ZED offers a wide variety of electronic ballasts:

• electronic ballasts for one, two or four uv-lamp operation
  • ballasts with integrated hour counter and uv-monitor
  • power range from 10W to 600W
  • lamp current from 100mA to 6A
  • supply voltage 115V AC, 230V AC, 12V DC and 24V DC
• instantaneous start without flicker for long lamp life time
• equipped with power factor correction - CE-conform
• lamp faults are indicated by a potential free relay contact (alarm trigger); LED´s display the current mode of operation
• up to 30% energy saving compared to conventional ballasts
• preheat on request
• dimmable electronic ballasts on request
• microprocessor controlled electronic ballasts with RS485 port for PLC (Programmable Logic Controller) connection
• starting component for delayed power-on of 4 (by cascading up to 16) electronic ballasts

Please contact us if your lamp requires other technical data. We are able to adapt lamp and ballast in most cases.

Why electronic ballasts?

The electronic ballast became the standard in the lighting industry. It leads to significant energy and money savings in nearly every application. The lamp operation is flicker free and the ballast produces virtually no noise or hum.

The incoming 50/60 Hz power (115 or 230 volts) is converted to high-frequency AC (usually 20 to 40 kHz). This leads to a constant gas discharge compared to conventional ballasts and prevents cathode flicker.

Electronic ballasts are more efficient than magnetic ballasts in converting input power to the proper lamp power. The operation of uv-lamps at higher frequencies reduces end losses, resulting in an overall lamp-ballast system efficacy increase of 15% to 20%.

Electronic ballasts are directly interchangeable with magnetic ballasts. They operate with most of available uv-lamps. Long term usage has demonstrated the reliability of electronic ballasts.

Electronic ballasts that operate two or four lamps at once, are allowing the use of a single ballast in systems with several lamps. This reduces installation and field wiring costs. Other advantages are reduced weight, quieter operation and reduced lamp flicker.

The advantages of using electronic ballasts in UV lighting at a glance:

• constant power level within the whole range of mains voltage (+/- 10%), giving consistent performance throughout the range
• instantaneous start without flicker, which conserves the lamp
• dimensions of the cabinet can be kept small
• minimum wiring necessary
• no compensation required
• lamp faults are indicated by a potential free relay contact to be processed by external systems (alarm trigger), a LED displays the current mode of operation
• the electronic ballast shuts down automatically in case of fault
• no cathode flicker, even at low temperatures, because of high-frequency operation
• up to 30% reduction in energy consumption compared with conventional gear
• improved efficiency
• low heat generated (efficiency of the ballast > 90 %)
• longer lifetime of the lamp

Electronic ballasts basically consist of the following functional units:

• filter - EMI-filter to attenuate conducted RF noise
  rectifier
• PFC (power factor correction) - provides sinusoidal line current
• charging capacitor
• frequency controller (for high-frequency conversion)
• power stage
• resonant tank
  and also
• fault logic (open-circuit / short-circuit protection)