I'll cut to the chase. LED lights installed Dimmer arrived after Dimmer won't work on just the +ve feed with lights all grounded to body near each light. Dimmer has + and - in and out. I read last night the standard bulbs are dimmed by reducing volts, but LED's are dimmed by reducing amps. Does this really mean I need to run all the light -ve's back to the dimmer or is there another way. All these lights and wiring are in the roof space, it took a day to get the roof in and now my sciatica is crippling me! I just don't think I can go through it all again... I know I should have done my research BEFORE wiring the lights but hey-ho. : Long shot but maybe I can get around it by adding some kind of load in parallel with the dimmer?
Unfortunately mate the lights need to run both + and - through the dimmer, also the LEDs are the dimmable type right?
I put LED's in my van for the indicators and it came with some kind of suppressor/voltage regulator, maybe that is what you need
Zed. Had a squint at the spec for your dimmer thing. It works using PWM (pulse width modulation). Effectively, it flashes the leds, reducing the "on" time to make them dimmer. That is, it doesn't just wind the voltage down (which would make the leds just go off completely below a certain level). So...as it's a bit fancy, I assume you've got to wire it as they say.
Frade so as said dimmers flash leds normally the - side i think its something to do with if they use the + it kills the light straight away but if they switch the - the light drops off in curve. Mind you i could be talking rubbish
It is possible to create a bodge circuit that mirrors the switching of the negative side of the LEDs inside the PWM module and converts it to a positive side PWM. It is about three or so electronic components in a 'current mirror' circuit but it would use as much power again (turning it into heat) as the LEDs use in producing a mirrored current. Or maybe there is a +ve switching dimmer somewhere out there. Or fiddle a two core wire through by pulling it using the single core wire already installed ... Unless of course you fixed it in thoroughly.
