Hi,

I have two identical 220vac lamp dimmers capable of a 500W load.

The one is coupled to an incandescent lamp sequence of 14 x 40W = 560W and although over the top has worked perfectly for 3 years.

Recently I took the other identical dimmer, still unused, and coupled this to a 250W Halogen Spot light. It acts like a strobe with intervals of about 1 second and fails to reach any significant brightness.

Do these dimmers not power halogen type loads?

Regards
Andrew

 

Halogen needs time to charge up to full brightness I believe

 

Ha, let me rig a normal incandescent and see what happens. Why am I always wrong .

 

OK connected dimmer to normal 100W incandescent lamp and it still slowly pulses. I have to assume that the dimmer is faulty, would this be a fair assumption?

 

Yup!

 

OK connected dimmer to normal 100W incandescent lamp and it still slowly pulses. I have to assume that the dimmer is faulty, would this be a fair assumption?

As a point of interest, it's (barely) possible that the thyristor was damaged by the 250W lamp's inrush demand (altered triacs, for instance, occasionally exhibit high 'on impedance' with corollary 'on state' heating and (significant) transient alteration in triggering characteristics.

That said the unit was probably 'DOA' as you surmise...


Best regards
HP

 

I would agree it could be faulty, Being a 500w version, was this originally intended for power tool control?
If so did you try on something of this nature?
Max.

 

Halogen needs time to charge up to full brightness I believe

Halogen lamps have a tungsten filament, the same as a standard incandescent lamp, so they have similar turn-on characteristics, although halogen lamps run at a hotter filament temperature, so they may have a lower cold resistance, hence higher start-up surge current, for the same lamp wattage.
Otherwise the main difference is the gas in the bulb.

 

Thanks chaps. Will get a new one tomorrow.