Browse Forums Home Theatre & Automation Re: Home Automation - what worked well? 21Aug 03, 2010 3:21 pm Something is not clear to me. I assume the "switch" for each bank is contained within the light switch. There would be a limit. For example, for Clipsal's C-bus Wireless, you can have one or two banks switched. Demolition August 2009, Construction Started September 2009, Completed December 2010 Re: Home Automation - what worked well? 23Aug 03, 2010 6:50 pm Thanks. When the time comes I'll have to look into UPB. Particularly if I find that a sample Clipsal Wireless switch at the furthest location can't be seen by the central wireless router. Another factor would be the power consumption of the light switches. Finally, the Clipsal switches currently win on looks. Basically Clipsal Wirelss and UPB are similar concepts and they win on the basis that you don't need a central controller, don't need to take all the wiring back to a central point (or points), can wire the house conventionally (and therefore upgrade later). Conventional C-bus is the wrong approach. Maybe Clipsal will switch to UPB too (or at least offer it as an option). Demolition August 2009, Construction Started September 2009, Completed December 2010 Re: Home Automation - what worked well? 24Aug 04, 2010 4:38 pm Casa2 Basically Clipsal Wirelss and UPB are similar concepts and they win on the basis that you don't need a central controller, don't need to take all the wiring back to a central point (or points), can wire the house conventionally (and therefore upgrade later). Conventional C-bus is the wrong approach. Maybe Clipsal will switch to UPB too (or at least offer it as an option). Conventional C-bus is 100% the correct approach. Automation should be done properly to start with, not something that is retrofitted latter. Doing it retrofit you loose a lot of the benefits, one of which is centralised wiring. Re: Home Automation - what worked well? 25Aug 04, 2010 8:20 pm AJW Casa2 Basically Clipsal Wirelss and UPB are similar concepts and they win on the basis that you don't need a central controller, don't need to take all the wiring back to a central point (or points), can wire the house conventionally (and therefore upgrade later). Conventional C-bus is the wrong approach. Maybe Clipsal will switch to UPB too (or at least offer it as an option). Conventional C-bus is 100% the correct approach. Automation should be done properly to start with, not something that is retrofitted latter. Doing it retrofit you loose a lot of the benefits, one of which is centralised wiring. At the risk of sounding argumentative, centralised wiring is the wrong approach. Smart lighting should use less wiring than conventional wiring, not more. With centralised wiring, all lighting banks need to be brought to a central location (or a few). One day, lighting will be done with individually addressed light fittings (or bulbs). Then all lighting will be wired as a single bank, just like GPOs. This will reduce wiring. The reduced wiring cost (parts and labour) will go most of the way towards paying for the smarts. And one day will more than pay for the smarts. (I can imagine going to Wollies and buying an LED light that has a unique address printed on the box, which you feed into the lighting controller, for less than $20 on today's dollars.) In the mean time, the best compromise appears to be conventional wiring then either wireless or UPB communication to make things happen. Demolition August 2009, Construction Started September 2009, Completed December 2010 Re: Home Automation - what worked well? 26Aug 04, 2010 11:06 pm Casa2 At the risk of sounding argumentative, centralised wiring is the wrong approach. Smart lighting should use less wiring than conventional wiring, not more. With centralised wiring, all lighting banks need to be brought to a central location (or a few). One day, lighting will be done with individually addressed light fittings (or bulbs). Then all lighting will be wired as a single bank, just like GPOs. This will reduce wiring. The reduced wiring cost (parts and labour) will go most of the way towards paying for the smarts. And one day will more than pay for the smarts. (I can imagine going to Wollies and buying an LED light that has a unique address printed on the box, which you feed into the lighting controller, for less than $20 on today's dollars.) In the mean time, the best compromise appears to be conventional wiring then either wireless or UPB communication to make things happen. My centralised wired house (I have 3 'central' points scattered around the place) used less cable, not to mention most of it is smaller than traditional means and was less work for the sparkie, hence cheaper to install from a copper cable and labour perspective. It is also so much easier to re-arrange lights if I so wish, which to me is one of the many reasons why having an automation system is a good thing and if something goes wrong quite easy to get to the parts to repair or replace. As I said I have 3 centralised locations where my relays and dimmers are located, and with good placement hardly any of the load cables are any longer than what they would be if they went to conventional wall mounted switches. Using traditional cable methods with switches with in-built realys (like C-bus wireless) to me is a waste of time and money, you may as well just have normal light switches and be done with the lot. The only good thing I see about C-bus wireless is using it in retro fit situations, remote situations or using the plug-in lamp style switches. Re: Home Automation - what worked well? 27Aug 05, 2010 4:33 pm AWJ, Let me see if I understand correctly. 1) With 3 central points, you have less wiring than the conventional setup wiring? 2) The electrician charged you less to wire your house than if it was conventionally wired up? Cheers, Casa Demolition August 2009, Construction Started September 2009, Completed December 2010 Re: Home Automation - what worked well? 28Aug 05, 2010 8:54 pm Casa2 AWJ, Let me see if I understand correctly. 1) With 3 central points, you have less wiring than the conventional setup wiring? 