I've got one of the older Salvo 21W (wouldn't be surprised if some of the pieces come out of the H shop
). I started having problems, like leaking into the ballast compartment, which introduced water into the main wire. I striped one of the light head ballast compartment screws messing with it, and striped the gland threads. And finally the ballast went belly up. When I first started having issues, I sent it to Salvo, and Barry fixed the battery connection problem so it worked again, and suggested I dive it until it kicked, and then send it in for upgrade.
So finally it kicked. And I decided to try a DIY upgrade to a remote ballast light.
I replaced everything for $159.00. The only thing I kept from my original light was the canister, the reflector body/handle and the battery. I replaced the 24w Brightstar bulb, socket, cord, glands, 21w remote ballast head and the ballast/igniter.
I have no clue what I'm doing and my soldering sucks (not the best place to begin this level of project). But I have determination, a positive attitude and a friend to call for help who knows just a little more than I do.
The bulb came separate from the socket, so I glued the bulb into the socket using the high temperature red glue. Here is where I made my first mistake. The wire coming from the center of the bulb was so tight trying to push it through the socket hole that I just stripped the wire, ran the bear filament through the hole and sealed it with the red glue. More on this later.
I installed the igniter into the remote head and glued/potted it in with some 3m bi-component resin glue my dive buddy gave me that was perfect for the job (his work buys it by the case). The glue dried glossy and looked exactly like the glue that is already around the ballast and igniter. It poured in with a viscosity of just thicker than water, so to stop it from running down into the bulb socket tube, I put a dab of plumbers putty at the bottom of the light head and sealed the hole. Worked perfectly. The igniter is sealed and potted perfectly.
Then I measured and cut the carol cord. Putting the glands on was the hardest part of the job. They were so tight going onto the cord that it took me forever to work the pieces into place, even using some silicone for lube. Then I connected and soldered the igniter wires to the carol cord, screwed the light head-side gland into the light head end cap and glued it together with black, 100% non-acetic silicone. I screwed it together with SS 4-40 SS screws ($1.99 for a dozen at Radio Shack).
Then I really blew it. As I was going along on this project, and as I was doing each step of the job, I would "prove" my work by hooking the battery to the ballast to the igniter to the bulb to make sure the bulb would come on and everything was all good. So after I glued and screwed the carol cord/light head together, I wired up the battery to the battery side of the cord and the bulb to the bulb side.
And nothing happened. The light failed to ignite. I tested my battery with a meter, and it was fully charged. I figured that there must be a wire not connected inside the light head maybe when I glued it together something came apart. So I took everything apart. Cut the connectors, disassembled the whole thing (of course, the igniter is glued permanently into the light head).
And still the bulb didn't fire. I was distraught. :depressed: I just set it all down and went upstairs and sat. Crap! Either the bulb or the ballast must have failed. Then I thought, wait, not the ballast, but the igniter. And than I realized that I had been hooking the battery straight to the igniter and had totally forgotten the ballast! Duh!! How stupid of me. I hooked it all back up (including the ballast!) and it fired right up. So I had disassembled it for nothing.
I re-assembled it and retested it again (I was still just twisting the bulb wires to the wires coming from the socket tube. My plan was to wire in the bulb last). It fired right up.
I screwed the gland at the canister end of the cord into the can lid and wired in the ballast. I put shrink wrap around the ballast and wires to keep it all clean. But here was the issue. I have the large can and the NiMH 9ah battery, the tall one, and there was not room for the new remote ballast and the battery in the can. So, I figured I could buy a new Li-Ion battery pack, which is about ¼¿ the height, and have plenty of room for the ballast and battery. However, my friend suggest (to save $200.00), I could just take my 9ah battery apart and rebuild the batteries into two smaller battery packs. So I did.
I cut off the shrink wrap and cut apart the batteries by cutting the tabs. Then I re-wired in series the 20 batteries into 2 10-battery packs. I soldered wires to the cut tabs to re-connect the batteries, so it looks like some monstrosity, some Mickey Mouse bomb-like thing, but it works. Then I shrink-wrapped the 2 packs to hide the mess and hold it all together nice. Both batteries registered 14v.
Time to connect in the bulb. I connected/soldered in the bulb and turned it on. And it didn't light, but started arcing at the base of the bulb! :shocked2: I turned it off. Augh!! I pulled out the bulb, and where I had put the connectors on and heat-shrink around it all, there was just enough bare filament wire at the base of the bulb that the current was arcing. I realized that I should have left the wire insulation around the wire and worked it into the bulb socket hole in the first place. But it was glued in now, so too late to do much about that. So my solution was to use the red high-temp glue around the bare wires to create new wire insulation. That worked perfectly.
So I was finished. I filled my work sink and ran the light for 80 mins on the smaller, ½ sized battery (had to leave for work or I would have run it longer). While it was in the sink, I wiggled it and banged it all around a bit. It stayed lit perfectly. After the 80 mins, I put the battery on a meter and it had 12.5v, so I'm guessing I'll get about an hour and a half out of each battery. I'll want to buy a new Li-ion when I get the extra money. But in the mean time, I have 3 hours+ of dive time between the two batteries.
Thank you to Coldsmoke (Hunter) for all the phone help! And thanks to those who have posted enough DIY light stuff here and on thedecostop over the years that an all-thumbs amateur like me could muddle through this project. I figure I spent about $20.00 on various stuff, plus the $159.00 on parts, so the total rebuild cost me about $180.00.
