Dimmer switch

[Arthur]

Hi. Will an ordinary dimmer switch work with a florescent light fitting? nb. The flo/lamp will be less than 3 feet long.

Thanks.

Arthur.

[Andy Hall]

Usually not in any effective way with standard dimmers.

You can buy specific fittings, or change the ballast for an electronic dimming type, however.

e.g.

RS Components 243-2869

or more easily, since it is dimmed by a momentary switch

440-9619

.andy

To email, substitute .nospam with .gl

[Richard Sterry]

No, most definitely not. You should find warnings to this effect on the instructions to the dimmers. In practice, you might be able to get the tube to strike with the dimmer turned to maximum, and then turn the control back, but this really is not sensible and anyway the chances are the dimmer will fail. Don't even think about it!

There are standard dimmers for purely resistive loads such as standard incandescent lighting, and slightly more expensive ones which can also cope with reactive loads such as the transformers on LV lighting.

HTH

Rick

[Dane Koekoek]

No, fluorescent lights do not work with dimmer switches. They can be either on or off and need a standard switch.

Dane

[Dave Plowman]

You can dim florries, but it requires a special ballast. There are rather fine high efficiency ones where all you have to add to dim them is a simple variable resistor.

[Dane Koekoek]

Didn't know that Dave - thanks for the information.

Dane

[Arthur]

Thanks for your suggestions.

I have an add on question to this.

Will the florie light be safe in a confined space? To explain.. I had an arch form built into the 4' wide alcove beside a chimney breast. The arch form is flush with the chimney breast and is about 7" thick while the alcove is 15 inches deep. this leaves an 7.5" deep gap behind the arch form up to ceiling height.

The apex of the curve is about 14" from ceiling height and I want to fit some kind of lighting behind the arch-form to provide hidden down lighting. And I was going to put a simple bulb but had the florrie light idea today, hence my original question.

So the confined space is about 4' wide and 7.5" deep, with 'walls' dropping

14" from the ceiling.

Thanks for your advice.

Arthur.

[Harry Bloomfield]

Arthur was thinking very hard :

Not unless both the dimmer is intended for inductive loads and the light designed to be dimmed (electronic ballast).

[Harry Bloomfield]

Arthur wrote on 04/04/2004 :

Yes, providing the fitting is not enclosed on all four sides (has some ventilation).