Been reading the forums for a while now, Finally started to get on with the process. I decided to buy some fluorescent lights today. I decided to start with Fluorescent lights for the first week or so, then switch them to HPS. Now that I look back I cant really remember if this is a smart thing to do, or the right thing even. Some background info, im going to be "closet" growing I guess you could say. I just cant find anything for sale really at any of the local stores like lowes, home depot or walmart. The fluorescent lights I bought from home depot are a pain to setup, So im just going to return them and buy some other ones. I was wondering how most of you guys had your whole electrical system set up, do your lights use regular plugs that can plug into a wall or extension cable? Reason I ask, is my lights power cords look like this: http://img301.imageshack.us/img301/6286/img0004largeix0.jpg Im not electrically inclined, and have no clue what so ever what to do with this. Ive asked around and its a cieling light apparently, but no one could give me any information on making them into a plug. Should I not bother with these and just go ahead and buy different lights? For some people its probably easy, but im having a very tough time on finding the proper lights. I would prefer to not order them offline, but as a last resort I will. Any help is appreciated, Each store has so many different things to choose from and I dont know what to get exactly. Thanks.
Those wires are meant to be run directly into the house wiring, in the ceiling like a fan. You can buy an extension cord end from a hardware and that should work just fine I would think. It probably won't come with instructions, but there's only 3 wires. Wikipedia says that the wider blade is the neutral(negative), the thinner one the live(positive) and the ground is the round one (ya think?) As far as what lights to use...I'm only in this area to learn how to grow for next spring when I hope to start. Can't help ya there I'm sorry. Oh and I should put a disclaimer in here. I'm not an electrician, but I wire stuff anyway. I can't say 100% that this is right, but it makes damn good sense to me as far as I understand electrical wiring. If you explode, burn, or otherwise maim, injure or kill yourself I claim absolutely no responsibility.
You can buy light bars with cords attached at lowes (link). It is real simple to attach a normal plug to just about anything ment to be hard wired. I will do one for you right here. I have an out door lamp that is ment to be hard wired. I will now hook up a normal extension cord to it (it will be super safe). Here is a lamp I had in my first clone room. It did not come with that cord. What you need to buy for your lamp is an extension cord (12 or 14 gage), one strain relief cord connector, and three wire nuts for 10 to 18 gage wire. Almost anything electrical comes with a place to install a "strain relief". If not just get out the drill. Cut the receptacle end (female) off the extension cord. Strip the wires about a 1/4". and thread it through the stain relief. Push the wires through the hole in your lamp. Before connecting the wires, make sure to slip the strain relief's retainer nut (thin metal ring) over the wires and tighten it into place. This should hold the strain relief ridgid. Not everything requires a ground wire (green). This plastic lamp has none. If it was made of metal it would have one or I would attach the green wire anyplace on the metal housing with a screw. If its like this plastic one, just cut the wire off and out of the way. The wires will be color coded. Black, white, and green. attach alike colors by twisting the copper ends together. Push the twisted pair into the wire nut. Tighten the wire nut real tight. Give it a tug or two and make sure it's solid. No copper wire should show. After all wires are connected, take up the slack and tighten the outside cap of the strain relief by hand. Test it while standing in a metal tub of water<---Joking They make strain reliefs in metal and plastic and in a few sizes. Make sure your extension cord will thread through it before you buy it. I like the plastic ones with the round insides. Make sure the extension cords you use are good ones. Get them in 12 or 14 gage. It will say something like 3/12 on the package. 3 is the amount of wires and 12 is the gage. The lower the gage the thicker the wire. I hope this helps, R.