). I started having problems, like leaking into the ballast compartment, which introduced water into the main wire. I striped one of the light head ballast compartment screws messing with it, and striped the gland threads. And finally the ballast went belly up. When I first started having issues, I sent it to Salvo, and Barry fixed the battery connection problem so it worked again, and suggested I dive it until it kicked, and then send it in for upgrade.So finally it kicked. And I decided to try a DIY upgrade to a remote ballast light.
I replaced everything for $159.00. The only thing I kept from my original light was the canister, the reflector body/handle and the battery. I replaced the 24w Brightstar bulb, socket, cord, glands, 21w remote ballast head and the ballast/igniter.
I have no clue what I'm doing and my soldering sucks (not the best place to begin this level of project). But I have determination, a positive attitude and a friend to call for help who knows just a little more than I do.
The bulb came separate from the socket, so I glued the bulb into the socket using the high temperature red glue. Here is where I made my first mistake. The wire coming from the center of the bulb was so tight trying to push it through the socket hole that I just stripped the wire, ran the bear filament through the hole and sealed it with the red glue. More on this later.
I installed the igniter into the remote head and glued/potted it in with some 3m bi-component resin glue my dive buddy gave me that was perfect for the job (his work buys it by the case). The glue dried glossy and looked exactly like the glue that is already around the ballast and igniter. It poured in with a viscosity of just thicker than water, so to stop it from running down into the bulb socket tube, I put a dab of plumbers putty at the bottom of the light head and sealed the hole. Worked perfectly. The igniter is sealed and potted perfectly.
Then I measured and cut the carol cord. Putting the glands on was the hardest part of the job. They were so tight going onto the cord that it took me forever to work the pieces into place, even using some silicone for lube. Then I connected and soldered the igniter wires to the carol cord, screwed the light head-side gland into the light head end cap and glued it together with black, 100% non-acetic silicone. I screwed it together with SS 4-40 SS screws ($1.99 for a dozen at Radio Shack).
Then I really blew it. As I was going along on this project, and as I was doing each step of the job, I would "prove" my work by hooking the battery to the ballast to the igniter to the bulb to make sure the bulb would come on and everything was all good. So after I glued and screwed the carol cord/light head together, I wired up the battery to the battery side of the cord and the bulb to the bulb side.
And nothing happened. The light failed to ignite. I tested my battery with a meter, and it was fully charged. I figured that there must be a wire not connected inside the light head maybe when I glued it together something came apart. So I took everything apart. Cut the connectors, disassembled the whole thing (of course, the igniter is glued permanently into the light head).
And still the bulb didn't fire. I was distraught. :depressed: I just set it all down and went upstairs and sat. Crap! Either the bulb or the ballast must have failed. Then I thought, wait, not the ballast, but the igniter. And than I realized that I had been hooking the battery straight to the igniter and had totally forgotten the ballast! Duh!! How stupid of me. I hooked it all back up (including the ballast!) and it fired right up. So I had disassembled it for nothing.
I re-assembled it and retested it again (I was still just twisting the bulb wires to the wires coming from the socket tube. My plan was to wire in the bulb last). It fired right up.
I screwed the gland at the canister end of the cord into the can lid and wired in the ballast. I put shrink wrap around the ballast and wires to keep it all clean. But here was the issue. I have the large can and the NiMH 9ah battery, the tall one, and there was not room for the new remote ballast and the battery in the can. So, I figured I could buy a new Li-Ion battery pack, which is about ¼¿ the height, and have plenty of room for the ballast and battery. However, my friend suggest (to save $200.00), I could just take my 9ah battery apart and rebuild the batteries into two smaller battery packs. So I did.
I cut off the shrink wrap and cut apart the batteries by cutting the tabs. Then I re-wired in series the 20 batteries into 2 10-battery packs. I soldered wires to the cut tabs to re-connect the batteries, so it looks like some monstrosity, some Mickey Mouse bomb-like thing, but it works. Then I shrink-wrapped the 2 packs to hide the mess and hold it all together nice. Both batteries registered 14v.
Time to connect in the bulb. I connected/soldered in the bulb and turned it on. And it didn't light, but started arcing at the base of the bulb! :shocked2: I turned it off. Augh!! I pulled out the bulb, and where I had put the connectors on and heat-shrink around it all, there was just enough bare filament wire at the base of the bulb that the current was arcing. I realized that I should have left the wire insulation around the wire and worked it into the bulb socket hole in the first place. But it was glued in now, so too late to do much about that. So my solution was to use the red high-temp glue around the bare wires to create new wire insulation. That worked perfectly.
So I was finished. I filled my work sink and ran the light for 80 mins on the smaller, ½ sized battery (had to leave for work or I would have run it longer). While it was in the sink, I wiggled it and banged it all around a bit. It stayed lit perfectly. After the 80 mins, I put the battery on a meter and it had 12.5v, so I'm guessing I'll get about an hour and a half out of each battery. I'll want to buy a new Li-ion when I get the extra money. But in the mean time, I have 3 hours+ of dive time between the two batteries.
Thank you to Coldsmoke (Hunter) for all the phone help! And thanks to those who have posted enough DIY light stuff here and on thedecostop over the years that an all-thumbs amateur like me could muddle through this project. I figure I spent about $20.00 on various stuff, plus the $159.00 on parts, so the total rebuild cost me about $180.00.
