How about once it was outside in open air?

You could smell the fixture from the street lol. The garage stunk for about a week. We tried to leave the overhead door open as much as possible to air out the garage (we left it open when we were home during the day and closed it whenever we left the house or at night). Normally we always keep the door closed unless we're backing the car out or pulling it in.

I had to say things like "Oh my god....geez....wow...sheesh!" reading that! That's intense!

Lol yeah it was a heavy-on-the-lungs chemically smell that clung to EVERYTHING. We'd get in the car and go to the store, come out of the store, get in the car, and we'd smell the PCB and tar scent in the car! (We wouldn't notice it going to the store since the garage stunk really bad and we would get used to the scent but coming out of the store and getting back into the car, you'd smell the chemically smell again.

I SWEAR someone wiped off the light and car, but my dad didn't do it and no one else could have. The weirdest part is that I found a towel with wet black fluid on it and it smelled like PCBs!!!! But my dad said he didn't wipe up anything and I know he didn't because he would have gone ape-sh!t crazy if he saw a drop of tar on the car. Actually, I never told my parents, but there was a drop of tar on the car but fortunately the PCB oils kept it thin and runny so it wiped right off. Plus the car is black so it blended in. But the side of the reflector looked as if it were wiped clean. That light was toast though.

I salvaged the starters and two lamp sockets off the light and stuck them in a plastic bag and they still stink because they're in the bag! It's my way of preserving the smell to show others lol. It smells the same way but it doesn't have that lung-gripping affect that leaves you lightheaded. I actually had to take a couple breaks trying to remove the light because I thought I'd pass out on the ladder. The garage door has to be closed to remove the fixture because on end is above the door when the door is opened. So the smell was trapped in the garage. So I unplugged it on one trip, removed the lamps on another trip, and then pressed the button to open the garage and quickly unhooked it before the door opened all the way and ran to the yard with it. Then I opened it up and just gasped at what I saw inside (you know, since you saw the pics ) Then I put the reflector back on the fixture and put it at the curb. Then a scrapper came and took the light for scrap just as I planned (since trash pickup won't take anything not in a barrel) I got a pair of bolt cutters and chopped the cord off from the outside of the fixture (didn't unwire the cord and take it off in once piece since the whole inside of the fixture was covered in PCB oil, so I just chopped the cord off just outside the fixture to reuse it on a new light). In fact, the Harmony House fixture from my grandpa's shop has the same lamps and cord as the long-john did! I forget if I used the starters from the long-john fixture or if I used the ones that were in the fixture.

Wow, that's amazing! I'm sure it was a freak thing, but still...where my PCB ballasts are in use that whole room (in fact, the whole 2nd story of the house) would have to be gutted!

Wow! If the fixture is wired for 120V what is the voltage at the 277V tap when the power is on?

277v. This means you can use a multitap HID ballast as a step up transformer, I've done it before (I had a 400w MH ballast rigged for 120>277v at one point. Just don't exceed what the ballast is rated for (in my case, 400w).
Not sure if the reverse is true (like 277v>120v) but I imagine it is. Maybe I should try it...

Yes, it is. Highbays that have those quartz restrike things actually run of 120V (the quartz lamp is powered at 120V, from the unused 120V tap from the highbay. There is a relay involved somewhere too.)

Okay I never knew that before either! Interesting!

Yeah I found that really interesting too! I read it off an Advance ballast guide packet. Man, those things are full of typos but they have some really great information in them too!

I like the little instruction sheets that come with the current Advance electronic ballasts.

Cool I always wondered how come most low/high bay fixtures instruction sheet said something to the effect "120V input tap may be used for a incandescent auxiliary lamp 100 Watts Maximum" Now I know why
But how does that work? I mean how does the ballast know that the HID lamp is not lit? I have never seen both lit only when the HID is either dead/EOL or the after a power interruption and the aux lamp will go out when the HID lamp re-strikes

I believe with most designs, the halogen restrike is switched by a current sensor that monitors the ballast current to determine whether or not the lamp has lit.

Yeah Advance calls it a "relay switching device" (well not an exact quote, but that's pretty much what they called it) that monitors the ballast current like Joe mentioned. So when a PSMH lamp is EOL and failing to strike, the quartz restrike may be lit. I've seen that in a supermarket that was built in the mid-2000s but they had replaced all the highbays (acrylic reflector highbays with open bottoms) with T5 fixtures with 6 or 8 lamps before they ever even relamped any of the PSMH fixtures. What a waste. They kept the T8 troffers at the entrances and bathrooms T8 and kept the outdoor recessed 2X2 canopy lights PSMH and parking lot lights PSMH too.

Yeah, it would be pretty neat to have a fixture to mes around that has a halogen restrike though. Wonder how much one of those relays would cost.

Not sure but you could easily wire the incandescent restrike lamps to a switch and just turn on the switch manually lol. Defeats the purpose of being automatic though lol. And I'd rather use fluorescents in conjunction with the HIDs.

Heh, I thought of wiring the incandescent or maybe even LED restrike lamp to a one of those button PCs for a cheap way to get a automatic restike lamp.

LOL Only thing is though that with the thermal PCs, they take about 30 seconds of darkness to turn on the load, so you won't have instant light. I've thought about the same thing too though.

I remember I had one that was the opposite, it defaulted to on so it took 30 seconds of light for it to turn off. I guess that one would work.

Yeah but that's after power is applied. If the Mh lamp is keeping the photocell off, it will take about 30 seconds for the photocell to turn on the incandescent after the MH lamp goes out. If you had a switch and didn't turn it on until the MHs go out it would work but then you wouldn't need the PCs and would have to shut off the switch until the next power interruption.