Hi

We have a PIR lantern outside the front door. Bulb went so I changed it,
now the pesky thing stays on all the time, even in daylight - can't find the
destructions either.

It is (was) one of those that comes on at a low level after dusk, then turns
to full power when the detector is triggered, then back to low level after a
short time.

Tried turning in on during the day, turn on/off quickly, slowly, whatever.

Any ideas before I bin it & buy a new one?



--
Dave
The Medway Handyman
www.medwayhandyman.co.uk
01634 717930
07850 597257

In article ,
The Medway Handyman wrote:
Hi

We have a PIR lantern outside the front door. Bulb went so I changed it,
now the pesky thing stays on all the time, even in daylight - can't find the
destructions either.

[snip]

Any ideas before I bin it & buy a new one?

Seen a couple of these do this. I assume it's the same as the dying light
bulb taking out dimmer switches.

bulb pops, huge current pops the triac (or whatever is in these things).

It's dead dave...



Darren

In message , The
Medway Handyman writes
We have a PIR lantern outside the front door. Bulb went so I changed
it, now the pesky thing stays on all the time, even in daylight - can't
find the destructions either.

If it uses a triac to switch the lamp (which it sounds like it does)
then that has probably failed short circuit when the lamp popped.

--
Clive Mitchell
http://www.bigclive.com

On Tue, 27 Mar 2007 20:17:31 GMT, "The Medway Handyman"
mused:

Hi

We have a PIR lantern outside the front door. Bulb went so I changed it,
now the pesky thing stays on all the time, even in daylight - can't find the
destructions either.

It is (was) one of those that comes on at a low level after dusk, then turns
to full power when the detector is triggered, then back to low level after a
short time.

Tried turning in on during the day, turn on/off quickly, slowly, whatever.

Any ideas before I bin it & buy a new one?

Bin it.
--
Regards,
Stuart.

Clive Mitchell wrote:


If it uses a triac to switch the lamp (which it sounds like it does)
then that has probably failed short circuit when the lamp popped.

Triac seems to be the problem then.

We get through loads of PIR light, bloody things never seem to last long -
mind you we have a substation at the end of our cul de sac and our voltage
is always high - we also get through lots of light bulbs.

I shall avoid the dimming ones from now on.

Thinking about it, I've changed about 6 PIR lights for customers in the past
year.

Any suggestions for a make that will last more than 5 mins?


--
Dave
The Medway Handyman
www.medwayhandyman.co.uk
01634 717930
07850 597257

On 27 Mar, 22:56, "The Medway Handyman"
wrote:
Clive Mitchell wrote:

If it uses a triac to switch the lamp (which it sounds like it does)
then that has probably failed short circuit when the lamp popped.

Triac seems to be the problem then.

We get through loads of PIR light, bloody things never seem to last long -
mind you we have a substation at the end of our cul de sac and our voltage
is always high - we also get through lots of light bulbs.

I shall avoid the dimming ones from now on.

Thinking about it, I've changed about 6 PIR lights for customers in the past
year.

Any suggestions for a make that will last more than 5 mins?

The dimming ones are a terrible waste of money
http://wiki.diyfaq.org.uk/index.php?...med_PIR_Lights

Dont chuck the thing, replace the triac with something of higher
current rating, and it should last much better.

A low current fuse will sometimes save their bacon too, 2A is a good
compromise between protection and robustness.


NT

The Medway Handyman wrote:

Any ideas before I bin it & buy a new one?

Its an ex lantern! ;-)

(The standalone PIRs from screwfix I fitted years ago are working
perfectly. The PIR half lanterns I got from TLC were also rather nice)

--
Cheers,

John.

/================================================== ===============\
| Internode Ltd - http://www.internode.co.uk |
|-----------------------------------------------------------------|
| John Rumm - john(at)internode(dot)co(dot)uk |
\================================================= ================/

On Tue, 27 Mar 2007 20:17:31 GMT, "The Medway Handyman"
wrote:

|!Hi
|!
|!We have a PIR lantern outside the front door. Bulb went so I changed it,
|!now the pesky thing stays on all the time, even in daylight - can't find the
|!destructions either.
|!
|!It is (was) one of those that comes on at a low level after dusk, then turns
|!to full power when the detector is triggered, then back to low level after a
|!short time.
|!
|!Tried turning in on during the day, turn on/off quickly, slowly, whatever.
|!
|!Any ideas before I bin it & buy a new one?

Both PIRs I have installed have failed within a year, added to the lamp
failures. So maybe one has to live with the cost of a new one every year
or so :-(.
--
Dave Fawthrop sf hyphenologist.co.uk 165 *Free* SF ebooks.
165 Sci Fi books on CDROM, from Project Gutenberg
http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page Completely Free to any
address in the UK. Contact me on the *above* email address.

In article . com,
writes:

Dont chuck the thing, replace the triac with something of higher
current rating, and it should last much better.

A higher current triac will also have a higher holding current,
which relates to the minimum load a dimmer can drive. Often that's
around 40W, and will increase roughly proportionally with a higher
current triac. (This will not be an issue with dimmers designed
for use with LV halogen lamps, but they're more expensive. It may
not be an issue with a PIR -- check if it quotes a minimum load.)

A low current fuse will sometimes save their bacon too, 2A is a good
compromise between protection and robustness.

So far, I've found a 3A MCB has protected some rather expensive
X10 dimmers. 2A fuses don't -- many dimmers have them inside anyway.
They often blow together with the triac.

In a circuit I designed which uses MOSFETs rather than triacs to
switch mains, I have used a very fast blow fuse, but you won't
find that in cheap dimmers, and it would blow almost every time
a bulb blew (in this case, my load isn't bulbs).

--
Andrew Gabriel
[email address is not usable -- followup in the newsgroup]

In article ,
Dave Fawthrop writes:
Both PIRs I have installed have failed within a year, added to the lamp
failures. So maybe one has to live with the cost of a new one every year
or so :-(.

I've installed a number of relay based ones over the last ~12
years, and none have failed. They are all separate units from
the lights temselves. In most cases, I find the light itself
is in the wrong position for its PIR.

--
Andrew Gabriel
[email address is not usable -- followup in the newsgroup]