Planon

Planon is the brand name of a lamp from Osram that generates light with a dielectrically impeded discharge in xenon . The functional principle makes it possible to build flat lamps that emit light on their surface with high luminance and uniformity.

The lamp is operated with high frequency (around 40 to 100 kHz) high voltage and, like all gas discharge lamps, requires a special ballast for operation . Since this lamp uses high-frequency voltage pulses in the nanosecond range, this lamp requires electrical shielding in order to meet the requirements of the EMC guidelines. Since the supply cable, like the lamp itself, forms a capacitance, the length of the cable to the lamp is limited to around 20 cm to ensure safe operation of the lamp. Due to the dielectrically impeded discharge, it reignites with each pulse and can therefore be easily dimmed using a PWM process . For this reason, the lamp immediately reaches its full brightness when switched on.

Xenon is used as the luminous gas in this lamp, so that no mercury has to be evaporated in this lamp . Since electrons mainly contribute to the transport of electricity, it becomes less warm than fluorescent lamps and has a service life of up to 100,000 hours, limited by the service life of the fluorescent material. Nevertheless, the efficiency is lower than that of fluorescent lamps , since the Xe excimer discharge excites the fluorescent material with shorter-wave VUV radiation , at 172 nm instead of 254 nm (as with mercury), which increases the conversion losses.

The lamps can be built in different dimensions. Rectangular structures the size of an A4 sheet or more and a thickness of around one centimeter are common.

Because of their limited distribution and their rather complicated glass construction, the lamps are quite expensive.

swell

• Klaus Trampert: Charge transport model of dielectrically hindered discharges . Universitätsverlag Karlsruhe, Karlsruhe 2009, ISBN 978-3-86644-308-2 .