Be very careful when playing with T8 lamps and instant start electronic ballasts. There have been documented fires caused by mis-wiring of T8 equipped fixtures.
You must enure that the pins are shorted together. If you do not have shorting sockets then short the conductors going to the socket together. Not doing so has caused at least one fire, that we know of, in a Canadian jurisdiction. The fire was caused by charring of the tubes due to excessive heating of the lamp cathodes due to high current.
My jurisdiction, I am a regional electrical inspector in the Canadian Territory of Nunavut, has published a "Notice to Industry" on this issue. The notice was based on material found at the following URL.
http://www.nema.org/DocUploads/6B81894E-B05A-4BC9-AE0FC329416AB252/lsd_2.pdf Edited...
I just tried the link and NEMA has moved the document. Anyone want it? Send me a message and I will send you the "Notice to Industry" we published on this issue.
[This message has been edited by Rick Kelly (edited 03-03-2006).]
