Actions
Forum Thread Details
  • Replies 30 replies
  • Subscribers 542 subscribers
  • Views 4159 views
  • Users 0 members are here
Related

What's inside a 20+ year old dimmer switch?

scottiebabe

Not much. The dimmer function failed and only the switch function remained functional.

image

image

image

image

The schematic is the same as drawn by this author:

image

The Quadrac (an internally triggered triac, a triac + diac) failed short between all three terminals.

Searching for an X25783 datasheet led me to this,

image

https://images.100y.com.tw/pdf_file/31-Teccor-Quadrac.pdf 

A more common brand that may be similar could be the 

image

https://www.littelfuse.com/media?resourcetype=datasheets&itemid=b4817091-0710-4ac7-a446-a7ffcca0a634&filename=littelfuse_thyristor_q6008lth1led_datasheet.pdf 

The potentiometer used as a rheostat has a switch stacked on top.

Not much inside...

Parents Reply Children
  • in reply to scottiebabe

    My homeowner insurance company is involved with a company that monitors your electrical system to watch for various faults. They claim to find all manner of physical issues from open neutral wires to arcing wires. Obviously their intention is to minimize electrical fires, which I think is a very good idea. I wish I'd had this service twenty years ago!

    For the curious, It's State Farm and Whisper Labs ("Ting"). So far it's only warned me that I've had power interruptions, which I find more useful than the old 'quarter on the ice cube tray' method.