Scenes limits ?

Hello everybody, I have a questions about scenes.
I have a situation where i need to turn off some 300 Groups off (All Off Button) and each scenes can hold less than 100 Groups.
In my module scene1 and scene2 will run with no problem,but the scene3 and 4 will not process.
I tried changing orders and the 2 first scenes will alwayswork but not the the third or the fourth.
I also made sure not to overload the scene because at 55 groups sometimes the piced Logic reports shows overload warnings.So is there known limitation to how many scenes can be called in a module, I also tried to split the 4 scenes to 4 modules,only the 2 first scenes worked.
I am using Piced 3.7
What is the best way to turn off 300 Groups with 1 press, other than the house breaker ?.
Marc.

 

Hi Orihama,

Have you tried giving all the relay and dimmer modules an Area group address like Master and then place the master on a key input with on/off function. I know it is possible but just be careful of loads etc....

Regards

 

as mentioned use the area name to turn them all off, bu it is a ramp off not and on/off command that is needed.

I they reside in multiple areas, then use a scene to ramp the areas off. I currently do this at home now.

Mick

 

CIS recommends not using area addresses. Although they work, they do have limitations.

There is a limit to the number of group addresses that can be set in a single scan of the PAC logic. You can get around this by putting a delay between parts of the scene. For example, you could create 6 scenes with 50 groups each and do this :

Code:

SetScene("All Off Part 1");
Delay(1);
SetScene("All Off Part 2");
Delay(1);
SetScene("All Off Part 3");
Delay(1);
SetScene("All Off Part 4");
Delay(1);
SetScene("All Off Part 5");
Delay(1);
SetScene("All Off Part 6");

 

We tried a few scenes with 93 groups in each and ran the scenes 10 second aparts. During the second scene, the hardware respond half way through and revert back to first scene and stalled. I broke them one scene up to two smaller scenes each with a 1 second delay apart for each step, and it worked. So I want to confirm if the magic number for scene item is 50, right? Also, could we use a shorter period than 1 second between those two scenes because in my case my client didn't want to see the lighting start up differently.

 

Not necessarily. It depends on how much other logic you have running. See the logic help file topic "How Much Logic is Possible" in the FAQ section.

You can use a delay of 0.2 second. The only purpose of the delay is to prevent too many C-Bus group addresses from being set (added to the command queue) in a single scan.

Note that sending out 50 commands onto C-Bus will take around a second anyway, so there probably won't be a noticeable difference between a delay of 1 second and a delay of 0.2 second. See the FAQ help file topic "C-Bus Command Queue" for more information.

 

In a previous life (soon to be current life again) I commissioned a project where I had to control (on and off) approx 330 loads.

Now I like sleeping at night, so I made sure this significant amount of loads switched over 10's of seconds.

Its usually a good idea not to controls dozens and dozens of loads in an instant in the world of C-Bus, for several reasons...

 

If you are really into speed, you could take advantage of the fact that a big scene of up to 40 group - level pairs which can be stored in a DLT or a Neo, Saturn or reflections unit of recent vintage will play out significantly faster than one stored in a C-Touch.

This is because in a C-Touch, the scene is recalled and assembled by one microcontroller, and then sent to a second one (the C-Bus interface), to be broadcast on the network, while the simpler units do all of the above in a single microcontroller. You should be able to see 40 groups change state in about 1 second with a really long scene from one of these key units.

Of course, it's harder to keep track of scenes stored in units all over the network, but if you have a need for one "all off" scene or similar, this might be a neat way to finish the job quickly.

Don

 

I would suggest as PhilH has suggested... do it in stages. Turning off 300 loads is gunna cause a quite large spike on the mains, just as turning 300 loads on would create a dip.

Using Area Address does work, and I know a lot of sites that use it for all off and panic. There are some issues with synching the LEDs and Homegate / Touchscreens but it's not too bad as long as you understand exactly what teh Area Adress does (forces the loads off at a higher level than at Group level).

But I still kind of like the idea of scenes - it looks so much cooler when you make the groups turn off in a pattern working their way thru the site towards the door... I do that on all my new jobs, and it looks great

 

All depends on the actual application.

Will these loads be turning ON individually??

The Area Address is always a great option, however, good board layout from day one is important.

Cheers.