Technical parameters and wiring diagrams for DRL lamps

The content of the article:

What is a DRL lamp
Design features and principle of operation
Types of DRL lamps
Specifications
Application area
Lamp connection
Advantages and disadvantages

Lighting devices are used to create lighting in homes, industrial buildings, on the street, in museums and other fields. One of these products for creating artificial light is a DRL lamp. This is a device that belongs to the category of mercury discharge lamps. DRL has a different way of working from other light sources, which should be dealt with before buying or when choosing analogues.

What is a DRL lamp

Appearance of DRL lamps

First of all, it is worth sorting out the name, because it is on it that the master determines the characteristics and working conditions. The acronym DRL can be decrypted as follows:

D - type of ignition. The source lights up under the influence of an electric arc, which is formed when a voltage is applied.
P - mercury.
L - the conversion of ultraviolet light into visible light is carried out using a phosphor.

Also in the marking after the letters you can see a digital three-digit code. It shows the power the lamp is designed for. On sale you can find appliances with a power of 150 W, 200 W, 250 W, 400 W and other load values. In everyday life, 250 W and 400 W bulbs are usually used.

Design features and principle of operation

DRL lamp device

The DRL lamp has a standard design for discharge lamps. It consists of three parts - a glass flask, a socle and a burner. Electrodes and a limiting resistor are located inside the burner. Air is pumped out in the flask, after which it is filled with nitrogen. A phosphor is applied on the inner surface. The burner contains a mixture of inert gases and mercury. The lamp bases are different, the standard is E14 and E27.

The DRL bulb works similarly to a discharge lamp. When voltage is applied to live parts, a glow discharge occurs. As a result, electrons and ions accumulate and the inside of the tube is heated. Mercury evaporates, a glow discharge becomes an arc. As the amount of mercury vapor increases, the brightness of the glow increases. The resulting ultraviolet light enters the phosphor. When passing through it, it is converted into visible radiation.

Subject to operating conditions, the time for turning on the lamp and its output to the declared parameters is about 4 minutes. With increasing temperature, this time decreases.

Types of DRL lamps

Lamps DRL 250 and DRL 400

DRL lamps have several modifications that have different specifications and operating conditions.

Classic DRL lamp. Standard modification. The disadvantages of the model include high heating during operation, sensitivity to voltage changes, a long time to reach optimal performance. The most common are the DRL 250 lamp and DRL 400. The luminous flux of the DRL 250 allows you to use the device in home lighting.
DRV or DRVED - arc mercury tungsten (erythema tungsten) lamp. The product starts without the use of a throttle and has improved indicators of light emission.
DRLF - unlike a standard lamp, has improved characteristics due to the coating of the bulb with reflective material.

All listed types can replace each other.

Specifications

Any lighting product must have information about the power. In DRL lamps, it is indicated in the marking.

Also important indicators are:

Light flow. From this value, how many light bulbs are needed to create the necessary level of illumination per unit area.At DRL 400, the luminous flux is 18,000 lm.
Estimated time of operation. Shows how many hours the light bulb can work in the declared conditions.
Basement Sets the parameters for a chandelier or other lamp.
Sizes.
Supply voltage.

All these parameters, as well as operating conditions, can be found in the documentation for the lamp.

Application area

DRL lighting devices are actively used as a source of artificial light in external and internal illumination: for illumination of carriageways, highways, parks and squares, as well as industrial premises and industrial workshops with a capacity of several megawatts.

DRV products are used in the same facilities as DRL, as well as in lighting agricultural enterprises that grow various crops in insulated soil. It can be greenhouses, greenhouses, gardens.

Lamp connection

DRV modification does not need a throttle for connection. The bulb can be directly connected to the mains. The throttle lamp connection scheme requires a ballast. This device provides regulation of the current within a predetermined range. Using a throttle, you can eliminate the burnout of the light source and create a mode to start it. The inductor also corrects the operation of the device by stabilizing the operating voltage supplied to the contacts.

There are two types of chokes - independent and built-in. They are installed in various designs of luminaires and depend on the installation location of the ballast (PRA).

The following parameters affect the choice of ballast model:

light bulb electric power;
operating current and voltage;
winding temperature;
the most admissible heating;
greatest power loss;
Power factor.

