Solenoid on an SCR Dimmer

[DMooreJr]

Anyone ever put a solenoid on a SCR dimmer? How does it behave? I have never had to put a solenoid on an SCR dimmer because we always had separate control for a kabuki drop. We have someone coming through our place saying he wants to do this, solenoid for kabuki drops on our dimmers (strand cd80 dual 2.4 supervisors). I don't think it will behave properly. Just to point things out, we don't have any non dim dimmers for this purpose so it would a dimmer profiled in the board to be a non dim which is even more of challenge.

 

[Footer]

It'll work. Done it several times. Not ideal, but it will work.

 

[mstaylor]

As a one shot deal it should be fine. It probably wouldn't like if done over a long haul.

 

[JD]

Depending on the size of the coil, you may want to do a ghost load on the circuit as well. A smaller coil may kick in for no reason. A 100 watt work light will do the trick.

 

[Van]

Rigged a whole production of 'Inspecting Carol' with solenoids. worked fine, JD is correct that a 100 watt ghost load will help.

 

[dramatech]

Rigged a whole production of 'Inspecting Carol' with solenoids. worked fine, JD is correct that a 100 watt ghost load will help.

I worked in a show that had three Kabuki drops during the show. Each was controlled by three solenoids in parallel. We did four shows a day for more than a year. Dimmer racks were Strand CD80 supervisors. Never had a problem.

 

[mstaylor]

I just wasn't sure over a long haul if solenoids would not like a chopped signal. I have never done it but if you guys have, I'll take your word for it.

 

[JD]

They don't, per say, but you're not going to wear anything out, and good quality dimmers have sufficient snubber protection, so you shouldn't have a problem.

What is important to remember is that dimmers are never really off. I'm not talking about the idle set here, but the fact that the firing circuit allows some power to bypass the SSR. (Nature of the beast.) As long as the load is above 50 watts, this will not be a problem. Below 50 (such things as LED rope lights) and you will get some bleed through. Because of that, a small solenoid may kick in even with the dimmer off. Ghost loading will insure that there is enough load to prevent that from happening.

Its kind of like DMX and mic cables- "You'll never have a problem, until the day you have a problem!"

Since the solenoid is probably attached to something that will look way out of place should it happen at the wrong time, why chance it!

Larger coils with a heavy mechanical load are a safe bet. It is the smaller coils that are more likely to trip.

 

[kicknargel]

Slightly unrelated, but anytime you're running a kabuki off your console, make sure to think about 1) being careful not to accidentally trip it, say during channel check or cue editing (park can help with this. Maybe write a macro that un-parks it right before the moment) and 2) many solenoids are not rated for continuous duty, so avoid accidentally leaving the channel at full for a long period.