C-Bus to DALI install problems

Hi all,
just commissioning a C-Bus/DALI install and have probably painted myself into a corner here (metaphorically). The DALI ballasts will not accept (so it seems) a level 255 (MASK) setting for "Power On" default. So I then wrote a modules which when the lights power on it reads the the C-Bus DALI Application group level and after a 5 second delay, pulses the group off and back to it's original level - in effect - operating the switch.

I designed it like this as the spec says that when the room is unoccupied the lights turn off, when re-occupied the lights return to their original level. As there are both C-Bus switch lights and DALI dimmed lights in the same room I thought that using an interposing relay would do the trick - it doesn't seem to have worked.

e.g. If the lights were high when the room became unoccupied then when it is occupied occupied again the lights go to the default level of minimum, five seconds later C-Bus broadcasts the pulse but nothing happen. The light switch is still lit (5031NMx) so the DALI application is still at its' level.

e.g. If the lights were off they come on to low and pressing the switch on takes it to it's memorised state (memory toggle).

At No Time has the DALI Application level been changed.

As this tenancy is on a separate network to the Touch Screen I am going to take this logic off the the Touch Screen and place this logic the local network on a PACA controller and see it it works there (i.e. no network traffic delay). Can't be done till Monday now though.

Any help will be greatly appreciated. I'm stumped!

 

You are right in your assumption

I used an Addict to assign DALI addresses & to Groups & to set defaults. I have DALI group addresses in the project which are assigned to the DALI groups.

A PIR turns a relay on/off which interrupts the power to the room circuit. On coming back on any C-Bus lighting group, if it was on the light is on, if it was off the light's off - naturally. I assumed that the DALI would be the same - more fool me.

Through the addict I set the default "Power On" to 255 (MASK) but on test it just comes on full so I thought that I'd do some smart C-Bus scripting:

Once GetCBusState("CAS", "Lighting", "CAS G16PIR") = ON
then if (GetCBusState("CAS", "Lighting", "CAS NH") = ON)
or (GetCBusState("CAS", "Lighting", "CAS AH") = ON)
then begin

G16_DALI:= GetCBusLevel("CAS", "DALI", "CAS G16");
delay(5);
SetCBusLevel("CAS", "DALI", "CAS G16", G16_DALI, "0s");
end;​

That didn't work so I tried this:
same as above but from <then begin> it reads

delay(5);
PulseCBusLevel("CAS", "DALI", "CAS G16", 0%, "0s", "0:00:01", -1);
end;​

none of it works. I thought that the C-Bus sending the message down the line would trigger the C-Bus in a way that would simulate the switch use so that the DALI lamps would receive a level to go to (last set i.e. 0 then turn off, 29% then 29% etc.)

Now I'm wondering that because the Logic controller is on an adjacent network then it's too slow to react. I'm putting it onto a logic controller on the same network to see what happens. I don't like my chances though, I think that there is something I'm not doing right.

Thanks for responding. Tomorrow is test day at 10AM and it works in theory but the practical aspect is not working as expected.

 

DALI Ballasts

Don't know. Lights were supplied and installed by others. I was just called in to design install & commission. I've just found another error which requires a rewire for some light groups but not the DALI.

I'm pretty sure that they're Tridonic. There are CFs which I think has a PCA TCL EXCEL c one4all, 18 ? 24 W ballast and the T5 troffers have a PCA T5 EXCEL one4all 24?80W 220?240V 50/60/0Hz, dimmable but I haven't visually pulled one apart.

 

Hello Chris
From what you said it sounds like you are running the DALI fittings through a relay which is turned on and off by a motion sensor.
The DALI ballasts aren't designed to work like that.
You don't want to be interupting the power to the DALI fittings and should instead be controlling them with your DALI interface.
Use the relays to operate the "non DALI" fittings only.

 

Starting to seem obvious to me now - we learn

DON'T SWITCH DALI 240V FEED! This seems to be the obvious solution but I was trying not to rely on code but I guess I'll just have to do that. This just means a bit of rewiring in the switchboards (3 of) and some code written. I can do the code tonight & rewire the boards tomorrow (given the chance as the inspection is on then all being according to plan). I guess I'll just get defected.

Thanks for that.

 

How are you controlling the DALI from CBus?
Are you using a CBus DALI interface or the addict?

 

C-Bus controlling DALI

Yes the C-Bus controls the DALI lights through a DALI Gateway 5500DAL.

