Lighting
A flexibleapproach T
Andrew Wilson at Varilight encourages wholesalers to embrace flexible product solutions to facilitate trouble-free LED dimming
he widespread adoption of LED lighting has opened the door to significant energy savings, and its
versatility has also brought an incredible choice of light sources and luminaires to the market.
Whilst this has allowed architects, lighting
designers and specifiers to deliver imaginative lighting schemes that bring full expression to their interior design ideas, it has also brought with it increased complexity for those involved in manufacturing and specifying lighting control products. This, in turn, leads to some difficult decisions for wholesalers when deciding on which dimmer switches should form part of their offer. However, the recent focus on flexible product solutions from leading dimmer manufacturers provides wholesalers with opportunities to cover most eventualities from a relatively tight product range.
Drivers and dimmers One of the main reasons that flexible solutions are increasingly important is the proliferation of
different dimmable LED drivers in the market. Whether separate from the LED light source or contained within the body of the lamp or luminaire, dimmable LED drivers are generally larger and often more expensive than non- dimmable drivers. It’s therefore worth remembering that lighting manufacturers may choose non- dimmable drivers for some of their products, which cannot be dimmed, and so options to mix switches with dimmers on the same faceplate are often required. Those drivers that are dimmable might be designed for 0-10V dimming, protocols like Dali, or for phase-cut dimming. Amongst this final category, the situation is made more complicated because LED drivers designed for phase-cut dimming might specify either leading-edge or trailing-edge phase-cut dimming. Furthermore, with no agreed industry
standard for the way that phase-cut dimmable LED drivers are designed, there are many different approaches among LED manufacturers. This presents a significant
challenge for dimmer switch manufacturers whose products need to be versatile enough to cope with each variant in driver design, for installers who want to be able to provide robust solutions on site and for wholesalers in selecting the correct products and providing clear advice.
LEDs in action At Varilight, we have developed innovative technological solutions to cope with the variable design parameters (and indeed quality) of the many phase-cut dimmable LED drivers in the market. We manufacture the industry-leading V-Pro LED dimmer series, which has wide compatibility ‘straight from the box’ and a suite of features to allow for optimisation and fine-tuning of the performance of a given LED load. Installers have the option to adjust the minimum and maximum brightness settings of the dimmer to deliver the full stable dimming range of a given LED load and eliminate issues such as flicker at one end of the brightness range. A ‘Drive’ feature acts as a boost for lamps reluctant to switch on at low brightness. Three dimming modes are also available (including a simulated leading-edge mode) to extend compatibility, even for poorly-designed drivers that are difficult to dim. For dimmable LED loads specifying ‘triac’
control, our V-Com LED dimmer series is the best choice. V-Com dimmers are also supplied with the same suite of optimisation features as the V-Pro series. To cope with installations where different
types of LED driver are to be controlled from the same faceplate, the flexibility provided by solutions such as grid switch systems is increasingly important for electricians. With a grid system, installers are able to place dimmers designed for different types of LED driver alongside one another. For example, with Varilight’s PowerGrid system it is possible to locate dimmers for 1-10V drivers alongside dimmers for phase-cut dimmable drivers and on/off switches for non-dimmable loads.
Form and function However, the aesthetic of grid systems is not to everybody’s taste, and generally grid systems are offered in a relatively limited selection of decorative finishes and styles. So, at Varilight, we have just launched a new system, called
36 | electrical wholesalerApril 2019
ewnews.co.uk
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