How Do I Prevent A Blown Fuse ?

I currently live in an apartment in an old (1950's era) house. The whole apartment is on one circuit. I'm pretty sure that the wiring hasn't been changed since the house was built. I used to run (1) 250 watt MH fixture, (1) fan, (1) 2 foot fluorescent fixture, (2) 4 foot fluorescent fixtures, and (1) Phototron (the biggest one w/all of the lights) in my little vegetation room and (1) 400 watt HPS, (2) fans, and an aeroponic bubbler with a 30-60 gallon air pump(that I built myself) in my flowering room, plus a TV and a PC and monitor with no problems. Recently I decided to replace the 400 watt HPS with a 1000 watt HPS that I had in storage. But to do this without the circuit breaker constantly tripping I had to do some modifications. Now my setup is: (1) 250 watt MH, the 2 foot fluorescent fixture, a fan, and the Phototron in my vegetation room and a 1000 watt HPS, a fan, and the aeroponic bubbler in my flowering room, plus a TV and a PC and monitor. I disconnected the (2) 4 foot fluorescent fixtures. This set-up works pretty well. The only problem is if I turn the TV on while the grow room lights are on the circuit breaker trips. Once I flip the breaker switch back everything comes back on and stays on, unless I cut the TV off and then cut it on again while the 1000 watt is on. Is there a way around this? I have been looking into inverters, but how safe are these for indoor use? Any info or help would be greatly appreciated. I really don't want to take down the 1000.

a modern 15 amp circuit in good condition is maxed out at approx 1700 watts do the math... if u go to a 20 amp breaker without 20 amp wiring (12 gauge) u could burn down things.... have u considered using a couple of 42 watt daytime cfl's (equal to 150 watts each) in ur veg room

Move to a "MODERN" apt

You could put in another breaker with 12 wire, not much different from wiring any appliance. Simple as abc, black, white, green. Doesn't have to be permenent. VV

This is a tough situation to correct, unless you want to go through all the trouble of packing up the grow so you can bring an electrician in to upgrade the wiring--presuming that's even a possibility.

Note that you don't really want to be running a circuit in a building that old under such heavy load that you're tripping breakers just by flipping on one more minor appliance (unless your TV is a real beast.) IMHO you probably already had a problem even before you went to the 1000W, you just weren't up against the limits yet.

What's the inverter going to do for you? Let you run off of a stack of lead-acid batteries, charged during lights-out? That'd be a mess. Batteries are not happy or friendly to deal with, and your ballast wants house power. I'm not sure what trying to get starting current out of the inverter drawing on a battery array would be like. Grow rooms are complicated enough w/o hybridization with a submarine!

Edit:
Perhaps there are DC-DC ballasts out there that are a better match for working with a battery? So that you're not going Grid AC----> DC converter---->[Battery]---->AC inverter------>AC/DC ballast ---->Lamp, but rather just Grid AC--->DC converter--->[Battery]--->DC-DC ballast---->Lamp.

Still, I'd avoid it. Just managing and maintaining a battery array is a huge pain, even after you've worked out the hookups. There's acid/water levels to worry about in some configurations, outgassing issues with some batteries, etc.

If you can't be dissuaded, get to know the people on the forums at otherpower.com . They can help you design a battery bank that should work.

This is a place for full spectrum LED growlights. 28 watts each.

Add a dedicated 120V 20A circuit just for your grow room. This will give you a max of 20A x 120V= 2400W max out @ 80% = 1920Watts the extra 20% gives room for startup inrush current or if you have a 220V setup then add a circuit 220V x 15A = 3300W @80% = 2460W. This is more than ample to run the room of that size with room to spare. The electric bill will be the same no matter if 110V or 220V cause the meter is read in kW or kilowatts. This is the same thing as the V x A or Volts x Amps. Same, Same.

indoseedman said:

Add a dedicated 120V 20A circuit just for your grow room. This will give you a max of 20A x 120V= 2400W max out @ 80% = 1920Watts the extra 20% gives room for startup inrush current or if you have a 220V setup then add a circuit 220V x 15A = 3300W @80% = 2460W. This is more than ample to run the room of that size with room to spare. The electric bill will be the same no matter if 110V or 220V cause the meter is read in kW or kilowatts. This is the same thing as the V x A or Volts x Amps. Same, Same.

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How do I add a circuit? Is it something I can do myself? like flipping a switch or would an electrician have to come and re-wire the box so that the load is evenly distributed between (2) different circuits? BTW I realized that the whole level of the house in which I grow is on (1) 15 amp circuit. I've since switched back to the 400 watt but would "adding a (15 amp) circuit" allow me to run my 1000 watt? I really want to veg. with the 400 and flower with the 1000.

sometimes beggers cant be choosers man . i do just that kind of work for a living and itll cost ya a pretty penny to upgrade wiring to 12-2 or even 10-2. then again you can always diy. cfls sound liek your best bet. or move to a new place. a 1000w mh or hps ballast usually runs about 10-12 amps. 400w runs about 4-5.5 amps. add fans and everythign else and your way over. not to mention yer electr bill. if i could id help ya wire it all up . but for now just stick with the energy efficent smoke.

Wow I appreciate all of the advice. I guess I will just keep my current set up. I already added 3 more cfl's to my veg. chamber, so now it's: (1) 250 watt MH fixture, (1) 4' dual-bulb fluorescent fixture, (1) 2' dual-bulb fixture, (2) 65 watt cfl's (corkscrew type), and (1) 100 watt cfl (corkscrew type) in an area of 6'x5' and a 400 watt HPS fixture in my flowering area which is approx. 7'x7'. With the (2) fans, my PC, and my TV, I've had no tripped fuses. Will adding a 6' light rail to my flowering room really make a difference in terms of maximizing light coverage? And if there are any more improvement suggestions, please feel free to share them.

Be careful not to trip over but buy a heavy duty extension cord (12 awg) and run it to your grow room. Run it from a room not using a lot of electricity. Plug your computer and your tv into it. It is better for consumption and the electronics components in your room to be separate. If you do that, all of the power for that room can be for lights and fans. If you ever have a spike in the grow room, your computer and TV stays alive. You do the math. Add up all of the amperages of each light and compare to the breaker for that room.

indoseedman said:

Be careful not to trip over but buy a heavy duty extension cord (12 awg) and run it to your grow room. Run it from a room not using a lot of electricity. Plug your computer and your tv into it. It is better for consumption and the electronics components in your room to be separate. If you do that, all of the power for that room can be for lights and fans. If you ever have a spike in the grow room, your computer and TV stays alive. You do the math. Add up all of the amperages of each light and compare to the breaker for that room.

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Good idea. However, I'm trying to be inconspicuous. To run an extension cord from another room it would have to be run downstairs. I'm thinking my best bet is to just put the 400 on a mover and grow SOG from now on. I'm using 5.5" square containers now and am growing in an area of about 6.5'x6.5'. I'm not good at math so, if I'm putting 4 plants p.s.f. how many plants is that?