Current surges knocking out LED drivers
Current surges knocking out LED drivers
(OP)
An installation of LED lamps in refrigerated space (inside reach-in glass doors on grocery cooler) has seen high failure rate of LED lamp drivers (AC to DC). LED lamps are powered by a branch on the same phase (but separate branch circuit) as anti-sweat door heaters totalling 30A. Separate installation of controlls on door heater circuits have solid state relays opening and closing the 30A door heater circuits on a frequency of about 1HZ.
Could the voltage spike associated with each OFF cycle of the door heater circuits be causing the LED drivers to fail even though they are on a different branch circuit? e.g. the voltage spike would have to be traveling through the service panel and out the LED light branch to reach the drivers. It is a small store with not a lot on the panels (not a lot of other systems to damp out the voltage spike).
Could the voltage spike associated with each OFF cycle of the door heater circuits be causing the LED drivers to fail even though they are on a different branch circuit? e.g. the voltage spike would have to be traveling through the service panel and out the LED light branch to reach the drivers. It is a small store with not a lot on the panels (not a lot of other systems to damp out the voltage spike).





RE: Current surges knocking out LED drivers
Is the driver mounted in the frig too? Is it specified to work at that temperature? Or is it sitting on top of the frig and maybe running too warm?
You might want to try plugging the LED drivers into a surge protector and see if that helps. Or an uninterruptable power supply (UPS) might help too.
RE: Current surges knocking out LED drivers
However, low voltage wiring running parallel to high current wiring may have voltages induced in it.
Bill
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"Why not the best?"
Jimmy Carter
RE: Current surges knocking out LED drivers
If it is the door heaters then typical "surge suppressors" will not last long at all as they have a limit on the number of cycles they handle.
It could also be the fact that you are interrupting the driver power several hundred times a day if you're controlling them with door switches.
Keith Cress
kcress - http://www.flaminsystems.com
RE: Current surges knocking out LED drivers
Glenn
RE: Current surges knocking out LED drivers
In what manner does the driver fail? Is the driver chip shorted at the output?
Dan - Owner

http://www.Hi-TecDesigns.com
RE: Current surges knocking out LED drivers