I have just had a touch dimmer fail.
I had used it to control a bar with 4 x 50 watt GU10s.
I replaced with LEDs and ov course it wouldn't work as it had a 40watt minimum load requirement.
I put a Halogen back in and it worked - but after a while the dimmer failed. Could this be due to it seeing a mixed load?
I have now replaced the dimmer with one that says 4 watt LED min.
Dimmable LEDs usually need a trailing edge dimmer. Depending on design, long before LEDs arrived, some were but most weren't. I've got MK grid dimmers in one room fitted in the late 80s, and they are fine with LEDs. But other much newer ones which had to be changed.
So saying, I'm not sure why a LED would cause the dimmer to fail. Where I've mixed tungsten and LED with an 'old' dimmer, the LED just failed to dim.
Was it a dimmable LED? As far as I can see, some are and some are not.
Were the LEDs officially capable of being dimmed?
It fails to dim by drawing progressively more current during the shortened on part of the mains cycle until the semiconductor maximum peak current gets exceeded. Even some dimmers that are supposed to be OK with dimmable LEDs seem to suffer unexpected failures in service.
I know someone who has had several fail inside the warrantee period replaced with identical ones from a later batch that also failed.
And some that say they are just flicker instead
Like fluorescent lights, I've seen them flicker?
I find if you look out the the peripheral area of the eye the flicker is more conspicuous.
Yes it's something to do with our ancestors which needed to motice movement more than colours.
The LEDs were marked as dimmable.
The touch dimmer was getting erratic at turning on and eventually failed completely. (Doyle & Tratt brand)
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