Lighting question

[strout]

Ok, what I have is a cabnet with a canopy, probably like any other ordnary canopy. My T5 lighting has two ballast for four lights two lights apiece. The ballast has two wires coming out of both ends that connect to the ends of the two lighting tubes, the tubes have two little connectors for each tube that screw into the canopy top from the bottom side of the canopy, that holds them in place. My question is : where is the best place to mount the ballast? Its not complicated attching the lights, the problem is that the cord coming out of the balast to the power outlet is kinda short, no way its going to reach the power outlet without using an extension cord or mounting some kind of power strip in the canopy, if you mount the balast on the back side of the cabnet close to the power outlet you wont have enough cord to reach each end of the tubes. I guess Iam missing something, anyone used this type of system before???

 

[Chris_A]

What brand of ballast? Some sell wire harness extentions. You could also cut the power plug and hard wire an extention onto it. Electrical tape and heat shrink tubing can be your friend .

Chris

 

[Lotus]

As far as I know, the ballasts shouldn't really be in the canopy (to reduce heat over the tank). Maybe mount them at the top of the inside of the stand?

 

[strout]

I was thinkin of mounting them on the canopy, on the outside back and running an extension cord up to the power plug. Who ever made this design, messed up a bit by not giving you enough wire to make it to your power outlet.