I put a fluorescent “green” light bulb on in our room which has three light bulbs on the same dimmer (the other two are normal bulbs). When I dim the room the normal light bulbs dim but the fluorescent one stays the same brightness. I can think of several explanations but which is right if any?
The flu. bulb assembly has lower power going through it than before when the dimmer is activated ( lower voltage? current?) but is able to increase its efficiency
the bulbs are in series, but the voltage drop across the fluorescent one stays constant. (too lazy to check if they are in series as I would need a ladder to pull one out)
the reason I was so interested was if the dimmer was putting less power through the bulb but it stays as bright, does that mean that we should be able to increase the efficiency of the fluorescent green bulbs even further?
Is the fluorescent bulb designed to be operated from a regular 'ol dimmer? I am guessing it isn’t. Most are not.
If your fluorescent bulb is not designed to be operated from a dimmer, then it would be unwise to use a dimmer with it. Based on personal experience, I’m 99% sure that using a dimmer with a fluorescent bulb (that is not designed to be operated from a dimmer) will drastically reduce its life. Even if the dimmer is on “full brightness.”
The fluorescent bulb is not directly powered by the line current. It is powered by an electronic ballast that converts the line current into a form more suitable for the fluorescent bulb. The dimmer can interfere with the proper operation of the electronic ballast, which is designed to run on standard line current. There are compact fluorescent bulbs that are designed to run on electrical circuits controlled by dimmers, but they are expensive and hard to find.
hmmm I am not sure of this. the dimmer is having no affect on the bulb, so the ballast in my case is working “in spite” of the dimmer (though this might not be general).
It seems quite likely that the opposite could also happen -the active ballast could screw up the timing cycle of the typical thyrister dimmer, causing it to push more current out than expected. However, the fact that the other two bulbs are much dimmer suggests that this is not happening. I will have to get that ladder out and experiment.