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01-29-2007, 05:33 PM
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#1
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4 Rivet Member
2007 27' Safari FB SE
Tracy
, California
Join Date: Jan 2007
Posts: 321
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Dimmer for halogen lights
We will be a lot of boondocking and I would like to install some means to dim the many Halogen lights without creating a lot of wasted battery life. Has anyone done this with halogens?
John
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01-29-2007, 08:12 PM
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#2
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Rivet Master
2007 23' Safari SE
San Diego
, California
Join Date: Apr 2006
Posts: 1,495
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01-29-2007, 09:36 PM
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#3
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418
2007 25' Safari FB SE
1958 22' Flying Cloud
1974 29' Ambassador
Yucca Valley
, California
Join Date: Jun 2002
Location: 1963 26' Overlander
Posts: 4,804
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Quote:
Originally Posted by altamont
We will be a lot of boondocking and I would like to install some means to dim the many Halogen lights without creating a lot of wasted battery life. Has anyone done this with halogens?
John
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John,
Swego.com - Space Saving COMPACT APPLIANCES and more! has dimmers for 12V lights.
Consider this, though:
many of the older Airstream light fixtures employed several 20W bulbs, often 4 or more in a single fixture. One of your lights is only 10W, so 4 of them use no more energy then a pair of the old reading lights in a 70's Tradewind, for example. Just because they're nice and bright does not mean they waste energy.
Even at that, our single battery lasted easily for several days.
The real battery killers are furnaces, 12V TVs, and the use of fans etc.
A few halogen lights won't draw a healthy battery down hardly at all.
As an alternative, you might consider installing small toggle switches next to each light fixture, so that you can turn off unwanted lights and further save energy.
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01-30-2007, 05:20 AM
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#5
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Rivet Master
Commercial Member
Vintage Kin Owner
Naples
, Florida
Join Date: Dec 2005
Posts: 7,508
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Electronic dimmers
John,
There are few dimmers that you can use, but be sure that they are the electronic type. All of the others, while dimming the lights, will still be drawing the same load as a fully lit lamp and and converting the residual voltage to wasted heat. The electronic versions won't do that. They ARE expensive, but worth it.....generally in the $50-70 range.
Quote:
Originally Posted by altamont
We will be a lot of boondocking and I would like to install some means to dim the many Halogen lights without creating a lot of wasted battery life. Has anyone done this with halogens?
John
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__________________
lewster
Solar Tech Energy Systems, Inc.
Victron Solar Components and Inverters, Zamp Solar Panels, LiFeBlue and Battle Born Lithium Batteries, Lifeline AGM Batteries
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01-30-2007, 06:34 AM
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#6
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Rivet Master
1977 27' Overlander
1954 25' Cruiser
1990 34.5' Airstream 345
VC Highlands
, Nevada
Join Date: Mar 2005
Posts: 2,151
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You can buy the kits on ebay for about $10 and build them yourself. They will run up to 25 watts but if you put a heatsink on them, they will go higher. You can mount this in a little box if you want. Full instructions are included with these kite. They are real easy to build. I put mine together in about 15 minutes.
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02-01-2007, 08:37 AM
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#7
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Rivet Master
2014 27' Flying Cloud
Viera
, Florida
Join Date: Oct 2006
Posts: 1,296
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If you have to install a heatsink, then the switch itself is consuming power and converting it to heat that needs to be dissipated. The electronic dimmers I have in my home get warm when in use, so either way (electronic or resistive) you're loosing energy in the switch. If you really want to conserve power, Uwe's suggestion of adding switches is probably the way to go.
Randy
__________________
Randy & Pat Godfrey
Florida Airstream Club (027)
ACI# 1212 - AIR# 17017
2014 27FB Flying Cloud - SilverCabin II
2018 F-150 Platinum - unnamed
The best part of any trip is when you pull away from home.
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02-01-2007, 08:19 PM
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#8
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Rivet Master
Commercial Member
Vintage Kin Owner
Naples
, Florida
Join Date: Dec 2005
Posts: 7,508
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-or-
You could forget the dimmers anad go all LED or partial LED just for boondocking. Lots of light with almost no current draw. (so bright you'll need these ).
__________________
lewster
Solar Tech Energy Systems, Inc.
