Street Lights = Grow Lights?

[*Wintergreen*]

It strikes me that the vast majority of municipal street lights are either high pressure sodium vapor, metal halide, or mercury vapor, making them perfect grow lights for any illegitimate or legit hydro one could potentially dream up. A high quality grow light can cost upwards of $300, which is a fare amount when you need six or seven. Any thoughts on whether "borrowing" street lights is worth the trouble?

-*Wintergreen*

[wrench352]

Your going to cut down six or seven streetlights?This sounds like something out of The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers.Your smokin too much of your product.This is the stupidest thing I've read this year.

[krickman]

I use a streat lamp in my cacti growing chamber... Works perfect! And it dident cost me anything... :-)

The reason i have the streat lamp is that i was walking in a park after a big storm and the wind had blown down one of the armatures and the bulb was not damaged... Lucky me... So i thougth that i culd do somethin fun with it and i did... I use the 50W HPS in combination with a 30W LE

Maby i am stupid but it works fine for me :-) hehe

[tom haggen]

Dude if think you can use a mercury vapor light to grow vegitation you need a slap in the face. Also, If you don't know the correct time to use a metal hallide and an hps light than you will fuck your plant up.

[powdermunkey]

The forum you want for this discussion is at www.hempcultivation.com. This site is for explosives.

[Bert]

For North Americans, the main problem will be that street light ballasts are usualy 240 - 270 V and house current is 110 V. The electric company prefers to run as small gauge wire as possible-

[tom haggen]

Ya the Europeans are crazy for running such high voltage thru their light sockets. I personally like running 110v its much safer.

[Anthony]

240v is just as safe as 110v - as long as you don't lick it...

[FragmentedSanity]

Look - if your talking 6 or 7 lights your talking about a big grow. Big grows have many risks as it is - do you really want to add the hassle and risks of stealing the lights then wiring them up yourself?
The HPS and Metal Halide lamps can be used for growing - and if you happen to find an old street light you can buy legally they make for cheap grow lights.
As said this isnt really the forum to discuss growing - there are thousands of those. The only advice I have is that if you are planning a big grow - dont scrimp on the setup - getting that right is the first step to staying out of jail. Also note that a street light isnt compareable to a high quality grow lamp - but it can be used as a cheap substitute if need be.

[powdermunkey]

WTF does this have to do with explosives or weapons, anyway???

[Mumble]

There is a reason this is in the Water Cooler section. It doesn't fit elsewhere(tools maybe), but still is a nice conversation. It has to do with science and electricity so I see no reason for it not to be here.

[vulture]

Ya the Europeans are crazy for running such high voltage thru their light sockets. I personally like running 110v its much safer.


Not really true. It's mainly the amperage that kills, not the voltage. Stun guns have 50 000V for example, yet few die of exposure.

Short circuiting a 50A 12V car battery with your body will easily kill you. 0,1A at 240V will just give you a shock.

The european system is thus actually safer, because let's assume you're draining 100W from the net. In the US, the current would have to reach 0,9A to deliver that power. In Europe, only 0,42A would be required.

[tom haggen]

That is true. However, It takes a High voltage stream of electircity to carry a high amperage current. That gives high voltage electricity a much greater potential to have a very hazdous current. I know I said I thought your high voltage electricity is crazy. But truth be told its probably a better system. High voltage electricity is much more effecient and can carry electricity for long distances. Also the americans have a way of doing every thing back ass wards from the rest of the world. This reminds me I ran across an old shop light that I scored from a hippe and it sucks cause its setup to run with 480v electricity. I have looked into it and i'm trying to salvaging it cause its a damm good hps light that i scored pretty much for free. does anyone know if there is some kind of way to get something cheap(20-30$ not over 50) so I can run this light. I hope its not a 3-phase light i'm not sure though.

[grendel23]

I agree that the amount of current is what determines the severity of a shock, but it is the voltage, along with the resistance of the skin that determines the current.
Clean dry skin has maybe 50K ohms of resistance, at 120V that means 2.5MA of current, enough to startle you, but not really hurt, 240V means 5MA, that hurts quite a bit more but is not dangerous.
It gets scary if the resistance of the skin is lowered by water, dirt, salt, or because the skin has been punctured by an arc, inside the skin people are bags of salty water and conduct very well.I had a friend who received a nasty shock from 24VAC because his hands were wet with photo fixer.
Devices such as stun guns are current limited, if you were shocked by 50KV that was not current limited you would probably not survive.
For some reason DC seems to hurt worse than 60Hz AC, 190VDC from a motor controller will knock you on your ass.
tom haggen, I am sure your light is single phase, but it will not be cheap to convert your light to run on whatever voltage is used in your country. Your choices are a transformer to change the voltage, but power transformers are expensive, or a new ballast, look for a good deal from a salvage or surplus dealer.

[a_bab]

"Short circuiting a 50A 12V car battery with your body will easily kill you. 0,1A at 240V will just give you a shock."

Vulture, you are right (somehow) about the fact that the amperage matters. Actually, is the power absorbed by the body which is killing. Power equals with the amperage multiplied by the voltage.

On a side note, there is no way by getting killed by a car battery by the means of short circuiting it with the body. As grendel23 said, the resistance of the human body is far too big for any amperage to develop when one would short circuit the car battery. 50A 12V car battery means that the battery is able to deliver 50 amps and 12 V, but not that if you touch the connectors you'll get 50 amps in your body. In order to get this amount of intensity a far higher voltage is needed to beat the resistance of the skin. You can short circuit the connectors ans nothing will happend, even when wet.

[Blackhawk]

Especially if you use the backs of your hands like you should when investigating any possible live connections, seeing as they have a higher resistance than your palms and the reflex actions of your muscles will pull your hand away from what you are touching not towards it.

[Jacks Complete]

I have to disagree. Although 32 volts is generally accepted as the max. that is sure to be safe, 12 volts can kill. I got a shock off a 12volt car battery, when I was touching one terminal, my friend was on the other terminal, and I put my hand on his shoulder. We were both thrown backwards, hard.

It should never have happened, but it did!

A guy at work stuck a screwdriver into the 240 light socket, and the RCD saved him, but he bent the screwdriver to about 85 degrees, and he swears it took a few seconds to be able to let go.

Electricity is a weird one. It harms few people, according to the hospital records. This is due to it being the coroner that gets called, or the victim gets up almost unhurt a few moments later...

[tom haggen]

You must have fell into the fucking twilght zone to get such a shock from a 12volt battery.

[Jacks Complete]

Yes, it was pretty weird. We had both done the same sort of thing many times before. We were heating a thin bit of welding wire to red heat, and cutting up plastic stuff, IIRC. I suppose it could have been the inductive kick off it, but I remember the wire was pretty straight. The trick was to tap the wire against the terminal, so it didn't just melt the wire in two, whilst holding the part outside the current path. I bet it was the spark from the induction that broke down a current path, then threw us backwards.

It was a long time ago, now, at least 15 years...

Weird shit.

[tom haggen]

It sounds like some kind of transformer effect. I thought transformers only worked with ac current though. Either way sounds like you guys must have been bored.