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Building: Brownie points to put it back together
posted on 22/4/17 at 05:50 PM
240v relay for floodlight
OK...Fitted a new floodlight to the garage. Old one worked fine, coming on only on demand.
New one is LED and there appears to be enough current leakage from the light on the switch to just about trigger the LEDs but not enough to power them
up for more than an instant. Hence light flashes every second or 2.
Disconnected the switch and the problem has gone away.....so definitely the source of the problem....
I'd like to keep the little light on the over-ride switch if possible (any surgery to the switch will necessitate replacement, I think as
it's sealed and the plugs covering the screw holes won't come out without being damaged in the process..
Will a mains relay solve my problems? concerned that the leakage will be enough to trigger the relay, also....
If it will, please could you point me in the right direction?
If no luck, I'll just go out and buy a new switch and disconnect the little red light.
if its a conventional 'red light' on the switch, then that would be a neon, with a resistor, from switched live to neutral so
should not cause a problem
however, you can get induced currents depending on the wiring layout.
one solution is to put a small 'tungstan' bulb (or suitable resister) in parallel to the led, that should dissipate the leakage
is the light on the switch on when the led flood light is off?
ie acting as a backlight to find the switch?
if so then yes the current through that will cause issues in the led circuit.
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Building: Brownie points to put it back together
posted on 24/4/17 at 04:00 PM
quote:Originally posted by gremlin1234
is the light on the switch on when the led flood light is off?
ie acting as a backlight to find the switch?
if so then yes the current through that will cause issues in the led circuit.
Yes and Yes - I thought that was what I said in my OP? Apologies if it wasn't clear. What I'm trying to figure out is a way to fix it
without butchering the backlight on the switch.
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Building: Brownie points to put it back together
posted on 25/4/17 at 12:37 AM
quote:Originally posted by gremlin1234
quote:I thought that was what I said in my OP? Apologies if it wasn't clear.
sorry, I was thinking of the normal arrangement of warning/pilot light on when switch is on. - makes more sense to me now ;-)
No worries!
quote:
quote:What I'm trying to figure out is a way to fix it without butchering the back-light on the switch.
simplest to just put a low* (or even high) wattage incandescent bulb in parallel to the led light.
*(ie a pygmy bulb)
Feels to me like a 'bodge' ... that incandescent bulb will blow at some point and I'm back to square 1. Was thinking a good old
mechanical relay would resolve the problem.... happy to fit a resistor rather than a bulb, though, if anyone has any recommendations... TBH I'm
still leaning towards removing the wire for the neon...
Maybe I'll try both configurations...
