The electricity in my apt is constantly dimming all my lights around the entire apt like a faint very light flicker/dimming. It happens about 20 -30 times a minute. Its like a blink of an eye dimming or surge.

I had a ballast burn out on me the other day. Could this be the cauze of my ballast burning out?
If I wasnt in the room when the ballast started smoking ALOT..would the electricity arch and the ballast blowup or catch fire...!!!????? Would it trip the breaker before it caught fire?
Would this flickering cauze the ballasts to overheat trying to control the electric flow?

I have alot of questions about this subject and growing. So please... if your an electrician please, please, please, help me.
TYVM!

not an electrician but can sure bump it up for your safety

[Tyga]

I think that it might have to do with some sort of voltage drop...Not pisitive though. Hopefully one of the sparky's will chime their thoughts in.

have u tried shuttin equipment down .. 1 at a time.. to see if its just using too much power? or 1 at a time to fin out maybe if 1 of the things plugged in is causing this? ill bump also.. but id try to shut down things that take alot of power. and see if its still happening....

mainly check the plug that burned hte ballast out!!! take off the cover.. make sure theres not any melted wire and shit man .. this sounds if its sagging .. but .. usually because a bad connection or wire or something!

wouldnt take this lightly man u dont wana come home to the cops and fire department fucking u up.

Ive gotten advice from you all and I appreciate the time and concern but I need these specific q's answered:

1) - If I wasnt there to shut the ballast off when it was smoking would the ballast just stop working or would it continue to run electricity through it until it arched or exploded or something?


2) - Why didnt the breaker trip as soon as this happened shutting down the lights?

3) -All the lights do it in the downstairs neighbors house too. Its just a slight flicker or dimming that is fast like a blink of an eye but it happens constantly. Can this burn out a ballast?

what u are describing sounds likes a surge or something called i thing a sag.. in the electricity..

umm the ballast thing.. is a wierd question.. it really depends on y it started smoking.. and honestly.. if ur breaker didntgo while that was smoking and shit.. id go get those things with six plugs.. and a little circuit breaker so that if something happens and ur circuit breaker doesnt trip.. the one on the plug should!! just like how most ACs have the little box with the fuse in it !..


i had a 400w ballast start smoking and the thing ran fine it was wierd.. so we just didnt use it. i opened it up.. to find.. a loose wire and burned wire.. replaced the wiring of the entire ballast and wala shes back up and going..

dude open the ballast up! and see what the issue was..

and if u can keep the ballasts outside of the grow room this will keep the life going longer..

i recently helped a friend build a box around a shelf on his shelving unit with panda film.. and ducting to make the box keep the heat from ballasts going straight out the exhaust instead of heating up the room im trying to cool..

another thing.. do alarm clocks need to be reset.. or clocks on stoves and shit or is it only flickering just lights? or can u see or hear flickering withing everything u plug in or what? more details needed to help man.

could also be a lose connection coming from the main power line..

bad transformer close to ur house!..

lose connections in the breaker panel..!

i mean.. this could be anything from too much power being used in the house itself... or a lose or bad connection outside the houose.. but seeing as its happenin to ur neighbors.. sounds like u should ask ur other neighbors if its happening in surrounding houses its probably outside ur houose.. if its just ur building or house or whatever.. then atleast u can start to narrow it down!

Flickering lights are almost always caused by a poor connection somewhere in the circuit. If lights flicker when you turn on a switch, the problem is probably in the switch, but if all the lights in a room or a part of the house flicker, you may have a bad connection at the panel or a faulty circuit breaker. If you are familiar with the circuit and know that some lights on it are operating normally, look for a loose connection somewhere along the line. It will probably be accompanied by arcing, which will blacken wires and may create a burning smell.

Read more: Strange House Electrical Malfunctions | eHow.com https://www.ehow.com/info_8351209_str...#ixzz23GVFDm6a

[ItGrowsHerb]

Had a transformer on a pole go bad nearby and it caused the weirdest things. The next door neighbors fuse panel outside was hot but not tripping, my tv would fluctuate on and off, things ran at different speeds.. it was as if a variac had set the voltages upwards differently. If I can recall my multimeter showed 160 volts?

Took a day and a night to get it swapped out. No power for the meantime. I wasnt growing so it was just an odd evening, mostly sittiing outside with the neighbors in the nighttime heat watching a power co. guy assess stuff...