# Stealing used ballast



## Jlarson (Jun 28, 2009)

We just take them to the recyclers as is, the one we use has a price for motors, ballasts and transformers, I would assume others out there do the same. Hence the ballast theft.


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## HARRY304E (Sep 15, 2010)

gold said:


> I got a bunch of these retrofits (t12 to t8) for a franchise and we put the old ballast and bulbs behind the store for a truck to pick them up and recycle them at the end of the night. Some of the stores are in not-so-great neighborhoods and the local homeless have been stealing the old ballast as fast as we can stack them. It has me curious if there stealing them what are they doing with them, is there some market for used ballast or are they just ripping them apart for whatever core value they have like some small internal copper windings or something?



The ballasts have copper coils in them:thumbup:


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## gold (Feb 15, 2008)

Jlarson said:


> We just take them to the recyclers as is, the one we use has a price for motors, ballasts and transformers, I would assume others out there do the same. Hence the ballast theft.


thanks
I thought you couldn't recycle the 8' t12 ballast because of the PCBs


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## 220/221 (Sep 25, 2007)

It's really difficult to harvest the copper from a ballast like that. I've tried.

Balasts for two 8' T12's are getting scarce around here. We may have to start retrofitting soon.


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## Jlarson (Jun 28, 2009)

gold said:


> thanks
> I thought you couldn't recycle the 8' t12 ballast because of the PCBs


I bet china doesn't give a flying f*ck about that. That's probably where the vast majority of them will end up no matter what.


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## Magnettica (Jan 23, 2007)

gold said:


> I got a bunch of these retrofits (t12 to t8) for a franchise and we put the old ballast and bulbs behind the store for a truck to pick them up and recycle them at the end of the night. Some of the stores are in not-so-great neighborhoods and the local homeless have been stealing the old ballast as fast as we can stack them. It has me curious if there stealing them what are they doing with them, is there some market for used ballast or are they just ripping them apart for whatever core value they have like some small internal copper windings or something?


Maybe they're smoking the PCB's.


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## etb (Sep 8, 2010)

I wasn't in on this but a friend's EC got the bid for retrofit of an entire college campus. I don't know how they had the authority but the EPA was going to stiff them millions per year if they didn't retrofit so they did. EPA didn't seem to care that the ballasts were thrown into the dumpster, but they did require all the leads to be cut flush so they couldn't be wired up again.


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## MDShunk (Jan 7, 2007)

If someone was stealing your trash, essentially, I'd just put a check mark in the "problem solved" column and not worry about it. 

I worked for a company a good many years ago that sent us to Hermasillo Mexico to tear out some machinery and bring it back to the US. The plant was fenced in, and any least little bit of trash we sat outside of the fence was taken by the locals. It was almost like free garbage service. Pallets, torn out pipe and wire scraps, floor sweepings, crating material cutoffs... every bit of it would be snatched up if we piled it outside the fence.


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## Greenblinker (Aug 4, 2008)

I am currently on a T12 to T8 conversion job for some schools. One of my partners has been saving the ballasts for his neighbor that just scrapped his own A.C.. To my understanding the guy is getting 6-10 cents per pound on the ballasts. Not worth the time or gas money to me but people value there own time differently.


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## MDShunk (Jan 7, 2007)

Greenblinker said:


> Not worth the time or gas money to me but people value there own time differently.


You got that right, and I'm pretty happy about it. I carry two business cards from two different scrap metal men. I can call either one of them and normally have them on a jobsite in less than an hour to take away all the low value stuff I don't want to mess with. That normally means steel and "mixed metal scrap", like machinery, ballasts, and motors. Normally, I'd just throw a little bit of that type of stuff on my own truck, but if I have a bunch, I'll call one of the scrap metal guys. Every town in the USA probably has a few that trawl the area in broken down pickups being driven by greasy men with three teeth.


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## Greenblinker (Aug 4, 2008)

MDShunk said:


> I'll call one of the scrap metal guys. Every town in the USA probably has a few that trawl the area in broken down pickups being driven by greasy men with three teeth.


