Sup guys is a ballast the same thing as the inverter just another name for it?????

 

They basically do the same function which is convert one type of voltage to another here are some examples.

Ballast
Used to convert house voltage i.e. 120 volt AC to voltage required to run a High Pressure Sodium or Metal Halide grow lamp(the big, bright bulbs)

Inverter
Used to plug into your cigarette lighter in your car or any 12 volt power source so you can hook up regular household appliances. I.e. The blender in the toyota matrix commercial(or was that a pontiac vibe??? i forget)

Hope that helps.

 

In a HID setup it uses both though. The inverter takes 12 Volts DC and changes it to AC, then the Ballast can step up the voltage by a couple thousand for consumption by your Bulbs. A conventional balast (or transformer) needs AC (alternating current from the inverter) to work.

 

Thanks guys one questions which one should i buy? the dealer said my inverter is blown because my hid's on the drivers side isn't woring. Which one should i buy inverter or ballasts? Their are some ballasts on sale on ebay if they will fix my problem then i wanna buy those, but will they? THanks

 

Being an electrian i think im qualified to answer this .. a ballast,transformer,inverter they are all diff names for the same thing. They take voltage and convert ....weather it be a step up or a step down.As for the hid ballast its 12v DC in and its step up to 400-600v DC out .... some hid kits have a built in inverter and some have a seperate inverter the purpose of the inverter is to boost the voltage slightly upon start up to bring the xenon lamp to full brightness in less time.