2) The electrician charged you less to wire your house than if it was conventionally wired up? Cheers, Casa Point 1, correct less power cable was used. Each light is on average 5m from a dimmer/relay, so for 20 odd points he used more or less a 100m roll of 1.0mm 3 core cable, plus about 20m of 1.5mm (may even be 2.5mm) 3 core to the main switch board. Doing it the conventional way there would have been more cable inovolved as a loop would have been taken to every swicth location and then every light wired to the switch. So you could probably add another 1-2m for the 1.0mm cable plus maybe another 25m or so for the 1.5mm cable. On point 2, when it came to labour cost he (or should I say the builder) charged the same simply becuase it was his first C-bus install so had no idea and I didn't really care too much. Bearing in mind of course I did the LV side of the C-bus. Afterwards the sparkie and I had a yarn and he said that it saved him about half a day in effort as it was easier to run the cable and fit off. When it came to the cost of parts, I wasn't charged for the surge protector that was installed in the switchboard in lieu of the cost of switches that I did pay for. So as far as I am concerned A) less cable and a smaller size cable at that was used, B) the effort involved in installation was less (so should have been cheaper by all rights) and C) the system that I have is far more flexible that conventional wiring, a point proved by the changes I have made many times in the 10 years since I first installed the system. If I were to do it now I would make one change though. You will note that I did this 10 years ago, so this was before DIN releays/dimmers were available, so my dimmers etc are all 4 channel and are mounted on platforms in the roof cavity. I would now move these to DIN boards and because the capacity of the DIN modules is higher (up to 8 dimmers in 1 package and 12 releays) I would probably have just one or maybe two locations rather than 3. Of course this would mean the run lengths would increase, however I think the minor extra cost for more cable would far out weigh any down side, and of course the time to install, repair and modify would be far less than traditional cabling methods. Re: Home Automation - what worked well? 29Aug 05, 2010 10:36 pm Thanks AJW. C-bus is sounding more attractive. Unfortunately my electrical rough in is now finished so I have to look for another method for controlling my lighting. Demolition August 2009, Construction Started September 2009, Completed December 2010 Re: Home Automation - what worked well? 30Aug 15, 2010 7:39 am Hi all, have just started looking up about Home Automation, does someone have any estimate of costs etc. I am an electrician but at moment Home Automation might as well be nuclear physics as I have no idea what to do with it! Re: Home Automation - what worked well? 31Aug 15, 2010 12:47 pm Ross, Estimate of cost is difficult without knowing what you want to do. In my case, I've made sure the "hooks" are in and will put in the systems as required. For example, Clipsal wireless switches can be changed over for conventional swithces at any time. This gives you control over lighting. Run lots of data cabling. This is useful not only for data but for anything that is not mains voltage such as automatic curtains, temperature sensors, motion sensors, etc. In my case, the extra data cabling has cost at the moment. Also, I've got three touch screens going in, a conventional front door video system and an automatic door latch. When time and funds permit, I'll start adding things. In the end I'll have: 1) Three touch screens and the ability to use myiPhone or iPad to control things 2) Front door video able to appear on any of the control panels 3) Automatic door opening 4) Automatic curtains 5) Themes, such as Home Theatre where the screen comes down, the curtains close and the lighting adjusts 6) Temperature control 7) Security system I'm sure lot's more will be added over the years. Cheers, Casa Demolition August 2009, Construction Started September 2009, Completed December 2010 Re: Home Automation - what worked well? 33Aug 17, 2010 4:42 pm Jezza what system are you using casa? I'm a software programmer, so one of my hobbies will be to write all the software myself. Should be fun. Demolition August 2009, Construction Started September 2009, Completed December 2010 Re: Home Automation - what worked well? 36Aug 18, 2010 10:10 pm That sounds interesting. Test equipment?? Spec ans and scopes or other? Build thread: viewtopic.php?f=31&t=34120 Handover 23 Dec 11 Squatting 21 Dec 11 Fixed 12 Oct 11 Plastered 31 Aug 2011 Framed 7 June 2011 Site Start 7 Feb 2011 Land Titled 18 Jan 2010 Land Deposit 25 Jun 2009 Re: Home Automation - what worked well? 37Aug 21, 2011 8:54 pm Where did you all get the tracks for your automated curtains? Re: Home Automation - what worked well? 38Aug 25, 2011 10:06 am has anyone had experience with products from http://www.smarthome.com.au - would be interested to hear feedback on them Re: Home Automation - what worked well? 39Sep 01, 2011 2:26 pm Hey, Newbie here ... I am in a rental property but have a lot of freedom in that the landlord aproves anything I want to do to the house, as long as I am the one paying for it. Whilst this is awesome, I also have a small budget so it means I prefer to spend the minimum. This thread is well cool. I would love to do some of the things suggested. Can anyone give me an idea of how much something like the automated curtains cost please? I doubt anyone could give me ideas of costs for some of the other things but I would love the abillity to have an automatic timer for light switches as well. I also want to ramp up my home security system with cameras that record both out the back and in front, in part so I can see who is at the door before opening it ... but I guess that is a different thread. Home Automation - what worked well? 40Sep 01, 2011 3:36 pm How much are we looking at for the Clipsal wireless solution? 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