Victron Solar Components and Inverters, Zamp Solar Panels, LiFeBlue and Battle Born Lithium Batteries, Lifeline AGM Batteries
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02-01-2007, 08:57 PM
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#9
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Rivet Master
1977 27' Overlander
1954 25' Cruiser
1990 34.5' Airstream 345
VC Highlands
, Nevada
Join Date: Mar 2005
Posts: 2,151
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Quote:
Originally Posted by rgodfrey
If you have to install a heatsink, then the switch itself is consuming power and converting it to heat that needs to be dissipated. The electronic dimmers I have in my home get warm when in use, so either way (electronic or resistive) you're loosing energy in the switch. If you really want to conserve power, Uwe's suggestion of adding switches is probably the way to go.
Randy
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Well, actually - the dimmers I have run the full 30 watts and do not get warm. However if you want to run more the 30 watts then a heatsync would be necessary.
The reason is that thyristors, once warm, can experience thermo runaway.
Say for example if you have 50 watts that you are trying to control and you dim that down to 25 watts, you may build up 2 to 3 watts of heat energy in the thyristor. It is not a lot but it is enough to heat up the chip and cause it to fail. But it really represents only a small percentage of the total wattage.
Lamp dimmers for halogen lamps typically are controlling between 300 to 500 watts and they do get warm, but not too warm that they can not be touched.
PWM dimmers are the most efficient way to control lighting. On a side note I have burned up 2 switches on overhead lighting in our 77. Those will be replaced with PWM dimmers as well and another great thing, they can really help expand your boondocking abilities. We go for a week and have zero problems.
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02-01-2007, 09:19 PM
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#10
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4 Rivet Member
2007 27' Safari FB SE
Tracy
, California
Join Date: Jan 2007
Posts: 321
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I am leaning toward replacing all the halogens with LED's. Wattage is unknown so I will need to do some investigating. As we really don't use the overheads to read by, I think this is a good plan.
Where can I get LED replacements?
Thanks to all.
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02-01-2007, 11:09 PM
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#11
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Rivet Master
1977 27' Overlander
1954 25' Cruiser
1990 34.5' Airstream 345
VC Highlands
, Nevada
Join Date: Mar 2005
Posts: 2,151
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if I may offer - I did a lighting test comparing LED lighting to Incandescent lighting. The test results can be seen here.
Overlander '77 | LED Lighting Test #1 | LED Lamp Test Jan-06
Final result - I have given up for now on LED Lighting because the color of the light is not TOO bright and it is so cold in color that it made it feel like I was in an ice cave, not a comfortable trailer.
I have a new approach which I hope to implement and document soon which involves swapping out each of my 18 watt, 1156 base incandescent bulbs with 5 aqnd 10 watt halogen bulb sockets and lamps. This alone will cut the incandescent by half and will still allow us to have the warm light we both enjoy. That will also be coupled with the dimmers I mentioned above for additional savings.
As a second, Compact Fluorescent is a great alternative to incandescent lighting of any kind. It is still cold in color but nowhere near as cold as the LED Lighting.
I have even tested the newer "warm light" led's and still find them to be cold in color.
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02-02-2007, 07:41 AM
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#12
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Always Airstreaming!
2005 22' Safari
1960 24' Tradewind
Anytown
, Connecticut
Join Date: Oct 2006
Posts: 3,115
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Check these folks out, they have some pretty cool stuff:
12 Volt Dimmers - D1201
__________________
J. Rick Cipot
Sandi Gould
NEU New England Unit
Airstream Life Magazine
Proud Member of WBCCI
WBCCI #3411
AIR #17099
2009 Silverado 2500HD
2004 22' Safari
1960 24' Tradewind
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02-02-2007, 05:21 PM
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#13
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4 Rivet Member
2007 27' Safari FB SE
Tracy
, California
Join Date: Jan 2007
Posts: 321
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Thanks RickandSandi, this looks like the ticket.
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02-02-2007, 08:18 PM
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#14
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Rivet Master
Airstream - Other
2016 Interstate Grand Tour Ext
Bosque Farms
, New Mexico
Join Date: Jan 2004
Posts: 7,026
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Just don't buy one made by Lucas (Prince of Darkness, well known to drivers of British sports cars). I had a, well, VERY smoky experience with the light dimmer in our MGB ...
Lynn
__________________
ACI Big Red Number 21043
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02-03-2007, 09:36 AM
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#15
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Rivet Master
Some Place with a German Name
, Texas
Join Date: Jun 2005
Posts: 908
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Altamont, I have a thread discussion LED retrofit of the ceiling mounted CCD style halogens. I have been quite pleased with their battery savings while boondocking.
http://www.airforums.com/forum...ens-17392.html
Also, consider replacing your remaining 10W bulbs with 5W bulbs. Other have reported the the difference in light output was not noticable.
