Theben France SARL718257546 Theben

LEDs have made a career for themselves in recent years. Thanks to advances in efficiency and colour rendering index, there is hardly an area of lighting technology where they are not present. It is true that the general regulations for illuminants apply to LED lamps, from the design of the lampholder to the measurement setup for luminous intensity. What happens in between, however, is not covered. In contrast to a classic lamp with a simple filament, LED lamps contain a lot of electronics for control. How this is constructed is up to each producer worldwide. The manufacturer of switching and dimming devices therefore currently has no clues as to which electronics he controls and how the lamp behaves. The relevant IEC standard is IEC 60669-2-1:2021. But not every incandescent lamp can simply be replaced by an LED retrofit lamp. This can cause massive disruptions to the installation - surprisingly, even during simple switching. The reason is the short but also extremely high inrush currents. They can be a thousand times or more the rated power. Contacts can burn or weld as a result. LED LUMINAIRES: DIMMABLE OR NOT? THE RIGHT CHOICE IS CRUCIAL! Not every LED lamp is dimmable. Even with suitable versions, the dimming characteristics vary greatly and depend on the manufacturer. LEDs often flicker and cannot be dimmed linearly and harmoniously because the electronic ballast reacts very differently to the phase angle. Some manufacturers therefore explicitly allow only one of the methods. CONTINUOUS LIGHT AGAINST YOUR WILL? RESIDUAL INTERFERENCE IS ENOUGH AND THE LED WON'T GO OUT! Another problem is caused by the interference suppression capacitors of the dimmer. Very low residual currents constantly flow through them. These are sufficient to supply LED lamps with one to two watts of rated power. They then no longer go out completely. Long, parallel cables can have a similar effect. UP TO DATE WITH KNX: RELOADING DIMMING CURVES The KNX dimmer from Theben goes one step further: various dimming curves are stored in the KNX programming software ETS, which correct the dimming behaviour depending on the light source used, thus ensuring smooth, stepless control. Another advantage of the new dimming actuators is that the dimming curves can be extended. New dimming curves can be conveniently imported via ETS, e.g. from future light sources. With this update capability, the KNX dimming actuators offer a high level of investment security. Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)