Light energy saver often inspires questions relating to effects on lamp and fitting life, and about effects on light output.
Lamp and Fitting Life
Simply put, any electrical device drawing less current and at lowered voltage will produce less heat. Less heat in a lighting Lamp, ballast or fitting translates into less degeneration of components over time: again simply...longer life.
Light Output
Because the Voltage controllers keep the voltage waveform, but reduce the RMS voltage by a more technically sophisticated process of waveform, reduced substantially more than peak voltage (reduced by 25V or 22, 5 V or 20V).
This means that there is not a one-to-one relationship between energy cost savings and light output. In fact, depending upon the type, age and condition of the treated fittings, light output will be reduced by only small part the level of savings achieved.
Yes, these products do indeed "DIM" your lights.
Please read on before deciding this is a "bad" or undesirable effect.
The Fact: Your Lights Get Dimmer Over Time Anyway!
Your lights are dimmer today than they were yesterday. And, they will be dimmer tomorrow than they are today. In fact, as your lights approach the halfway point in their expected lamp life, they will only produce about 60% of the light they did when they were brand new.
Yes, the Voltage controller set to achieve 20%-30% cost savings will initially dim your lights about 5% to 10% from their previous output. However, over time, the average light output from your lights will actually be greater using voltage reduction products than without them!
from 5% to 20% greater, over the final 50% of the lamps actual service life.
Investing Light To Gain Light
In effect, you are investing a little of your present light output in order to enjoy greater light output, for a longer period of time in the future.
With new or nearly new lamps, using one of the lighting controllers set to a modest 30% savings level, the life of the lamps can be expected to be extended by 40% to 80%. This means that a lamp with a typical lamp life of 6,000 hours should last from 18,000 to 20,000 hours, when treated by one of the lighting controllers.
The trend for light output reduction will be extended forward by this same amount of time, as well. This means that you will have the light output you would normally lose at 10,000 hours still being produced at 14,000 to 18,000 hours. The lamps will lose output at a much slower rate than if they were not treated by light controllers.
Your initial willingness to invest 10% of your light output will quickly begin paying you back with even brighter light than you would have had without the controller treatment, giving you as much as from one to three years of additional usable light output from the same lamps.
That's not a bad return on your "light" investment.
You Pay the Same for Aging, Dimmer Lights
Regardless of the age or light output of a discharge lamp, the electricity consumed remains constant. A two year old 250 watt light lamp will still consume 250 watts of electricity. However, it may be only producing 50% of its initial light output.
Lighting controllers instantly reduce the electricity usage of your lights by at least 25%. And, this savings remains constant for the entire life of the lamps, the life of the replacement lamps, the life of the lamps that replace those lamps, and so forth, for decades into the future.
Whenever you replace an aged lamp with a new one, your investment will begin paying off all over again...causing a modest initial light output reduction, then quickly reaching a point where the lamp output is greater than it would have been without our treatment, so that the average light output over the service life of the lamps will be greater with the controllers than without them.
With Light Energy Saver, You Pay Less for More Light