Mains filament lamps are plagued by two serious life-reducing problems – overvoltage and surge currents. The LampConserver MLC2500 overcomes these problems at minimum cost (product and installation), paying for itself in a very short time. As a general mains conditioning unit it ‘softens’ mains supplies and provides more suitable running conditions for lamps.
Overvolting
Many Installations regularly experience a mains supply voltage considerably greater than the nominal voltage for which they were designed. Each 5% increase in voltage will reduce lamp life by half, so that, even if the electricity supply remains within the 230V +/- 10% now harmonised in the European Community, lamp life can be reduced by a factor of 4.
LampConserver has a special Voltage Control circuit capable of reducing the mains voltage to the lamps. A small screwdriver adjustment of the trimmer potentiometer (situated to the side of the terminals within the unit) allows the desired voltage to the lamps to be ‘tweaked’ in order to achieve the optimum voltage for the installation.
Surge Currents
When mains filament lamps are first switched on the filaments are cold and at low resistance. Huge surge currents can flow, producing a thermal shock which breaks the filament and blows the lamp.
LampConserver usesMultiload’s unique patented 100% effective SoftStart which:
- totally eliminates surge currents and their fatal effect on mains filament lamps
- eliminated nuisance tripping of MCBs and fuses caused by surge currents
- increases the safety of short circuit protection by allowing fuses and MCBs to be rated at nominal current.
