Sine Wave Dimmer

Light bulbs want trailing edge dimmers.

Sine wave dimmer.

Phase control is a dimming technique based on the electric wire that is often used for halogen and incandescent lamps. It clips part of the sine wave of the alternating current to dim the light. Our z wave compatible dimmer switches help control and automate the lighting in your home. This is useful for eliminating all filament noise caused by typical phase control dimmers.

The dimmer isn t a rheostat because a rheostat simply introduces series resistance with the load your device under test. Motors and power supplies elv halogen want leading edge. The effect of the rheostat would be to vary the amplitude of the sine wave but wouldn t alter it. A notable disadvantage of sinewave dimmers is that they don t interact well with led loads it s likely that sinewave dimmed leds won t dim at all.

This is because line voltage dimming leds react to the hard phase angle that s present in both forward and reverse phase dimming which sinewave dimmers were designed to eliminate. The benefits of the technology speak for themselves but the bottom line is always price and that is where the downfall of the sine wave dimmer lays. As flourescent lights need a minimum voltage and both compact flourescents and leds use electronics which rectifies the peak voltage provided a variable amplitude sine wave would fail to dim all of these types but in a slightly different way that the phase shift dimmer fails to dim them. Sinewave is more expensive but it can handle both motors and light bulbs.

Sine wave dimmers are more efficient then comparable ssr and scr dimmers they are able to operate much faster be much quieter and still achieve the same efficiency. The following examples will make this clear. The strand sst dimmer utilizes a micro controller to produce high frequency pulse width modulated con trol waveforms to the dimmer s igbt power switches. Shop our z wave dimmer switches below.

A forward phase triac dimmer cuts out a portion of the ac waveform at the leading edge of each half sine wave. On the contrary a reverse phase dimmer cuts out a portion of the ac waveform at the trailing edge in order that the dimmer turns off part way through the sine wave. A relatively new type of dimmer that uses high frequency typically 40 50 khz pulse width modulation to produce a pure amplitude modulated sine wave output. Z wave products offers a great selection of dimmer switches.

In addition since the sine wave dimmer draws current in a sine wave it does not produce harmonics. There are three main types of dimmers trailing edge leading edge and sine wave. A lamp in series in the circuit can be thought of as a rheostat set to a particular resistance.