Indoor PIR's used Outdoors

Hi,

I was wondering if it would be possible to use an Indoor PIR (5753L) in a porch. The PIR will be located in the ceiling of the porch and will be out of the bulk of the weather (certainly the rain). All I need is to pickup when someone is at the door (not when they are walking up to the door). So mounting the PIR directly over where their head would be seems sensible. The outdoor Clipsal PIR will just be too bulky (and ugly if I might say so).

JB

 

so what make the isntallation different to an indoor install.

It is out of direct sunlight

It is out of the rain and weather

Might get a little dusty, I dont know what their IP rating is.

If it were me I would put it in and give it a go.

 

I'd be curious to see how it goes. The 5753's don't have an IP rating as such because they're designed for indoor use.

I'd be interested to see if you have any false triggering problems with temperature changes, airflow through the unit, condensation etc. If you install a 5753PEIRL (multisensor) in lieu of a standard 5753L then you've got the option to dial the sensitivity back if you have false triggering issues. It would also allow you to set the sensitivity such that someone has to be right at the front door before it trips. Could be handy.

The other thing of interest would be longevity, i.e. if there is any degradation of performance in the coming months/years as it grots up with crud.

 

One of our installations has 3 PIRs mounted in this exact situation. The only problem was that time one of them got hit with a hose to clear the cobwebs... a new PIR and a brief lesson on water vs electronics, and there hasn't been another problem. They've been installed for a few years now.

 

The right advice

The 5751 occupancy sensor is designed as an indoor device and does not feature an IP rating. In addition it does not have a sealed optics chamber. The 5750WP on the other hand has an IP66 rating and is a completely sealed device. Why is this important? One reason is that drafts, insects etc can enter the optics chamber resulting in false triggering; secondly high humidity can cause loss of the sensors sensitivity with time. The other thing to notice is that the 5751 features a thin polypropylene window that can move, any wind gust on it may also result in false triggering. The 5750WP features a rigid Fresnel lens. Also have a read of ?Your Comprehensive Guide to Installing Infrascans? by Clipsal circa 1996.

 

I did the exact same thing to save money + i think the indoor sensor looks 100% better than the outdoor one. Mainly choose them because i think they look much neater than outdoor sensors.

Always used to get false triggers even after adjusting settings etc.

About 6 months later after the initial install I removed them all and installed outdoor sensors.
Best thing i ever did.

They are much better at reducing false trips.
You can adjust the angle in which they look much better than the internals.

Any new installs I don't even try and use the internal sensors outside.

Jason..

 

Today I have found that my Outdoor Infrascan has stopped working. On close inspection I found water had somehow got inside, and has damaged the electronics. I find this weird as it was rated IP66.
It was located on the southern side of house.
Has anyone had similar problems? or is it a manufacturing fault.

 

See http://www.cbusforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2585

I had the same issues...

Cheers

 

it happened. the water probably went in via the cat-5 cable, people suggested. Also look at all the joining parts at the back closely because I had seen a cracked join. It was two or three years ago though.

 

pir

i have 4 indoor pir,s out under the eaves at my house.
they have been there for 3.5 years so far.
yes they do trigger in the wind but i have disable buttons on a touchscreen
which is perfect when its windy.
as far as w/proof , i dont directly hose them but i do hose around them on occasions and have had no problems so far.
in my opinion they look heaps better than the w/p model.

cheers

 

We just had the Indoor PIR blow in our (indoor) storeroom area. It died and melted the plastic of the cover from a short circuit. There was a water leak in the floor above, and the water got in there somehow.

2 days later one of my work mates had the same thing die at his house. Perversely, it was the same model, same fault, and also was killed by a water leak coming in from the top !

So, they definitely don't like water, those little beasties. Also odd that they both drew sufficient current from the bus to heat up and melt the plastic casing no wonder the C-bus was acting somewhat oddly on both sites prior to the eventual death of the PIRs

 

Not really. Its easy to have 2 amps worth of supplies on the bus, and at 30+ volts that's 60 odd watts.

That plastic must have a pretty high thermal resistance. I believe the plastic of the sensors probably has a thermal resistance of about 30 degC per watt per mm, so assuming the walls are 1mm thick, it won't take too many watts to get up over the melting point. (Obviously the area has to be taken into account, which I have not... )

But just think how stinking hot a 50W light fitting gets - and it has plenty of ventilation. Even a 7W pilot lamp in a small, enclosed space gets damn hot, and we've got plenty of watts to play with on the bus!

 

Maybe one day CIS could design an IP66 sensor that does look like the 5753 series and less like something off a space ship. I could contain the feature set of the multisensor with sensitivity and time adjustments.Just like all the 240 product does.

 

Hey - they JUST FINISHED re-designing it !

The sensor head's the same, but the knuckle arm and cable sealing method are based on a new design :

 

Looks are more than skin deep

Just to fill you in as to why the 5750WP is 'so ugly' it was a deliberate design choice (dating back to the original and still existing CLIPSAL 240V Infrascan PIR products).

Because the unit was primarly used to detur crims creeping up your drive in the dark then it should look 'aggressive' (in fact it was stylised to look a bit like a dogs head and neck) rather than be discrete.

The idea was to stop the crim coming on to your property in the first place rather than just scaring him once he did.

 

LOL, Uncle Sam.

Yeap, that makes sense in a perverse kind of way. But I guess I don't need to point out the obvious fact that since they are creeping in the dark, they cannot SEE the PIR unit anyway...

Before I was involved in Clipsal products, I looked at Infrascans for my own home and decided not to use them due to their ugly appearance and high cost. I now realise that the cost has a lot to do with the quality of the detectors and electronics, and wish I had not used the pretty-looking alternatives - they never really worked propoerly and now they are all dead!

In my mind it's doubtful that ANY sensor, or even lights turning on from a PIR, would make the slightest difference to any real criminal. Having a big ugly sensor that is hanging out there for the world to see just makes it blatently obvious what "security method" is in use, and due to the design makes it exceptionally easy to disable (especially the old one, just chop the exposed cable).

But we can't knock the IP-rated Infrascan since it is an exceptionally sucessful product, but it sure would be nice if there was an attractive version for all those situations where there is an "more real" method (eg: alarm) to deter criminals.

 

The 5 P's

We assumed the Crims would 'case the joint' first in daylight and hopfully move on if they saw some form of safety measure in place, the same rational that has people put stickers on the window saying 'protected by Bloggs security' etc.

As for their effctivness there must be something to it as I recall occasions where 240 or C-bus versions were vandalised before an actual or attempted break in occured