We've got one on this job that picks up all the old fixtures. I don't know how he does it, but he fits at least 18 -8' long 2 lamp fluorescent ice cube tray fixtures in the back of his ranger every day. Thats with the lenses separated from the fixture too . I don't think I could fit all those in my silverado even if I had a trailer. He says he gets about $120 per load, probably eating steak every day now...


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## Dennis Alwon (May 9, 2009)

unless those ballasts are very old they don't have pcb in them.


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## brian john (Mar 11, 2007)

My brother worked with a guy, that took them home, burnt them sde a sawzall and seperated components for the copper and steel.

I say go for it we should recycle as much copper and aluminum as possible.


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## wwilson174 (Apr 25, 2008)

When I worked around the steel industry years ago I watched them load the charging cars for the open hearth furnaces with scrap iron , including things like motors , transformers and ballasts. In the open hearth process the meldors needed to add copper , cobalt and other additives to achieve the specific kind of result they wanted, which was usually high quality steel for making tools and guns and such. The metallurgists would take samples during the melding process and instruct the meldors to add whatever they needed to achieve their desired result. So the copper that was in those motors and things was used without a difficult retrieval process. BillW'


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## danickstr (Mar 21, 2010)

a resourceful homeless guy could theoretically burn the black coating off of the ballast (releasing nasty black smoke) to get at the copper. 

I am sort of guessing he wouldn't care about the environmental impact, so placing such items in the hands of thieves may not be the most responsible thing to do.


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## Mr. Sparkle (Jan 27, 2009)

MDShunk said:


> You got that right, and I'm pretty happy about it. I carry two business cards from two different scrap metal men. I can call either one of them and normally have them on a jobsite in less than an hour to take away all the low value stuff I don't want to mess with. That normally means steel and "mixed metal scrap", like machinery, ballasts, and motors. Normally, I'd just throw a little bit of that type of stuff on my own truck, but if I have a bunch, I'll call one of the scrap metal guys. Every town in the USA probably has a few that trawl the area in broken down pickups being driven by greasy men with three teeth.


Yeah I am pretty sure one of them stole my lawnmower last week. I left it outside my fence overnight by mistake, woke up in the morning and it was gone.

I live on a dead end and the only non local traffic we get are municipal vehicles and scrappers.


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## John Valdes (May 17, 2007)

I would like to come up on some T-12 ballasts in the trash. I would take every one of them. My basement has six 8' fixtures and one is always out because of a magnetic ballast.
Whats the deal on the conversion to T-8? Same tombstones? Just rewire? I know the electronic ballast was double the price. I can still buy new T-12 ballasts. I think?


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## danickstr (Mar 21, 2010)

since the part after T = 1/8th of an inch, I would imagine the t-8 (1") pin spacing would be thinner than the t-12 (1 1/2"), although I haven't ever tried it.


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## Jim Port (Oct 1, 2007)

Same pin spacing, just a different tube diameter.


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## Podagrower (Mar 16, 2008)

John Valdes said:


> I would like to come up on some T-12 ballasts in the trash. I would take every one of them. My basement has six 8' fixtures and one is always out because of a magnetic ballast.
> Whats the deal on the conversion to T-8? Same tombstones? Just rewire? I know the electronic ballast was double the price. I can still buy new T-12 ballasts. I think?


Tombstone for electronic ballast is typically shunted (internal shunt has 1 wire connection, external shunt has a jumper wire). Electronic ballast has 3 wires for tombstone instead of 6. To reuse the old tombstones, simply hook up both wires from your existing tombstone to the one wire from the new ballast.

Sounds way more complicated than it is.


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## Podagrower (Mar 16, 2008)

I started a little remodel job this week, and while stripping fluorescent fixtures (have to provide written documentation of proper disposal), I noticed the ballast had never been changed on many of the fixtures. It's an old building, so I started looking for "No PCB" on the ballasts, not there. That means they are pretty old, so I start looking. Date code stamped (I mean imprinted with tools, not ink stamped) 1 70. Yep, 40 year old ballasts, still in operation.


