Problems with Hubbell Metal Halide Lights

[U Wash]

I am trying to determine what might be the problem with my Hubbell Metal Halide lights in my self serve bays. About 3 years ago I installed 6 new hubbell wall mounted fixtures. I replaced some GE Metal Halide fixtures that had worked fine for over 20 years but the plastic lens turned yellow and had to be replaced about every 7 years. Plus the fixtures were showing some age.

I decided to go with the Hubbell lights because they offered glass lenses.
I installed those 6 lights and they worked out fine so then I replaced the remaining 8 fixtures with some more hubbell lights about a year later. Then at about two years with the first fixtures I had a ballast fail.
I was surprised a ballast went out in 2 years but I replaced it. Then about three months later another fixture had a ballast go out, then another. After 4 ballast failed I contacted Hubbell. They had no idea what was wrong. I did ship the four failed ballast to them for testing. I worked directly with Hubbell's Service Manager on returning these ballast for testing. Plus I advised them I had the fixtures on the same circuit as the old lights. I had an electrician check the circuit. It always tested good at 120 volts.

Here is the rub. I never received a reply back from Hubbell with results from what their supposed testing found. I contacted the service director several times by phone and left voice mail messages and sent him e-mails.

In the mean time 6 more of the fixtures had the ballast fail. I replaced all the failed ballast with a generic ballast from the major carwash supplier whom I had purchased the new hubbell fixtures. No problems with those ballast so far but I am not yet out 2 years on those replaced ballast. The last fixture that went bad had a wire in the fixture that was installed during manufacture
that showed over heating stress.

I am concerned that Hubbell has a manufacturing probem where they shipped a bunch of poor performing ballast. Plus there might be a design problem. The wire that overheated was certainly looked light duty and I replaced it with one with heavier copper. Obviously I am disappointed that Hubbell never contacted me after I took the time to send in the bad ballast.

I would like to know if anyone else has experienced similar problems With Hubbell Fixtures.

 

[Bubbles Galore]

Not to get off topic with the first reply, but I went with T-5's and have never looked back. They are brighter than most metal halide washes in my area and don't lose nearly the luminescence over time that the metal halides do. If you start looking into additional lights, I would check them out, I have been really happy with their performance.

Good luck with your MH!

 

[vinh]

What watt is your metal halide. mine is 320 watt. I have one fixture that I change the ignitor every 2 years for some reason. a ballast kit compose of ballast, capacitor, and ignitor. I change ignitor first. half time this will fix problem. The over half of the time its is the capacitor. I only had 1 ballast fail in 8 years fail. I am a big fan of Advance ballast kit. I buy from ebay for 30 bucks. They are oem in hubbell and scottsdale light.

I have a box of ignitor I bought off ebay for $7 a piece, I buy my capacitor from capacitor king for $12. Changing a whole ballast kit each time is not economical especially if you paid more than $50 for the kit.

 

[U Wash]

Not to get off topic with the first reply, but I went with T-5's and have never looked back. They are brighter than most metal halide washes in my area and don't lose nearly the luminescence over time that the metal halides do. If you start looking into additional lights, I would check them out, I have been really happy with their performance.

Good luck with your MH!

I also use the T'5s. They are great lighting. We put a metal halide on each side of the bay and T-5 flouresens in the front of the bay. We have pull in back out bays. But Guess what. After 2 years I am in the process of replacing a ballast. My fixtures are 8 foot with 2 sets of 4 foot bulbs.
Two of the bulbs are not lighting.

I found that my carwash distributor started with a mnufacturer who had two ballast in the fixture. However, after 2 years they went out of business and now they carry the same fixture with only one ballast for the two sets of lights. So if you have to replace ballast make sure you open it up and see what is needed. They shipped me the single ballast and of course they don't handle the old ballast for the one they shipped two years ago. I did find replacement ballast on line

 

[U Wash]

What watt is your metal halide. mine is 320 watt. I have one fixture that I change the ignitor every 2 years for some reason. a ballast kit compose of ballast, capacitor, and ignitor. I change ignitor first. half time this will fix problem. The over half of the time its is the capacitor. I only had 1 ballast fail in 8 years fail. I am a big fan of Advance ballast kit. I buy from ebay for 30 bucks. They are oem in hubbell and scottsdale light.

I have a box of ignitor I bought off ebay for $7 a piece, I buy my capacitor from capacitor king for $12. Changing a whole ballast kit each time is not economical especially if you paid more than $50 for the kit.

I am using 175 Watt metal halide bulbs. My fixture has a capacitor and a ballast. However, I am not familiar with an ignitor. Maybe that is used in higher wattage bulbs. Where do they go in the wiring pattern and I assume they help in starting the bulb to light. Are they possibly used with the pulse system?

