Hey Guys:
Don't know if anyone is outfitting their garage or shop with lights or not, but here's a little something worth passing along.
I needed to replace 4 of my 0 degree shop lights yesterday and took a look at what Home Depot had. Of course, they had shop lights that were packaged as 0 degree start and they were around $25 or $28 or so. Then I took a look at their bargain shop lights - at the urging of the electrical department associate. We opened one up and looked at the ballast and it was rated at 0 degree Celsius (14 degree F). Price - $ 8.53.
So, I bought 4 of them and figured that even if these were units with ballasts which did not meet spec, I could bring them back and spend the extra money. If not, I'd be money ahead. Well - they work just fine up here in the greater Syracuse NY winter temperature. It's not hovering around zero, but it's cold enough that my fluorescents which are not cold start ballasts, struggle to fire up. So - it appears that these are a great bargain for a cold start unit, as long as you don't need the -20 degree fixtures.
Watch out though because they have a couple of economy units on the shelves. The one you want is SKU 732-334. The other units are not cold starts.
Hope this helps...