Knock from Cable Company, HID causing spikes

Hi, this morning i had a knock from cable company, guy told me there are spikes coming from the house, he traced it right to my property. I started my grow 2 days ago, 2 600w HID on right now. grow is in basement. router upstairs.

How can I stop this? Ballasts are digital. Im trying to read up on tapes and wraps to shield the waves radiating or whatever is happening but its all over whelming right now wondering if someone can help me and tell me some clear solutions I can do. Right now ballasts are mounted screwed into basement ceiling. I can try moving the ballasts maybe down near the ground? Any help would be great thanks!!

Just info, not suggestion you have louzy house wiring.

Found this old post. Might help


also this article.

Just read that whole thread, thanks for help guys. after lots reading and calling to my local hydro dude, seems magnetic ballasts is way to go, sucks because i almost bought them as thats what ive always used but thought this time digital would be a nice change, NOT.

Just had this happen as well a couple of days ago. Are you in the Denver area?

Comcast stopped by and said there are spikes coming from my property. We are out of town so I have been tripping a bit about it. My wife called and they said it was from outside and wanted to check. They said the spikes are around when my lights come on.

May I ask what brand ballast you purchased?

The ballast has a wire that connects it to the lamp. This wire acts as an antenna. So Gavita for example puts the ballast right on the reflector and the connection to the bulb is short and shielded by the grounded metal housing (faraday cage)

They sell the ferrite bead things that you put on the ends of the wire to the lamp and thats supposed to help, never tried it.

Back when the lumatek ballasts first came out (silver ones) I had some and they were terrible about RF. I used shielded cable to wire the lamp sockets to the ballast, with the shield grounded.

If all else fails then you are stuck with the magnetic ballasts or perhaps the square wave HPS ballast by hortilux i think it was their platinum, if you can find them.

I had a similar issue with my cable company. They knew i was growing from the interference but didnt really care just wanted to fix the issue. Turns out I had the cable line coming from the exterior crossing right over one of my ballast cords. Every day at 6pm the neighborhood would have their cable fucked up lol.

Sure seems like the cable companies would have some sorta RF filter in the loop to stop this from happening.

Renfro said:

Sure seems like the cable companies would have some sorta RF filter in the loop to stop this from happening.

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Cant filter it out if its in the same frequency range as their signals.

Harmonics. And digital anything has the most.

Had this happen. Worst feeling ever. Switched to ballasts that have internal RF protection (phantom 2) and the problem was fixed.

I know galaxy ballasts also have it.

It's your high frequency digital ballast. The RF field creates interference with your cable signal and in fact will travel back up the cable and affect everyone else on the same loop.

You'll need a different ballast, 315W CMH (low frequency ballast) or LED.

Had that happen to me way back and switched back to magnetic. I think it has to do with how old your cable wires are and if they're sheilded. The cable co will upgrade them sometimes.

Gemtree said:

Had that happen to me way back and switched back to magnetic. I think it has to do with how old your cable wires are and if they're sheilded. The cable co will upgrade them sometimes.

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No, it's because electronic ballasts run at very high frequencies which interfere with cable signals.

ttystikk said:

No, it's because electronic ballasts run at very high frequencies which interfere with cable signals.

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Yea which run through cable lines

Had the cable guy come last year and it turns out their stuff is shielded. The line going to my modem was loose and letting interference in.
He tightened it up and it's been fine ever since.

I was out of town last week and had the cable company stop by. They left a note saying I was having ingress interference between the hours of six and six and it was causing an outage for others.

I have all phantom 2 ballasts which should be RF shielded. I did rewire my 50 amp breaker and I wonder if I messed something up there.This spot has been running for 5 years with no trouble.

I am thinking I am going to have to wait the 4 weeks I have left before I have them reconnect the cable. Anyone have any ideas?

nurrgle said:

I was out of town last week and had the cable company stop by. They left a note saying I was having ingress interference between the hours of six and six and it was causing an outage for others.

I have all phantom 2 ballasts which should be RF shielded. I did rewire my 50 amp breaker and I wonder if I messed something up there.This spot has been running for 5 years with no trouble.

I am thinking I am going to have to wait the 4 weeks I have left before I have them reconnect the cable. Anyone have any ideas?

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Maybe one of the ballasts has had a protection failure?

If you fucked up the ground on the breaker rewire then the protection may not be able to function. Something to check.

I checked the wiring to my beaker and found the ground wire was pretty loose, I just pulled it out of the bus. Fixed that, going to do an am radio test to see if that fixed anything. If not then I guess I better start digging through the storage shed for some magnetic ballasts.

Do you think the ground being loose could have caused the issue?