On Wed, 06 Feb 2008 02:53:01 GMT, Rich Grise wrote:

:On Mon, 04 Feb 2008 14:03:41 -0500, default wrote:
:
: On Mon, 04 Feb 2008 18:18:50 GMT, Ecnerwal
: wrote:
:
:In article ,
: default wrote:
:
: The range is old and I use it a lot - cooking and beer making are
: hobbies. That last can be hard on ranges.
:
:As it happens, I make beer on mine. Invested in a "canning element" 13
:years ago, put a 10 gallon pot on there and boil 8 gallons or so of wort
:down to 5, no problems with the range at all in 13 years. Catching the
:drips the exhaust fan can't keep up with and cleaning everything to suit
:me before I get started is more of a problem. The range, and the range
:controls, have had no trouble at all with this...
:
: Well, I'm not looking for reasons why I shouldn't do it, but how to do
: it.
:
:A lamp dimmer would work, if you could figure out how to add some
:temperature feedback, like a thermocouple or using the element
:itself in a bridge, there are lots of possibilities.
:
:But if the lamp dimmer is rated for as much or more power than
:the element, then there's no problem, other than temp. control,
:as I said.
:

I don't think it will need temperature feedback at all. It would simply work the
same as it would in controlling lamp brightness when used as a dimmer, ie. time
proportional power control. It only needs temp feedback if you want the temp to
be controlled to agree with a dialled temp setting. If the scale is marked
simply 1 - 10 for example it doesn't really matter whether there is feedback or
not - it is simply an arbitrary power setting determined by the potentiometer.

Have a look at the NXP app note in my post down the bottom of the thread and
then look at (p.545, 546) and fig.14 and you will see that the lamp dimmer would
work in the same manner, just without the zero crossing triggering.