X10 and fluorescent lights
P J
lights being controlled by X10. With the recent push for energy saving
fluorescent lights I am not sure if it would be possible to replace the
old bulbs with the new ones and still have my X10 controls working. How
are you handling this situation?
pj
Dirk Bruere at NeoPax
On/off is probably OK, but I doubt a dimmer function will work.
--
Dirk
http://www.transcendence.me.uk/ - Transcendence UK
http://www.theconsensus.org/ - A UK political party
http://www.onetribe.me.uk/wordpress/?cat=5 - Our podcasts on weird stuff
gree...@neo.rr.com
<dirk....@gmail.com> wrote:
>P J wrote:
>> I have an old X10 light control setup in my house with only incandescent
>> lights being controlled by X10. With the recent push for energy saving
>> fluorescent lights I am not sure if it would be possible to replace the
>> old bulbs with the new ones and still have my X10 controls working. How
>> are you handling this situation?
>> pj
>
>On/off is probably OK, but I doubt a dimmer function will work.
On/Off may not be OK. Depending on the brand, many CFL's spew all
sort of electrical noise back into the electrical wiring. This noise
can interfere with X-10. I have some that work just fine and others
that play havoc with X-10.
Bill Kearney
Yep, not unless they're the more expensive (often much more) type than
clearly state they support being operated from a dimmer.
Dirk Bruere at NeoPax
It might make sense to go for LED lighting.
More expensive initially, but over the lifetime of the LEDs probably
cheaper than fluorescents.
Dirk Bruere at NeoPax
Well, ON is probably ok :-)
Jeff Volp
"Dirk Bruere at NeoPax" <dirk....@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:6vs2u5F...@mid.individual.net...
> Bill Kearney wrote:
>>> On/off is probably OK, but I doubt a dimmer function will work.
>>
>> Yep, not unless they're the more expensive (often much more) type than
>> clearly state they support being operated from a dimmer.
>
> It might make sense to go for LED lighting.
> More expensive initially, but over the lifetime of the LEDs probably
> cheaper than fluorescents.
I have a 120V 4W LED produced by Lumoform that produces more noise than any
CFL I have tested. Here is a photo of the X10 signal just fitting between
the noise bursts: http://jvde.us/x10/line_noise+X10_XTB_X10-in.jpg
The X10 signal is at mid-screen and near both sides of the trace. It fits
in the little gap after each zero crossing before the switching supply in
the LED starts up. The XTB-IIR can actually recover that X10 signal.
Jeff
P J
> On/off is probably OK, but I doubt a dimmer function will work.
I don't use dimmer at all.
pj
dicko
Some brands of bulb work OK, others create noise.
I have a whole bunch of Greenlite bulbs that are x-10 compatible.
They're several years old so I dont know if they're changed the recipe
for them.
I had problems with Lights of America and Fein. I ended up wiring a
humongus 1mh choke in series with each fixture to get them to work.
A bit more expensive, I also have wired a Leviton 6287 5amp Universal
blocking filter in series with the fixture to get it to work too.
-dickm
Steinar Midtskogen
> Bill Kearney wrote:
>>> On/off is probably OK, but I doubt a dimmer function will work.
>> Yep, not unless they're the more expensive (often much more) type
>> than clearly state they support being operated from a dimmer.
>
> It might make sense to go for LED lighting.
> More expensive initially, but over the lifetime of the LEDs probably
> cheaper than fluorescents.
I had both LED and fluorescent lighting, but I had to replace all the
LED lighting (with fluorescent) when I began using X10 because they
destroyed the X10 signals.
I've also tried dimmable fluorescent lightbulbs with mixed results.
They light level drops much faster and they sometimes refused to
relight if turned on unless the brightness was at the maximum.
--
Steinar ; NIL DIFFICILE VOLENTI ; http://latinitas.org ; http://voksenlia.net
gree...@neo.rr.com
I have had LED problems as well. It's a shame they can take a
technology that is noise free by itself and then design cheap power
supplies that create all sorts of noise. One set of LED puck lights I
purchased at Home Depot were so bad, they emitted enough RF energy to
stop my wireless mouse and keyboard from working. I ended up throwing
away the power supply that came with the lights and modifying an old
Dell 19v laptop supply to take its place. They are selling this
poorly designed crap all over the place. There is no way it meets FCC
regulations, but no one seems to be enforcing those regulations these
days.
P J
> I have a 120V 4W LED produced by Lumoform that produces more noise
> than any CFL I have tested. Here is a photo of the X10 signal just
> fitting between the noise bursts:
> http://jvde.us/x10/line_noise+X10_XTB_X10-in.jpg
>
> The X10 signal is at mid-screen and near both sides of the trace. It
> fits in the little gap after each zero crossing before the switching
> supply in the LED starts up. The XTB-IIR can actually recover that
> X10 signal.
