advice required

[RMS]

Hi all,

i am currently undertaking a project at college. Its to create a project on electrical electronic principles and design anything related to this.

I was thinking of designing office lighting energy saving methods, by the means of dimming lighting when lux levels are met by means of natural lighting depending on the time and type of day. Also i was thinking of maybe having lights fed via a sensor and relevant contactors so lights are only on when rooms are occupied but i need to consider the advantages and disadvantages of this.

I will have to research this before taking it up but if anyone has carried out work like this and could offer useful information or ideas then thats great.

I was also thinking about making a flood alert system using float switches and have some sort of auto dialler for alert calls but will have to see which idea is best for me.

any advice greatly appreciated.

 

[JohnD]

Office energy saving is always a popular one.

An office I used to work in had a combination of timers, PIRs and contactors to do this:

08:00 All offices and stairwells lit.

18:00 Offices go down to half-lighting, PIR activated. Anyone showing signs of life in the office, the section in sight of that PIR returns to full lighting. PIR-set lights remain on for 30 mins after last movement detected. corridors and walkways set to half-light, except in areas adjacent to PIR-lit areas which are fully lit.

20:00 Offices go dark, except for PIR-activity areas. In offices where PIR is on in any part, the walkway/corridor sections to stairs and lift remain at half-light as long as PIR lights are on. Stairwells (which are also fire stairs) remain at half-light. walkwayss/corridors/lift lobbies have very occasional lights on so the security guard can patrol in safety. Walkways and lift lobbies on each floor go up to half light if movement is detected on that floor (usually patrols). Reception areas, guard's office and tearoom remain light. First aid room is controlled by local switching only. Plant rooms and Electrical cupboards have local switching and maintained emergency lighting.

Fancy designing one of them? An earlier version had office phones dialling a number meaning "lights on in the vicinity of this phone please" and "lights off in the vicinity of this phone please" but the PIRs were better.

 

[Steve]

Its a good idea to have offices on several circuits of light. I was giving a statement in a small room in a police station the other day, and the light came on automatically when we walked in. It was one of them new fancy 2-tube "wing" square recessed fitting, with dimmable ballasts (it dimmed on anyway!) and it had a tiny sensor mounted on the bottom of it.

A school i went to had a corridor where there are doors at either end, and classrooms down both sides. What they did is put a PIR at each end, a sound detector, and door contacts to control about 6 lights on this corridor. I guess there was an electronic control box.

Another school i went to had long-range PIRs and sound detectors on the corridors. You'd get half way and they'd go off though, too short a delay. you'd have to clap your hand to make the lights come back on. That was cool

 

[RF Lighting]

We had a new building at our school which had the lights linked to the class change bell. As the start of lesson bell went the lights came on, and the end of lesson bell switched them back off.

A nice idea, but a waste of power in the empty rooms that were switched on automatically, and as you were invaribly still in the room when the bell went, you ended up sat in darkness.

They had the system removed in the end, in favour of good old standard light swiches.

 

[industryspark]

is this the project section of the 2nd year HNC?

can remember doing mine couple of years ago if so, ended up doing an inductance / capacitance meter that could be used with a DMM.

all i can say is thank goodness for the wealth of info on the internet!

not an expert on lights by any means but if it is the HNC project a good piece of advice i could give you is to choose a project that you know you can definetly produce a good report/design on. we found that those of us who chose the 'right' project had the less stress and got through easy.

and incase your wondering, i was one of those who chose a sh*t of a project....

.....but made it through anyway, just

anyway tell me ive wasted my time now because its not the HNC your doing!!

 

[RMS]

Hi industry spark,

its 2nd year ONC project, i understand exactly what you mean, i am trying to find something simple to understand as my knowledge on electronics is limited, i know about the theory of capacitors,inductors, transistors, op amps etc. but trying to put it together and make sense of it in every day electronic circuits and i struggle a bit, but its something that i want to learn more about and interested in.

 

[industryspark]

Sorry couldnt be more help RMS.

know what you mean about the electronics, not my favourite subject to be honest but i managed to get through with this project ok.

the best advice i can give is like i already said, just take your time and choose the right one (something you know about and have an interest in)because a few in my class chose what they thought were good idea's but they had no realistic chance of achieving them.....but they didnt realise until too late!

also, your tutors will have told you to keep it well on track and get infront with the project-thats great advice believe me (advice which i must admit i didnt really take and therefore had more than a few alll nighters as a result! )

 

[ack351]

When i did my onc, and my hnc for that matter, i chose fairly basic projects, not because that was all i could manage but simply because the Btec projects are more to do with the planning than the implementation of something, basically they want to see you have the organisational skills to plan and see it through, and you must be able to present it well too.
For the record for my onc i rigged up some emergency lighting in my work place. Was a very simple project in terms of the technical side, but i included all the planning stages that went into it and all that stuff, like emails to suppliers, usual jargon, took lots of nice photos along the way to put into a powerpoint presentation,and i got a distinction for it. remember that although it will be your tutor that is marking it, and he may or may not be vastly technically inclined, the bloke who will be moderating them probably will never have picked up a screwdriver.

Anyway, good luck.

 

[RMS]

thanks for the advice guys.

I'm currently doing a re-fit job in a school that includes hall lighting, emergency lights, fire alarms etc. Think i might use this, as its something i am confident with and enjoy. Will take on board the advice.

thanks

 

[MattChan]

Hi RMS

I'm an electronics engineer, gis a shout if you end up doing something electronicy and need a hand

Matt