I am also replacing the capicitor first. One of the reason I shipped both capitors and ballast to Hubbell, I was hoping they would tell me if it was the capacitor or ballast. However, with no answer I was never able to find out. I did get one to light again for several months by just changing the capacitor but then I finally had to put in a capacitor. I was also concerned because the replacement capacitors were different in style from the origianl OEM ones. So I was concerned the replacement capacitor would not work properly with the OEM ballast.

 

[Kevin James]

Our electrician loves the energy efficient T-5 fluorescent fixtures. He loves them because the ballasts only last about 2 to 3 years and then they need to be replaced, more service calls for him. They use a lot less power but they just don’t last.

We replaced all of our 175 watt metal Halide bulbs with fluorescent bulbs from 1000bulbs.com at the suggestion of “2Biz”, not a problem with them yet, but then it’s too early to tell.

The problem we found with the metal Halide lights is the bulbs punk out after about 8 – 12 months and need to be replaced.

I don’t know why your all PO’d at Hubbell. They are just like all the other companies, make a product as inexpensive as they possibly can to increase their profit margin. I don’t think Hubbell makes any of the components in there fixtures, I think they buy the least expensive components, subassemblies to assemble a fixture. As far as getting a return call, forget that, you’re not even a grain of sand in the road of Hubbell, if you had 500 fixtures then they’d probably do something but with only a few fixtures they’d tell you to call your distributor, that’s what he’s there for. Sorry if I’m harsh but that’s the reality of it.

 

[soapy]

Check out the new SSCWN that is currently being shipped out. It will explain how you can get your lights replaced at little or no cost.

 

[washnvac]

I replace they capacitor everytime I replace a MH bulb. This prolongs ballast life, and it keeps the light oupout like new. I get those at capacitorking.com. About $13-15 each. When I did not do this; the new bulbs were lasting less and less between changes.

I was very surprised when I read an article that said to change the capacitor at each bulb change. So I have been doing it, and I can honestly say it is well worth it.

 

[2Biz]

I started a thread in Feb. about converting my 175w Hubbel Fixtures to fluorescent bulbs from 1000bulbs.com as mentioned by Kevin James.

http://forum.autocareforum.com/showthread.php?t=6668

I'm now in the fifth month on the conversion and I haven't had a single failure. When I did the conversion, I was amazed at the damage the Metal Halide or Mercury Vapor bulbs did to the fixture, lens, and wiring. These bulbs put off a tremendous amount of heat. The heat is obviously hard on all the components in the fixture. After switching to the flourescent bulbs, the fixtures barely get warm to the touch.

I posted some pictures of my bays with both the Metal Halide bulbs and the "Daylight" flourescents I used for comparison. There is a huge difference in the quality of light let alone the savings I see every month from the conversion. I went from 2,100 watts plus the power consumed by the ballasts to 840 watts total after the conversion for 12 fixtures. Thats equates to a 60% savings in my light bill plus I'm getting more light from the flourescents.

Since you already have the Hubbel fixtures and to keep from having to change ballasts and capacitors regularly, maybe you might consider using the compact flourescents instead. Food for thought...

 

[I.B. Washincars]

I've changed out about 70 to the flourescents and agree with 2biz. So far I am tickled pink. I have about 14 more left to do. I had one bulb fail after one day, other than that no issues whatsoever. Takes about 15 minutes per fixture to do the conversion. It will probably take longer to get rid of all those used bulbs and ballasts than it did to change them all out.

 

[2Biz]

It took me a little longer than 15 minutes to convert some of my fixtures. Some of my supply wires were so brittle (from the heat) that just moving the wires cracked the insulation. On these fixtures, I had to pull new wires from the junction box in the attic. Something to watch out for....

 

[Earl Weiss]

Do the flourescents work at 30 degrees? How about 20 degrees?

 

[Earl Weiss]

For the conversion did you just wire direct bypassing the ballast and use a base converter - mogul to regular?

 

[MEP001]

There are a number of different brands and designs of CFL's that all have different minimum start temperatures. I've seen them as low as -20° F. Most of the larger ones are at least 0°F. I've always had a CFL for a porch light, a standard household type rated for 32°, but it always starts even down to 20. It's just weak for a couple minutes until it warms up inside the fixture, then it's fine.

AFAIK, there are no CFL conversion bulbs designed to run off a HID ballast since that would just waste electricity for no reason.

 

[I.B. Washincars]

For the conversion did you just wire direct bypassing the ballast and use a base converter - mogul to regular?

Yes, just wired the power directly to the socket. I didn't use a base converter. When searching 1000bulbs.com I narrowed down the search to mogul base bulbs only and found a 105W that would easily fit in my fixture.

 

[2Biz]

I ended up taking out the mogul base and rewiring in a standard base. It gave me an additional 1" of clearance in the fixture. Probably not necessary since the mounting arm can be bent to allow for extra clearance if needed.