Flourescent Header Cable

[Sean McClellan]

I'm in the process of making some flourescents and I'm trying to figure out a system of wire from my remote ballast to my light. I've been trying to figure out a way to make a header cable. (To control all 4 bulbs withough havig to run 4 seperate cables and connectors) If anyone has had any experience with building a header cable or has any knowledge on the subject please let me know.

Thanks

 

[Andrew Brinkhaus]

Alternatives to the traditional kino made header cable?

 

[Cool Lights]

Well we'd have to know a lot more about what bulbs and ballasts you're planning on using. I've done a lot of DIY fluorescent projects and I never used a remote ballast because its such a pain and I don't see the advantage. I know some people love to tape tubes to the ceiling but I never thought it was a good idea so I don't do it.

The 55w tubes which are commonly used have up to 4 wires per bulb so that means you're running as many as 16 wires between the remote ballast and the light unit. Some ballasts have less outputs than others so yours may not require the 16. A fulham ballast which is very good only has about 3 wires out so you need some jumpers at the end where the sockets are to make it work.

http://www.fulham.com/Detail_Ballasts.php?ID=WH5-120-L

On the other hand, an advance ballast has 6 wires.

http://advancetransformer.com/uploads/resources/EL-2070-R02.pdf

Some of the ballasts I've seen here in China have 7 or 8 wire terminals.

In addition, the voltage going across there is much higher than you think so you need 18 gauge / 600v rated solid core hookup wire as per spec of most ballasts. That kind of wire doesn't make for such a great multi-wire cable when you consider flexibility and being able to roll it up and all that. So you'd need to find a multiwire cable with enough conductors in it to handle all the wires coming from your ballasts (2 ballasts for 4 bulbs). Next you have switching on/off. The switching is only done on the input side of the ballast. You can't safely switch the output voltage going to the tubes, only the line voltage coming into the ballast. That's why most fixtures switch two tubes on/off at a time. Otherwise it takes 1 ballast per bulb and that's more expensive.

Then after you consider all this, you still need a good multiconductor cable that will handle the voltage, connect securely on both ends, etc. It's not such an easy problem to solve. These connectors are typically round and have a screw on lock. If you use the fulham ballasts (2) then you need 7 wires going from the remote to the "head". 6 for the ballasts and 1 extra for a case ground. So thats a 7 conductor round secure connector you have to find somewhere. If you use the advance ballast you need a 13 connector (12 for ballasts and 1 for ground).