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## Control Freak (Mar 8, 2008)

They dont make things like they used to :whistling2::whistling2:


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## Greenblinker (Aug 4, 2008)

Podagrower said:


> I started a little remodel job this week, and while stripping fluorescent fixtures (have to provide written documentation of proper disposal), I noticed the ballast had never been changed on many of the fixtures. It's an old building, so I started looking for "No PCB" on the ballasts, not there. That means they are pretty old, so I start looking. Date code stamped (I mean imprinted with tools, not ink stamped) 1 70. Yep, 40 year old ballasts, still in operation.


I've been finding the same things at the schools we are currently at. Manufacturers info is Stamped onto the ballasts with no mention of PCBs. I'm used to the usual Advanced/Universal brand ballasts but I've been removing alot of General Electrics, Solas? and even a few Motorolas. I've seen GEs before but never heard of Sola and never new Motorola was in the lighting business.


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## John Valdes (May 17, 2007)

Podagrower said:


> Tombstone for electronic ballast is typically shunted (internal shunt has 1 wire connection, external shunt has a jumper wire). Electronic ballast has 3 wires for tombstone instead of 6. To reuse the old tombstones, simply hook up both wires from your existing tombstone to the one wire from the new ballast.
> 
> Sounds way more complicated than it is.


No problem with the wiring as the wiring scheme is on both ballasts. What advantage is there to the electronic ballast? If they last twice as long as magnetic then okay. I guess if I have to use electronic that's okay too. Just more money. Thanks


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## tam (Oct 21, 2008)

HARRY304E said:


> The ballasts have copper coils in them:thumbup:


do you recall how much? and the difficulty of opening it up?


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## bobelectric (Feb 24, 2007)

Copper was a lot more 2 years ago!


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## user4818 (Jan 15, 2009)

I took some T12 ballasts to the scrapyard once. They told me I can throw them in the dumpster outside.


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## Celtic (Nov 19, 2007)




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## Theriot (Aug 27, 2011)

Just did a job where I replace fourty two lights. Left the old ones there one night and they are gone. This was just yesterday. The GC is lolling into it. Our deal was I keep them. I use Thea for GCs. I put whips on them for temp lights in other jobs. Works well, I don't have to keep replacing temp lights or the GC doesn't have to buy them. If some gets messed up oh well they were free and I'll get more.


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## HARRY304E (Sep 15, 2010)

tam said:


> do you recall how much? and the difficulty of opening it up?


There is a small copper coil in them and you can pry them open with a screw driver but I really don't think it is worth the time.


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## 347sparky (May 14, 2012)

John Valdes said:


> I would like to come up on some T-12 ballasts in the trash. I would take every one of them. My basement has six 8' fixtures and one is always out because of a magnetic ballast.
> Whats the deal on the conversion to T-8? Same tombstones? Just rewire? I know the electronic ballast was double the price. I can still buy new T-12 ballasts. I think?


 
Did some conversions from t-12 to t-8 8' fixtures in a truck shop. Same tombstones, single pin, just rewire like it shows on the diagram. Its a little different. If you had the option a 4 lamp 8' fixture works better, less length to fire the lamps.


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## pudge565 (Dec 8, 2007)

My neighbor used to bring old ballasts home from work and burn them. He then took the copper and scraped it.


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## freeagnt54 (Aug 6, 2008)

John Valdes said:


> I would like to come up on some T-12 ballasts in the trash. I would take every one of them. My basement has six 8' fixtures and one is always out because of a magnetic ballast.
> Whats the deal on the conversion to T-8? Same tombstones? Just rewire? I know the electronic ballast was double the price. I can still buy new T-12 ballasts. I think?



How much are you getting 4 lamp t8s for? I think you can get them for $8-$12 depending on your buying power at the supply house (homedepot is like $13-$14 last I checked. 

They sell retrofit kits to convert 8ft t12 to a 4 lamp t8 it has tombstones, tombstone plates, and ballast cover. I'm not sure how much they run but I have installed hundreds of them.


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