I wonder what it would do to powerline ethernet I've been thinking of
getting.
pj
P J
> Some brands of bulb work OK, others create noise.
>
> I have a whole bunch of Greenlite bulbs that are x-10 compatible.
> They're several years old so I dont know if they're changed the recipe
> for them.
> I had problems with Lights of America and Fein. I ended up wiring a
> humongus 1mh choke in series with each fixture to get them to work.
>
> A bit more expensive, I also have wired a Leviton 6287 5amp Universal
> blocking filter in series with the fixture to get it to work too.
I only bought one of those fluorescent replacement bulbs once for a
non-X10 circuit for trial. It was advertised as lasting much longer than
incandescent bulbs, but in my case it lasted much shorter. Though it may
have been just a statistical anomaly, I haven't tried another one since.
pj
Bill Kearney
> non-X10 circuit for trial. It was advertised as lasting much longer than
> incandescent bulbs, but in my case it lasted much shorter. Though it may
> have been just a statistical anomaly, I haven't tried another one since.
The thinking seems to be that some CF bulbs don't take as well to being
frequently turned on/off as well as incadescents.
Jim Hewitt
news:gna9h6$rp7$1...@news.motzarella.org...
Last March I replaced 75% of the lights in my house with CFLs (I think all
N:Vision brand from Home Depot.). I have a combination of about half and
half - some are controlled by X10 switches and some aren't.
My experiences from nearly a year of CLFs and X10:
1. Interference with X10 signal generated by the CFLs - none confirmed. All
X10 controls are as responsive as they were before the transition. However,
see #2 about spurious dimming.
2. CFLs on a WS467. Dimming not supported and not advisable. I could 'dim'
the light but I noticed no difference in light output until the bulb turned
off at about half dimmed. It buzzed lowly as the dimming level increased.
I have disabled local dimming which I had previously enabled by modding the
switch. Sometimes I hear a slight buzzing sound from the wall switch itself
which goes away when I turn the lights OFF then back ON again. My guess is
that the switch is trying to dim for some reason. This is on a switch that
still supports local dimming - so I don't know if someone accidentally
dimmed it, or if stray X10 signals [possibly from the CFLs] caused the
switch to go to a dimmer level.
3. CFLs on a WS467 - lights turn ON just fine and will go OFF, but the CLF
flickers about once every 2-3 seconds. Apparently this is caused by the
local sensing current [so the X10 switch will turn on when you manually turn
on a lamp that has it's own on/off witch]. I have not yet tried to modify
the switches to disable this feature - reather I have resorted to adding a
incandscent light bulb to the circuit. For my porch lights, this is one of
four bulbs, but in the kids's bedrooms, this is one of two bulbs - so I'm
not getting as much electricity savings as I could. I've heard about adding
a suitable resistor to the socket to remedy, but haven't felt secure enough.
I do plan to add a small 25W light to the porch circuit to illuminate the
house number, then I can use 4 CFLs instead of 3.
4. CLF life. I have not put the CFLs in high-traffic (turning on and off a
lot) locations, or places where they would be on only for short periods of
time. And some of them are recessed in the ceiling. But I have only had
two bulbs fail - one after 3 months and one after 8 months. I haven't yet
requested a refund on those bulbs. All the rest are still going strong.
5. Dim start-up. At first, the CFLs almost instantly reached full
brightness, but after just a few weeks, the slower startup was noticeable.
now, after 8 months, it is VERY noticeable and becoming annoying. I have
actually added some incandescents back in to a fixture (still a mix) where
we couldn't tolerate the delay. When I replaced the few that did burn out
with new bulbs of the same vintage, there was no apparent difference in
overall brightness so they don't seem to be getting dimmer with age (yet).
6. X10 switch life. So far I have not had to replace any of my wall
switches. Of course, we avoid dimming them, but they haven't shown any sign
of abuse from either driving the CFL or from any interference.
YMMV.
Jim
Steven Downin
brands. It worked for about 2 days. The lights were destroyed. I'm
guessing that the off sense current did them in.
I use a lot of X10 appliance modules to control outside Christmas lighting.
One must be sure to unplugged the lights when trouble shooting since there
is always current present. The other interesting thing are LED lights.
They have a slight glow when off from the sense current. I resolved this by
assuring that there is at least of regular light string in the X10 run. For
those electronic controller devices I put a relay between the X10 and the
device.
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Josepi
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