Chris Lewis wrote:
According to Jeff Wisnia :


When you are replacing the dimmer, go to Rat Shack and pick yourself up
an inline 3AG fuse holder and a few 2 amp 3AG fuses. Wire the fuseholder
in series with the hot feed to the dimmer (it should fit inside the
dimmer box) and you'll be pretty well be protected against a future
burnout. You may have to replace a burned out fuse, but the dimmer
should be OK.



That's just what I did with the four table lamps in our home which are
fitted with "touch dimmers". After the second dimmer blew I added 2 amp
fuses to all of them. I've probably replaced six fuses in the last five
years, but all the dimmers are still alive and well.


I find it hard to imagine that a fuse would blow fast enough to
protect a triac. But, if it works...

Make sure you get fast-blo.

Thanks, I realized too late that I forgot to mention that.

Not to be pedagogical, but I sized the fuses for my lamps by looking up
the specs of the triacs in my lamps' touch dimmers, the ones which were
punching through, and found on their maximum I^2*t rating. (eye squared
times tea)

Then I looked on Buss' website and found that the blowing energy (also
expressed as I^2*t) of their 3AG 2A fast blow fuses was somewhat less
than that of the triac, so I figured it should work.

And work it has....I use two 75 watt bulbs in a "Y" adaptor in each of
those table lamps cause the two are cheaper two purchase than one 150
watter in most places, plus when one bulb dies I still can get light to
see my way around from the other one, assuming it didn't expire with one
of those tungsten arc blasts and take out the fuse. I think I probably
have three or four "normal" bulb burnouts for every one which takes a
fuse along with it.

And some people accuse me of being a geek who "gilds turds"....Wonder
why that is....G

Jeff

--
Jeffry Wisnia
(W1BSV + Brass Rat '57 EE)
The speed of light is 1.8*10^12 furlongs per fortnight.