# HPS lights in water ?



## Cosson-Gigs (Dec 12, 2012)

Went floundering the other night and found the water really murky, I couldn't see even with my 250 HPS light so I shut if off and let it cool down then lowered the front HPS light in the water and was able to see about a 4 to 6 foot area. Just wondering if anyone has tried the HPS bulbs directly in the water like the oldtimers used to do with the 12 volt 1,000 lumen bulb ? I did some experimenting with the HPS today, took a 100 watt HPS bulb sealed the bulb into the socket and put it in a 5 gal. bucket of water running it on an Inverter and 12 volt deep cycle battery and it ran 3 hours just fine, I turned it off after 3 hours, It may have run an hour or more ?


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## Five Prongs Of Fury (Apr 15, 2008)

I wonder how long four 150's would run on an inverter with 2-3 deep cycles?


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## Gnwdad (Oct 14, 2007)

Five Prongs Of Fury said:


> I wonder how long four 150's would run on an inverter with 2-3 deep cycles?


 
I tried it with two inverters from Harbor Freight, less than an hour with 2 batteries.


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## Cosson-Gigs (Dec 12, 2012)

Five Prongs Of Fury said:


> I wonder how long four 150's would run on an inverter with 2-3 deep cycles?


Not sure ? but the question i have is will you need 4 lights ? when you place just the one 100 HPS bulb without a housing you get 360 coverage ? The bulb I put into the bucket of water ran 3 hours and with 2 batteries it should run 6 ? which would do me just fine, I have the Honda gen. but just tolling with the idea. All I know is that when I put my front 250 light in the water , 'which is inside a sealed housing' I could see twice as good, but it doesn't shine a 360 like the old hand held 12 volt bulbs. I figured maybe the 100 HPS bulb in the water with a ground fault plug would do the job of a 250?? I may make a hand held one and test it some time ???


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## Flounder9.75 (Sep 28, 2007)

If you get the more head waterproof socket and do a remote ballast it should work just fine


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## flounderslayerman (Jun 3, 2011)

Could be something to check out. I have a few 150's with busted housings I could use to see what I could come up with.


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## Cosson-Gigs (Dec 12, 2012)

Flounder9.75 said:


> If you get the more head waterproof socket and do a remote ballast it should work just fine


 My front HPS light 250 watt, I put the ballast in a sealed box in the boat and ran a ground fault plug between the ballast and the light, it is in a sealed housing and I can run it out of the water , which is what I normally do, but in very stained water conditions where I couldn't see dropping the light down on the water made a considerable difference, Seemed like If I shinned the light straight down was the best, tried shinning it out to the front but it didn't work as well.


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## Benw86 (Aug 16, 2011)

What size inverter did you use?


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## Cosson-Gigs (Dec 12, 2012)

Benw86 said:


> What size inverter did you use?


 I used a 1,000 watt inverter but found that It wouldn't shut down when shorted out by placing the wires going to the bulb in salt water, I'm sure an immediate wire short would have shut it down, we also tried a smaller 400 watt inverter that had a built in shut down when detecting a short, we stuck the wires going to the bulb into a cup of salt water to make sure it was safe and it shut down immediately, so I'd make sure you test it and make sure it is safe, I was told the secondary side of the ballast runs 1,300 to 1,500 volts and about 2 amps, it wouldn't be fun to get a hold of that! we ran the single 100 watt HPS bulb tapped up half way just like the old 12 volt street light bulbs, in a bucket of water "the bare bulb" sealed, and using a heavy duty equipment battery it ran 9 hours. I still use the Honda Gen. but some friends that didn't want to buy the Honda, wanted to try at least the one single HPS bulb. Maybe someone will test one out fishing one night? Just got ta make sure its SAFE ! :001_huh: by the way, a ground fault plug would not trip the circuit when we tried using it for safety, and we wired it on the 120 side and the ballast side , no difference ?


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## Benw86 (Aug 16, 2011)

Ok so I'm running 6 of the walmart 12 volt lights and one old school 12 volt street light (the street light is way brighter than the walmart deals) on 3 deep cycles. I would like to switch to the hps lights but i cant afford a quiet gen. Would 2 100w lights be better than what I'm running now? And where can I find ballasts and bulbs? and what kind of ballasts? I live in Defuniak... Lowes? Ace? Walmart?


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