On Tue, 05 Feb 2008 18:08:12 GMT, "James Sweet"
wrote:



The lash up works. I can control a 120 VAC lamp with the dimmer
triggering the external triac. So at least it triggers on 120.

Before it goes into the range, I need some mounting washers for the
triac. These are bolted to a bare heatsink and I'd rather insulate
the triac than insulate the heatsink.

Still want to tinker a bit to see if the bare, out of the box, dimmer
can be made to work the triac with only the two wires they supply.
--

Wire it up on 240 powering a couple of 200-300W incandescent bulbs in
series, if that works then it should work fine with the burner.

I'll give that a try.

My current interest is to see how to get a lamp dimmer (pure out of
the box, so to speak) to trigger a triac. It may be unnecessary, but
there's some crud on the inside of the stove chassis; mostly rust and
condensed oil - not too bad but what one might expect from a 30 year
old, well used, kitchen range.

Anyhow, my reasoning goes like this - I see the stuff behind the panel
and figure that the potentiometer in the dimmer might just die from
crude ingestion (or significantly shorten its life).

I don't know about you, but I hate having to EVER repair something I
designed and built . . . If the $3 lamp dimmer can be considered a
component only, and work the secondary triac that seems better to me.

I'm still not ready to do any hardcore installation - no triac
insulators and (one of the things I overlooked) no suitable "hard"
means of breaking power to the element . I think it was you who said
that - thanks. So I need a DPST switch capable of 10 amps ( and
another hole through the porcelain finish to mount it)

This is way more fun than just going to the hardware store and
shucking out money for another ancient design range control.

I have one burner that doesn't work now, so I can apply it as soon as
I trust it. It hasn't worked for years but that's immaterial.
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