The most common breakdown in gas-discharge drl lamps is associated with ballast malfunctions. The device will not light up during operation. For this reason, it is important to be able to check the throttle for operability. This can be done using a multimeter that will check the integrity of the windings and the presence of inter-turn circuit.

Another way of checking is by using an incandescent lamp of the same power, connected in series with the circuit. When the product is in good condition, the light will turn on at half light or blink. In the absence of light, damage to the winding can be judged. Too bright light indicates the presence of an inter-turn short circuit.

Advantages and disadvantages

The advantages of the lamp include standard socles

DRL lamps are quite popular light sources. This is due to their positive qualities, which include:

long term of operation;
compactness;
standard socles;
good luminous flux;
reduced power consumption.

Disadvantages limiting the use of light bulbs:

Susceptibility to voltage changes.
The presence of pulsations that are harmful to human health.
Long ignition time.
The presence of harmful ultraviolet light.
Lamp modifications have lower efficiency and service life.
The presence of harmful components in the composition.
Fragility. The glass flask is easy to break, so you need to work with the device carefully.
The complexity of disposal. Mercury and other harmful substances contained in the appliance cause the light bulb to not be disposed of with household waste. It is disposed of at special collection points.

Despite all the advantages of such light sources, most consumers of electricity switch to LED analogues. They are safer, have a longer life and improved performance. LED lamp e40 analog DRL 400 has almost replaced the gas-discharge product.

In 2014, the Russian Federation signed the Minamata Convention. According to this document, starting from 2020, the production, use, export and import of mercury products should be discontinued.Gas-discharge devices fall under the ban; therefore, it is now recommended to think about replacing the DRL 400 with LED lamps with improved characteristics and a high degree of environmental friendliness. This applies to both home and industrial and street lights.

Alexey Kuznetsov

As an evil, they produced high-pressure mercury lamps of the DRL type, as a lamp designed purely for operation only on alternating current of industrial frequency. However, the practical testing of all these lamps with purely direct current allowed me not only to eliminate their flicker, which is harmful to my eyesight, but also to extend their useful useful life by a considerable percentage !!! The fact is that during the burning of an alternating current arc discharge in them, all the evaporated active material of the emitter from their oxide self-heating cathodes with periodic changes in the polarity of the alternating current in the arc discharge in the lamp is thrown from side to side depending on the direction of the current in the arc discharge in lamp, and in suspension, precipitates on the entire inner surface of the quartz bulb of the lamp discharge tube, blackening it very much !!! But if an arc of a continuous purely constant unidirectional current is ignited in the quartz discharge tube of a DRL lamp, the picture of lamp wear sharply changes radically in a favorable direction. Instead of weighing the evaporated active material of the lamp oxide cathode emitter with its subsequent gradual deposition on the walls of the lamp quartz discharge tube with their blackening, in a purely direct current arc discharge, its predominantly one-sided transfer from the anode with its deposition onto the cathode with a minimum of its emission onto the quartz walls discharge tube lamps with their blackening. And the quartz flask of the lamp discharge tube along its entire linear length for most of its service life remains virtually transparent, only slightly blackening against its cathode, thereby preserving its light transmission. And this work on a purely constant current of high-pressure mercury lamps such as DRL significantly prolongs their useful life with preserves their previous luminous flux without such a brutal decline. When operating at purely direct current, the DRL lamp behaves like a powerful zener diode similar to assembling LEDs connected in series, and instead of a ballast inductor designed for it, it requires similar circuit solutions to power the LED LED assemblies to stabilize its operating current, only for higher power and higher operating current lamps. So why then electric lamp plants did not develop and did not produce high-pressure mercury lamps of the DRL type specially designed for their operation only on purely direct current with only one self-heating oxide cathode in the quartz discharge tube of the lamp and one burning anode against it and a working anode in the form of a solid a pointed tungsten rod without any oxide coating instead of a second self-heating oxide cathode on the opposite side of the quartz lamp discharge tube? Why did the engineers then put such an emphasis on high-pressure and ultra-high-pressure mercury lamps, namely, alternating current, if their technical characteristics were always worse at the same time, and the useful life due to the intense blackening of their quartz bulb during their operation is much shorter than that of these lamps pure dc? They really liked to produce an excessive amount of mercury wastes requiring special processing, deliberately reducing the useful life of their high and ultra-high pressure mercury lamps !!! Alexei.

To answer

Andrew

In fact, when working on DC, the cathodes quickly become too thin