heat alert?

This is the light and the ballast I have.(400 watt hps) It is the first time I will use it. I am growing in a closet 5ft high 3ft wide and 3 1/2 ft deep. I put the light on 7am this morning and by 11am the hood was roasting hot and the ballast itself was pretty warm. I understood they would get hot but is the ballast itself ok to get that warm? Do I need fans blowing directly on ballast and hood. Just seemed like that stuff was awful warm. I know the room needs vented but do I need the hood vented somehow or am I too worried?

Fans blowing directly on as well...

What was or is the pemperature in the room?

maybe a cooltube with relector & inline fan

this is completely normal. and if you put an exhaust fan close to the light it'll benefit your plants more..blowing on a light just moves the heat around.

The temp got down to @ 68 last night and within 4 hrs it was up to almost 88. That is with me occasionally opening the door to cool. If I have 1 fan blowing new air in, one above the light exausting air out and a small fan blowing on the light is that enough? I just dont want any sort of fire hazard. Or do I also need a fan on the ballast. Is it ok to have the ballast close to the wall? From the pic does it look ok to stand the ballast up? I could also leave the back of the closet open to vent heat as the closet I am in goes to a crawlspace. Sorry if these are silly ?'s.

can we see a picture of your cabinet with everything in it?

You should be venting cool air from the bottom of the cabinet and expelling the hot air from the top of the cabinet.

This is my space. I have the oscillating fan, a fan above the light and have just been leaving the back of the space open a bit to pull air out. do I need another fan here as well. Temps have been @ 82 with the light only on for 2 hrs now. I also came home today to find the lighs had not come on! They went w/o light for 7 hrs. Do I just leave the light on the remaining 5 hrs or leave it on a full 12 hrs thus making my light schedule change? Thanks for your help!

Take off the ballast outside if you can. And don't worry it's heat is normal. My ballast keeps constant temperature of 70-80 degrees celsius. This is about 160F.