New grower with equipment problem.

[D Rock]

Hello all. I am a new grower with a bit of a problem. I have a Hydrotek hood with a hydrotek ballast that supports a 1000 watt HPS bulb. When I first started growing my bulb was real bright and making the plants grow all fast but now it takes forever to flicker on and then when it is warmed up and as bright as its going to get its at like 25% power. The bulb is only a couple of months old. I bought the equip ment off a guy and they were new in the box none of it had been opened. He bought the stuff in a hydroponics store in texas and had extra so sold me some of his equipment so its not like he was purposely selling me faulty equipment. Here is my question do you think it could be just a bulb problem or a igniter problem in the ballast how do I tell what exactly is causing it to not fully power the bulb?

[kinky19777]

Sounds to me like the igniter....I would start there. If you are just determined its the bulb get a nice grow bulb that way if thats not the problem you got a spare...

[D Rock]

Originally Posted by kinky19777

Sounds to me like the igniter....I would start there. If you are just determined its the bulb get a nice grow bulb that way if thats not the problem you got a spare...

Thats what i was going to do today. But a igniter how hard is that to replace?

[D Rock]

Well I bought another bulb but its still not working. Guess i will call hydrotek and see if they can replace my igniter.

[D Rock]

Well I jusst talked to sharon at hydrotek and she said it sounded like the capacitor to her. Told me to send the capacitor and the igniter and they would replace both. Now thats customer service. Didnt ask if i had a receipt or when I bought it they just took care of the problem. Awesome!

[D Rock]

Well I just overnighted the ignitor and the capacitor to hydrotek and have since moved my plants outside hope they do ok.