Sorry about the delay in seeing your response I've just done the "As Builts" for the changes to be made and am now programming the logic to trap DALI application group levels on shutdown so that the PIR can set the previous levels on occupancy detection.

This is not much fun. I wonder what I wasn't considering when I wrote the script to get the levels and then set then after power on? However, I've just got to make it work, tomorrow.

Cheers

 

Addict for set-up only

The Addict was only used to program the addresses, assign addresses to groups and set default ballast behavior. It's the non-compliance to the mask that it all went wrong unless the mask only remembers the arc on command. Lance did say that it should go to it's last state on mask or maybe I misunderstood him.

Cheers again.

 

Tridonic USB Interface

I have a Tridonic USB interface; is that the same as a SCI? I tried to look at the network after I programmed it with Master Configurator but as it didn't behave as the old Tridonic DALI config Tool 1.5 does I decided that I'll give it a miss until I have time to learn it. The config tool was a dog of a program and I found the Addict a dream to use.

I was lazy in going "quick & dirty", something I never usually do, but I feel that highly integrated systems are open to falling over through hardware/software glitches and I wanted to apply the KISS principle. As always the job is running true to form and it has only just got to the stage of fine tuning in the commissioning. Everything has appeared to work fine; switches & dimming work, PIRs work, etc but when other trades aren't in the way and one can get to the nitty gritty one finds that it isn't working quite as expected.

Thanks for your suggestions though, it's keeping me on track when my usual phone help isn't available (week-end!).

 

So today it all works exactly as I programmed it to. It seems that it takes forever for a B&W touch screen to synchronize between networks. I changed the TS this morning to have a different approach and now it doesn't work again. I'll come back tomorrow and it'll work fine. I really need to split the logic into separate networks so that each works off its local network but can be switched from the touch screen.

 

C-Bus DALI End Result

For ashleigh & DarylMc and anyone else who was interested.

I decided to rewire the switchboards so that the DALI lighting circuits wasn't to be switched via room relays but to be switched via level control. I rewrote the logic to appear like this as when the Room is occupied, if the lights are off they MUST come on - from re-reading the specs. This is all in one module per room:

Once GetCBusState("CAS", "Lighting", "CAS G16PIR") = ON
then if (GetCBusState("CAS", "Lighting", "CAS NH") = ON)
or (GetCBusState("CAS", "Lighting", "CAS AH") = ON)
then begin if G16_DALI = 0
then G16_DALI := 220;
SetCBusLevel("CAS", "DALI", "CAS G16", G16_DALI, "0s");
end;
​

Once GetCBusState("CAS", "Lighting", "CAS G16PIR") = OFF
then if (GetCBusState("CAS", "Lighting", "CAS NH") = ON)
or (GetCBusState("CAS", "Lighting", "CAS AH") = ON)
then begin
G16_DALI := GetCBusLevel("CAS", "DALI", "CAS G16");
delay(0.2); {I put this in to make the next line run on the next clock tick - I found long ago that this can sort problems where we make try to do read/write into memory}
SetCBusLevel("CAS", "DALI", "CAS G16", 0, "0s");
end;
​

I uploaded these rooms onto a logic controller to install into the local network and remarked out the equivalent out of the Touch Screen. As I cannot change the wiring in the 3 boards until tomorrow as the inspection was today I just connected it in and uploaded the Touch Screen. I found that I don't have change the wiring - it works perfectly and seemlessly as if there are no interposing relays. JOY of JOYs!

So, to check something out, I removed the logic controller and uploaded a version of the Touch Screen without that part remarked out and guess what?

Here's a hint, ONLY USE THE COLOUR TOUCH SCREEN OR A COMPUTER FOR MULTI-NETWORK INSTALLATIONS. The Mk2 B&W cannot poll and cannot see the sub-nets until the sub-net does something. So by tomorrow it should work when everything has actually been turned On/Off or had a level changed from the sub-net. Even then I don't trust it. I have requested that they install a B&W touch screen in the sub-net to control that as I don't trust the schedules to work from one network to another. Meanwhile I've left the logic controller in.

Here's another thing I observed. When using the DALI application on a switch and it's ON on the switch, for example, and I set it OFF via the logic (as I've done here) the LED light does NOT turn off as it would if it was on the "Lighting" application.

I have found this phenonimum on switches that have a TRIGGER CONTROL group as an application - if you have two or more switches with the same group on the separate switches and you turn one on the other switch does not turn on (the LED doesn't light up). To turn it off on the other switch it must be turned on on that switch and then turn it off. The original switch will still be ON. - This was a few years ago and I don't know if that's been fixed yet.

