Varilight Touch/Remote Dimmer with mains lamp?

[lukealmigh7y]

Hi All,

I've been looking around these forums for a while now getting some inspiration for my own projects and I've finally decided to get of my ass and do something with my lighting to kick off my home cinema project.

I have recently acquired 2 Varilight Touch/Remote dimmers, I've used one to replace a standard wall swith and it works perfectly, my question is, will one of these dimmers work on a mains powered lamp, i.e. put a feed from a plug through the dimmer to control a lamp?

I have a feeling its not going to work but though i best check just incase.

Cheers

[kevlar]

Yes that will work fine, I have 3 stand alone lamps wired through varilight dimmers.

[dalethecaptain]

Its no problem to do this, however you should use a lamp plug (or round pin plug) on the lamp cord and the appropriate socket outlet connected to your Varilight dimmer so that it can not be inadvertently used to power anything else, otherwise you will endanger people and property due to the soft start nature of the dimmer circuit. I have seen people plug vacuum cleaners into dimmed outlets....

The attached picture was plagiarized from Screwfix, these plugs are not that expensive. REMEMBER - Still only allowed 6 amps maximum on a lamp socket!