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02-03-2007, 01:56 PM
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#16
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4 Rivet Member
2007 27' Safari FB SE
Tracy
, California
Join Date: Jan 2007
Posts: 321
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Why do the British drink warm beer? Their refridgerators are made by Lucas Electric. I used to have an old Triumph TR6.
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02-03-2007, 03:19 PM
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#17
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Rivet Master
1976 Argosy 24
now being enjoyed by Heath and Mary in
, Vermont
Join Date: Sep 2005
Posts: 1,432
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Dimmers for the New Argosy
I bought the Frilight Swedish dimmers recommended by RickandSandi.
They are very cool looking and seem to be well made but one of them was defective, right out of the package.
We’ll now see whether the seller, importer or manufacturer will stand behind the fairly expensive product.
The good one is trick looking and smooth operating.
Sergei
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02-03-2007, 03:53 PM
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#18
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3 Rivet Member
1964 24' Tradewind
Big Bear Lake
, California
Join Date: Aug 2004
Posts: 184
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Pretty Cool
[quote=Buttercup]if I may offer - I did a lighting test comparing LED lighting to Incandescent lighting. The test results can be seen here.
Overlander '77 | LED Lighting Test #1 | LED Lamp Test Jan-06
Final result - I have given up for now on LED Lighting because the color of the light is not TOO bright and it is so cold in color that it made it feel like I was in an ice cave, not a comfortable trailer.
Buttercup,
I won't say if my 2cents here actually relates to dimmers, but I used an 1141 LED in amber, to replace my porch light so the lense won't melt. Got it at PepBoys, and its more orange than amber. Also I thought the 1141 incandesent bulbs are a bit less wattage than 1152, so there would be a wattage savings there. I also believe that there are now LEDs that have been warmed up in color to get closer to the incandesent glow. I think your web site is very nicely done and is really an act of kindness for those of us out here in need of a good reference. Your lighting experiments really illustrate well the examples you choose at the time to compare. Thanks for the enightenment!
Ed
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02-03-2007, 05:22 PM
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#19
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Rivet Master
Join Date: Mar 2002
Posts: 1,486
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Re: Lucas electrical. I once had a Morris Minor. The entire electrical system consisted of headlights, taillights, four bulbs in the instrument cluster, and a fan for the heater. This car had four electrical fires while I owned it. Considering how seldom I could get it to run at all, this is quite a statement.
My understanding of the halogen cycle is that the bulb has to heat up to its design operating temperature to condense a black film that otherwise will coat the entire interior of the lamp - including the inner face of the lens. I know from experience that an extended period of low voltage will cause this film to affix itself permanently, greatly reducing light output. Question: how does a dimmer circuit avoid this problem with halogens?
Mark
__________________
'85 Sovereign, 25'
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02-06-2007, 11:02 PM
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#20
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Rivet Master
1977 27' Overlander
1954 25' Cruiser
1990 34.5' Airstream 345
VC Highlands
, Nevada
Join Date: Mar 2005
Posts: 2,151
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Quote:
Originally Posted by j54mark
My understanding of the halogen cycle is that the bulb has to heat up to its design operating temperature to condense a black film that otherwise will coat the entire interior of the lamp - including the inner face of the lens. I know from experience that an extended period of low voltage will cause this film to affix itself permanently, greatly reducing light output. Question: how does a dimmer circuit avoid this problem with halogens?
Mark
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You are correct but in the end it may not really matter...
Quote:
dimming does not increase lamp life throughout the entire range, as in the case of ordinary tungsten lamps. The relationship between lamp voltage and lamp life is only applicable within 5% - 10% of the rated voltage. The reason is that when the voltage is lowered, the halogen corrodes the colder parts of the filament, which counters the decreased evaporation rate of the tungsten. Lamps are designed to control the cycle, so that nominal lamp life is always (roughly) obtained, however the lamp is dimmed.
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Yes you may build up some deposits but in my case I will take that alternative living with increased boondocking ability and replace the bulb when needed. In the end it is the boondocking I am after and dimming greatly expands that for me. Although the lamps do build up some deposits at lower temperatures, I have been running for nearly 3 rears now with the same bulbs and have minimal deposits that I can see. I think it is a give and take.
BTW - I just found on ebay a 20 amp, 12 volt dimmer circuit which will control over 200 watts. Again - a little soldering and you are in business. Only $12 for the kit or $24 for the completed unit (you provide the case)
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