So ramble, ramble, ramble, I do go on.

Sort of fixed; all my stress was caused by the limitations of the hardware installed and not by my ability. What wasn't I taking into consideration? The hardware. Fortunately the Touch Screen was part of the original installation and NOT MY PROBLEM - the repair is a variation (including if only the logic controller is supplied).

Once again, thanks for your thoughts and support.

Chris

 

Hello Chris
I read this forum to try and learn some new things so thanks for the details of what you are up to.
I went looking for a reason why I was suggesting not to drop the power to the DALI ballasts and I could not find anything.
But on a site I have with 70 DALI ballasts after a period of about 12 months the ballast programming started to go a bit haywire.
The odd ballast had lost it's resume from power loss setting.
I could be wrong but I put it down to many loss of supply incidents.
To be honest I don't know if that has been a problem since but now I have set the CBus DALI interface to correct the status which it does after a period of time.
The good news is that it has been running for 3 years now without any other problems and not so much as a lamp failure in that time.
I did some documentation on the ballast address's at the time but I regret not writing the address on the ballasts for the time when I have to go and change one.
One thing I was able to do at the time which I thought was pretty cool was to have a laptop connected to the DALI SCI interface and use a remote session from another laptop to wander around and check the ballast address.
Although better planning might have made that unnecessary.
Glad to hear it's working out OK.

 

DALI & Power Loss

Daryl, Loss of power to a DALI ballast as a means of switching them is, as I stated, a "quick & dirty" method of switching them and not a method I like to use. But I'm getting old and at the time of design it seemed the best way to go. The programming is now set so that I can rewire the boards to bypass the relays but yesterday when it worked I was happy that it was working and after being so stressed I felt that that was that. Tomorrow I'll probably go and rewire the boards to eliminate the relays because I like my installations to be just right.

I hear of ballasts loosing their addresses but I haven't experienced it. I have heard that different ballasts (manufacturers) write to their eproms at different times. Some write when the power is removed, some write at every status change etc. To be honest I have no idea. DALI is a standard and how a manufacturer applies that standard is up to them. I have heard of a whole building being addressed over a period of days then the next day the whole lot had lost their addresses and they had to start again.

A trick I use is once all are addressed I drop the power from all the DALI lighting circuits. That way if it writes to the eprom on power fail its done straight away. I think Osram ballasts do this.

I always recommend Tridonic ballasts for DALI jobs because I've had the most success with them however, I have been told, that on large jobs, try to get all the same batch number. That's never going to happen I feel, unless you're organising a $M lighting purchase so have the buying power to dictate.

Personally I random address, map the addresses the same way as yourself except I use an iPad to RDP the laptop plugged in to the line with a wireless switch attached to the laptop, assign the groups and then draw up a plan as part of the documentation. If a particular unit fails completely I then repair / replace the faulty lamp and use "Physical Select" to assign the address. You can only do this one at a time of course. Government jobs appear to now require addresses affixed to each light but that may be just the engineers requirement. Good idea though.

Remember this though, DALI is a standard ONLY and it's mugs like us who have to make the physical things work depending on their nuances and who knows what that is going to be until we commission them?

Cheers.

 

Hello Chris
Thanks for your suggestions.
I did some searching and found some information on Vossloh-Schwabe DALI ballasts regarding saving the settings.

I am quite certain I never did this and hopefully it explains the loss of settings.
Documentation wasn't easy to find at the time but at least I will know for the future.
Since Tridonic supplies an interface, software and local support they would be high on my list as well.
One thing I never addressed to my satisfaction was a method to attach the DALI programming interface.
The DALI programming is the only thing on site which can't be done remotely.
I always wished there was an ethernet interface but I suppose it would not be so much use off site anyway.
I have some cables labeled inside the board to connect but I was wondering if anyone uses or has seen any good ideas for a terminal setup, plug in arrangement or perhaps ethernet connectivity.

 

Power Cycling DALI Ballasts

Hi again. I was talking to someone today "who knows" and is incommunicado with the manufacturers of these devices. At one stage they said not to switch the power to their DALI ballasts but they qualified that in that you don't need to to power switch the lights. In other words, use it's capabilities. However, they have come out recently and said that switching the power to their ballasts will not adversely effect their ballasts and will not effect their their ballasts' life span; i.e. it doesn't matter if you do power switch them.

So there it is.