that it's hard to catch if you're not staring at the ceiling. At first, it seemed to be happening to only 3 lights, all on the same circuit. Then I saw it happen to another couple lights on other circuits.
Background:
We upgraded 15, 300W incandescent light fixtures in this room. This building was built in 1949. The room I'm having a problem with was adjacent to part of the building that burnt down sometime in the '80s, although the room suffered no visible damage.
At some unknown point, new TWN was installed on the lighting circuits. No ground wire in the conduit.
We've installed the same ballast and fixtures in 4 other rooms in this building with no problems.
This room has a 6 pole relay, controlling the 6 lighting circuits in this room from a wall switch. Relay is 1959 vintage and mounted directly to the bus in a 1959 Westinghouse panel.
Since all we did was connect new light fixtures to the existing wiring, and my sub has rechecked his splices, I'm pretty sure it's due to an existing problem with the building wiring. We've checked all connections to the breakers and to the relay with no issues found. What's weird is that only one fixture will do it at a time. Not all 3 fixtures on the circuit blink out. So it couldn't be a corroded contact on the relay could it?
We haven't yet pulled the relay to examine the contacts.
Any ideas?
Anyone had problems with the Multi-Voltage 120-277 ballasts blinking out like this?
I'm starting to think there's voltage fluctuation on the line that puts the ballast into auto-sense mode for a second, causing the lights to blink off then back on...
Thanks.
New fixtures: 1st Source T8 High Bays 4' - 4 lamp fixtures, with GE 74476 ballasts model #: GE432-MVPS-H, ballast factor 1.16, Program / Rapid Start, parallel wired, running on 120V. These ballasts have the Multi-Volt Technology auto-sense circuitry. I've used around 5,000 of these ballasts now.
Problem: Lights in certain fixtures in this room will completely shut off, then turn back on about 1 second later. It's fast enough that it's hard to catch if you're not staring at the ceiling. At first, it seemed to be happening to only 3 lights, all on the same circuit. Then I saw it happen to another couple lights on other circuits.
Background:
We upgraded 15, 300W incandescent light fixtures in this room. This building was built in 1949. The room I'm having a problem with was adjacent to part of the building that burnt down sometime in the '80s, although the room suffered no visible damage.
At some unknown point, new TWN was installed on the lighting circuits. No ground wire in the conduit.
We've installed the same ballast and fixtures in 4 other rooms in this building with no problems.
This room has a 6 pole relay, controlling the 6 lighting circuits in this room from a wall switch. Relay is 1959 vintage and mounted directly to the bus in a 1959 Westinghouse panel.
Since all we did was connect new light fixtures to the existing wiring, and my sub has rechecked his splices, I'm pretty sure it's due to an existing problem with the building wiring. We've checked all connections to the breakers and to the relay with no issues found. What's weird is that only one fixture will do it at a time. Not all 3 fixtures on the circuit blink out. So it couldn't be a corroded contact on the relay could it?
We haven't yet pulled the relay to examine the contacts.
Any ideas?
Anyone had problems with the Multi-Voltage 120-277 ballasts blinking out like this?
I'm starting to think there's voltage fluctuation on the line that puts the ballast into auto-sense mode for a second, causing the lights to blink off then back on...
Thanks.