Garage door opener

[GoNavy]

This has nothing to do with ShopSmith, but still confusing...little back ground...last week my eleven year old Chamberlian Whisper belt drive garage door opener model HD800 had the pulley on the motor drive shaft snapped off, called Chamberlian (motor had life time warranty) couldn't be easier, they sent me a new motor with nothing more then the model num and serial num, great customer service. Since I already had the unit down from the ceiling decided to due some maintenance (had not done any in eleven years..lol) so bought a new belt, greased etc...and went to new LED light bulbs, the 60 watt ones they sell at Walmart, here is the confusing part..last night before bed looked through the garage door window to make sure the light in the opener went out, it was glowing..not really on, not off, kinda looked like a night light. Hit the light button on the remote, light lighted up real bright, as it should, turn light off, back to low glow, went to the garage and flipped off the breaker, total dark as it should be...so any ideas on whats going on, have to think this is an LED thing, opener socket must have some electrical leakage, not enough to light a bulb, but enough to fire a few LED's..any one else run into a problem like this, this is a new one on me. I could go back to regular bulbs, but if there is a problem with the sockets, that needs to be fixed doesn't it. Any electricians out there is this normal for a light socket to do, is it LED problem..I'm confused as to what to do..

[BuckeyeDennis]

My guess is that the opener uses a solid-state switch to turn the light on and off, instead of a mechanical relay. And that it has a small amount of leakage current. Ballpark of a milliamp will make LEDs glow, but not incandescent bulbs.

If you have a mechanical relay, you should be able to tell by inspection, or by the tell-tale clicking when it switches. If it is indeed solid state, the question remains whether this much leakage current is normal. The easiest thing is probably to call the manufacturer and ask.

[GoNavy]

Thanks Dennis, I pulled the bulbs and turned the light portion on/off did not hear any clicking, so guess I have Solid State switch. must be some power leaking going on, question is can this be fixed or are led's just going to be a no go for this opener. I saw some led bulbs on the net specifically for garage door openers, little more expensive, wonder if any of them account for this problem. I may give Chamberlain a call, I'm sure I am not the only person to try using led bulbs...

[sswoodworker48]

Genie door openers have an issue with LED bulbs that causes radio interference with the remotes. See the bulletin here: http://www.geniecompany.com/data/news/p ... 4-2014.pdf. They list some bulbs that work OK. Maybe Chamberlin has found LED issues, also.

[GoNavy]

Wow..doing some research and it seems this led glow effect is not as obscure as I thought it was...happens all the time I guess, primarily because low level of power that these led's can operate on were never considered years ago, not to mention all most all the articles I read said it will almost certainly happen if motion detectors or timers are involved and my opener has both a motion detector and a timer. No real harm is associated since the current leak, if we call it that, is by design to accommodate the timers and motion detectors, so I guess I just have a new capability in my door opener now...a night light...lol...cool

Still waiting on a response from Chamberlain, sent them an email to support, be interested on their take on this...

[JPG]

No experience with garage door openers, but the same thing occurs with a wall mounted infra-red body detector that turns the overhead light on. Yep when off like a very good night light. Been in use for over a year - NO problems. I am just living with it(the night light is nice to have prior to actual entry).

Previously had a spiral flourescent that acted really weird with the same detector.

[garys]

Solid state switches never switch fully off or fully on. They are a transistor of some kind that has residual resistance in both on state and off state. Older equipment has a mechanical relay that does switch fully on and fully off, so they work with any type of bulb.
Contact the manufacturer and see if they have a bulb they recommend, or just use the old incandescent lights which the opener was designed to work with.
Or, if you are sharp with repairs, simply add a relay downstream between the solid state switch and the lamp socket. Then it will work.