Vintage Lighting Vintage Century Strand dimmer

hanoacosta

Member
Hi Folks,

I'm trying to track down schematics for some old (1974 I think) Strand dimmers. There are no markings on the rack, the individual dimmer modules say "Model 306." There are 4kw, 6kw, and 12kw variants. Here's a couple images if that helps:




Thanks!
 
Hi Folks,

I'm trying to track down schematics for some old (1974 I think) Strand dimmers. There are no markings on the rack, the individual dimmer modules say "Model 306." There are 4kw, 6kw, and 12kw variants. Here's a couple images if that helps:




Thanks!
I can't see either of your images. I'm getting an error message from Control Booth.
I'm in Canada and our dimmer racks were five x 20 slot racks housing 100 six KW Strand Century models. At the time, 1973, the company was calling itself Century Strand in Canada and Strand Century in the U.S. Our original house light rack was another identical 20 slot rack populated with the 4 Kw, 6Kw and 12Kw variants plus 96 20 Amp Heinemann magnetic secondary breakers. This last rack was eventually replaced by a 48 slot CD80 AE rack in the theater's attic housing 48 dual 2.4 Kw modules powering the original 96 circuits as dimmer per circuit and controlled by a dedicated Lightboard M and its remote.
I'm remembering your dimmers as being a lite sandy beige in color and, aside from requiring periodic trimming, being solid as a rock in terms of overall reliability. They were in service for something like 20 years.
Toodleoo!
Ron Hebbard.
 
Standard Century-Strand 300's.

Steve Short at Lite-trol has parts if that helps. I have a 24 dimmer rack still in use, we get cards from Steve when they get funky

516 681-5288
800 548 3876
 
Standard Century-Strand 300's.

Steve Short at Litetrol has parts if that helps. I have a 24 dimmer rack still in use, we get cards from Steve when they get funky

516-681-5288
800-548-3876
@hanoacosta
If we're talking about the same dimmers with identically physically sized 4Kw, 6Kw and 12Kw models with chrome handles on their fronts and they pulled out like "works in a drawer", I never saw a 24 unit rack. The 20 slot racks were each more than six feet tall and had been installed in their basement room prior to the installation of the entrance door and the concrete poured around it and its fire rated frame. When we removed the original 1973 racks from the room, we had to SawZAll the frames to get them out the standard 6'-8" doorway. A rack designed to hold four more modules would've been a serious beast to confront. All of ours had low, mid and high trim pots accessible from their front panels.
Toodleoo!
Ron Hebbard.
 
Hi Folks,

I'm trying to track down schematics for some old (1974 I think) Strand dimmers. There are no markings on the rack, the individual dimmer modules say "Model 306." There are 4kw, 6kw, and 12kw variants. Here's a couple images if that helps:




Thanks!
Now that @derekleffew has made it possible for me to see your photos, I'd say ours were similar but in my minds eye I'm remebering ours having their trimmers located to the right side of the circuit breaker rather than the left. Ours may also have had a white banana jack as well for conveniently plugging in you meter leads while doing your annual trimming. These would have been installed in Hamilton Place in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada during late 1972 when it was under construction for its planned opening in the spring of 1973 which failed to occur until September of 1973 due to construction delays. Thus, as @derekleffew suggested, ours may have predated yours by a year.
Thanks @derekleffew
Toodleoo!
Ron Hebbard
 
Should be easy to reverse engineer that module! If they are giving you problems I could give you a long winded explanation why, but the fix is almost always replace the capacitors! They're what dry out and go funky.
 
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