RadioBanter - Halogen lighting interference

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Halogen lighting interference

Are there any solutions to eleminating or at least reducing the interference
caused by low voltage halogen lighting? Like many desk lamps and accent
lighting. My only solution so far is to make sure all lighting in the house
is off if I want to listen to the radio.

Thanks, please reply to as well as the group.
Vic

I design switching power supplies and related power supplies like lamp
ballasts. In short the answer to your question is NO! We use filters
per FCC requirements but it ain't enough! I've gotten rid of all the
inverter type lamps in the house here. I use filament lamps and am
helping the Saudi's fill the pockets with American dough!

Frank
Tucson

On Thu, 9 Jun 2005 13:23:44 -0400, "CycleOpps"
wrote:

Are there any solutions to eleminating or at least reducing the interference
caused by low voltage halogen lighting? Like many desk lamps and accent
lighting. My only solution so far is to make sure all lighting in the house
is off if I want to listen to the radio.

Thanks, please reply to as well as the group.
Vic

I remember years back, a company in NY was working on a replacement
bulb which would eliminate up to 80% of the QRM produced by such
lights. The only thing I have seen come out of anything are the
Philips "corkscrew" lights which are supposed to last 10 years. I
don't see any help from them.

Much as I like to have a low electric bill, sometimes, you just gotta
use the standard old table lamp with a standard bulb and turn
everything else off!

Al in CNMI

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On Thu, 09 Jun 2005 13:23:44 -0400, CycleOpps wrote:

Are there any solutions to eleminating or at least reducing the
interference caused by low voltage halogen lighting? Like many desk lamps
and accent lighting. My only solution so far is to make sure all lighting
in the house is off if I want to listen to the radio.

The problem is the dimmer in the halogen lamp. To verify, turn the light
all the way up in brightness and see if the interference goes away.

It would be cheaper to purchase a new light than to design and construct
a filter that would totally eliminate the cross-ovber harmonics from the
dimmer.

"yea right" wrote in message
...
On Thu, 09 Jun 2005 13:23:44 -0400, CycleOpps wrote:

Are there any solutions to eleminating or at least reducing the
interference caused by low voltage halogen lighting? Like many desk lamps
and accent lighting. My only solution so far is to make sure all lighting
in the house is off if I want to listen to the radio.

The problem is the dimmer in the halogen lamp. To verify, turn the light
all the way up in brightness and see if the interference goes away.

Yes and no. Dimmers were certainly the 'taditional' problem -- but there are
now a whole raft of new low voltage halogens that get their reduced voltage not
from a normal iron-core transformer, but from a cheap non-filtered switching
power supply [no dimmer involved at all]. These switching supplies have all
but replaced traditional transformers on the shelves of the chain stores. They
cause so much hash on the power lines that line-based remote control systems
[like X-10] won't even work if even one of these is turned on on that branch.
There are specific filter solutions for specific frequencies [again, like those
used by X-10], but they only block noise at the specific X-10 carrier frequency,
and do little for the rest of the band -- or for the direct radiated noise from
these plastic boxed 'jammers'. One wonders how these are even legal...

It would be cheaper to purchase a new light than to design and construct
a filter that would totally eliminate the cross-ovber harmonics from the
dimmer.

If the problem is from a switching supply, the only way to avoid the problem is
to either turn it off, or replace the supply with an iron core transformer
[while they are still available...]

"CycleOpps" wrote in
:

Are there any solutions to eleminating or at least reducing the
interference caused by low voltage halogen lighting? Like many desk
lamps and accent lighting. My only solution so far is to make sure all
lighting in the house is off if I want to listen to the radio.

Thanks, please reply to as well as the group.
Vic

That's about the only thing that worked for me :( We have them in the kitchen
and if I am listeming to the radio, I can tell at once when someone goes in
there and turns on the halogen lights. Fortunatelt there are other light
sources there as well so they don't have to work in the dark :)

--
Panzer

I use uber-cheap compact fluorescents. If I get noisy one, I take it
back to the store. Most are very quiet.

On Thu, 9 Jun 2005 13:23:44 -0400, "CycleOpps"
wrote:

Are there any solutions to eleminating or at least reducing the interference
caused by low voltage halogen lighting? Like many desk lamps and accent
lighting. My only solution so far is to make sure all lighting in the house
is off if I want to listen to the radio.

Thanks, please reply to as well as the group.
Vic

"CycleOpps" wrote in
:

My 2 cents on lighting and shortwave radios. I am an advocate of
fluorescent lighting, using the spiral type for desktop lamps whenever
possible. I also use this type of lamp in one of my ceiling fans that has
3 separate light sockets. When I first installed the fluorescent lamps in
the ceiling fan, I had a ton of interference with my shortwave radio. I
had resigned myself to the belief that I was not going to be able to use
the fluorescent lights in this application. I set about changing the
bulbs back to incandescent, changing one at a time. The shortwave radio
was audible in the background and I heard the noise go away after I had
replaced just 1 of the 3 fluorescent lamps. A little experimenting and I
discovered that the incandescent lamp was somehow dampening the noise
from the fluorescent lamps. To this day I still have 2 fluorescent bulbs
and 1 incandescent bulb in this fan. It doesn't look the greatest but it
still saves energy.

I have many other fluorescent lamps in the house, yet none seem to be an
interference problem.

Of your dilemma, one of the communication magazines recently covered this
same issue. Sherlock Holmes of Amateur Radio had his hands full with this
one. The issue shows a bulb with an apparently intact filament, yet a
check with a DVM showed the bulb to be open. Turns out that the bulb had
a microscopic opening in the filament, was open to the DVM, yet conducted
when voltage was supplied to it by the fixture and apparently even lit.
Problem is that it generated a ton of interference on AM. When the
individual finally discovered this and replaced the bulb, the
interference went away.

Bulb, contacts, switch, etc. Look for loose connections, perhaps if done
with respect for safety, do it with the lamp powered, gently manipulating
the switch, bulb (usually very hot), etc. Do this while listening to the
interference on your radio and look for a change in interference.

Regards,

Dr. Artaud

Are there any solutions to eleminating or at least reducing the
interference caused by low voltage halogen lighting? Like many desk
lamps and accent lighting. My only solution so far is to make sure all
lighting in the house is off if I want to listen to the radio.

Thanks, please reply to as well as the group.
Vic