On Fri, 28 Oct 2005 04:20:25 GMT, Steve Kraus
wrote:

I'm using one with an electric timer, not an electronic one.

But I thought both were either totally off or totally on. I don't see
how they could damage the bulb. The electric one at least just has a
mechanical switch controlled by a moving wheel.

That's fine. What you want to avoid is anything where the power switching
is done electronically like with a triac. Even that would probably be ok
if you could be sure that it passed the full waveform when on but unless
you put a scope on it you may not know. Light dimmers fall into this
category...their dimming action is due to not passing the full waveform.

Thanks. I didn't know about the triac stuff etc. I guess I've never
had one.

Some but not all photoelectric switches work this way. I have one like
that and it was notable for turning a lamp (regular incandescant) on and
off gradually--as daylight changed--it dimmed the bulb up or down. I
recently replaced it with one that was full on / full off with an internal
relay. I suppose there may be some electronic timers designed specifically
for incandescents lights that work the same way. But if the electronics
drives a relay to do the actual switching, or certainly an
electromechanical timer, will be just fine.


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