Alec Commander - Configure & Setup Device

Factory Default: FF (accessible only via USB)

Permissible values: 01 to FE (accessible via Alec Gateway)

Note: If you are linking < 100 devices to a single gateway you could assign them using only IDs representable in decimal notation (i.e. 01 to 99) for the user who are unfamiliar with hexadecimal notations.

When a ZC001 is shipped from the factory it is assigned the ID of FF (Hex). This is the same ID as the Alec IoT Gateway and when a command destined for ID=FF is received by the Gateway it will not be sent to the ZC001. So ZC001 will not cause any network problem when assigned with the default ID of FF.

If a ZC001 is to be used in a standalone mode then you may keep the ID as FF or you can change its ID using this command.

If ZC001 is to be used as an IoT device that allows management over the TCP/IP network from the Alec Commander Pro software, then you must connect them using a twisted pair multi-drop RS485 bus to an ALEC IoT Gateway, and each ZC001 must be assigned a unique ID of between 01 and FE (hex). Two ZC001 connected to the same RS485 bus MUST NOT be assigned the same ID otherwise both devices will become inccessible over the network.

Hence we recommend that you change the ZC001's ID via the USB connection using either the Alec Commander Basic or the Mobile Alec Configurator software that lets you change the ID via a mobile phone.

However, if for some reason you need to change the ID of a ZC001 that is already workings on a network and you understand the risk, it is possible to change its ID by clicking on the "Edit" button next to the Device ID box. You will be allowed to change the device ID to another unused ID.

If you make a mistake of assigning two devices to the same ID you will need to change one of them via the USB connection only since both will not be accessible over the RS485 network.

Clicking on this button will bring up the dialog box shown in section II). The dialog box allows you to set the time, define if the astronomical clock is to be used, as well as define the "Control Groups" that the lighting controller belongs to.

Default name: ALEC-ZC001

This allows you to assign a meaningful name to the ZC001 that you have connected to.

Note: The device name has no control significance and you can name them anything up to 40 characters in length, or you can leave them as is with their factory default name.

The textField shows the current date and time real time clock data in the ZC001. You can change its date and time by clicking on the "Set" button.

Each ZC001 has a real-time-clock (RTC) that has both date and time and is running continuously once it is powered on. However, in order to make use of the RTC-related capabilities of the ZC001 (such as real-time scheduling of its functions and logging of daily and hourly consumption data), its real time clock must be set to the correct date and time value.

Notes:

1) When a ZC001 is first powered up or recovered from a power failure it will lose its RTC value. You will notice that the ring LED indicator on the push button will blink rapidly 3 times every 30 seconds to indicate that the ZC001 RTC has not been set.

2) If the ZC001 is connected to the Alec IoT Gateway GW-E01 via RS485, then you DO NOT need to set the date and time of individual ZC001. You will only need to set up the IoT Gateway GW-E01's real-time clock once and the GW-E01 will automatically update the date and time of all the ZC001 every minute to synchronize all their actions. GW-E01's RTC is battery-backed and is also capable of updating its own RTC from the Internet so you normally don't need to do any manual settings of the RTC after a power failure.

3) If the ZC001 is a standalone unit and and if you do not intend to make use of the RTC-related functions then you do not need to set its RTC and the ZC001 will run on the settings based on "Default Settings" defined in this "Basic Configuration" screen.

4) However, if the ZC001 is standalone unit and you still want to make use of the RTC-related functions, then you must set its RTC via the "Set Date & Time" button described here after a power failure. For this reason if you deploy more than a few units of ZC001 in your work place it is advantangeous to consider networking them to a Alec IoT Gateway in order to let the Gateway manage the Real-Time Clock on all the ZC001 matically, and also enable you to program and control all of them via the Alec Commander Pro software.

Any ZC001 networked to an Alec IoT Gateway can belong to one or more of any of the 16 control groups. Check the control group check box if you want to assign it to a particular control group. The control group numbers are used by the "Monitoring & Control" function in the Alec Commander Pro. E.g. if Group Control send a 50% brightness command to group #7, then all the ZC001s that belongs to group 7 will be set to brightness of 50% and those that do not belong to group 7 will not react to the command.

Note: The Group control command only affects the selected zone temporarily. The brightness settings received from a Group Control command will not be memorized by the controller. If a zone has an occupancy sensor enabled, the next sensing will reset the zone back to the last user-set brightness. So the Group command is typically only useful to affect zones that may be unoccupied.

E.g. You could send a group command to turn off all the lights in a building. But if there are occupants at a zone and is configured to be turned ON by occupancy sensor then the lights will be turned back on as soon as the occupants trigger the occupancy sensor on that zone controller.

Factory Default: Enabled

When the lights are in the OFF or DIM state, if "Occupancy To Turn ON light" is checked then sensing of occupants will turn ON or brighten up the lights to the previous user-set brightness.

If unchecked then sensing of occupants will not affect the lights and the lights can only be turned ON manually (either via the push button or from the computer). However, vacancy OFF can still be enabled.

Factory Default: 3.00s

The total time it would take for the lights to brighten from minimum to maximum brightness.

Acceptable range: 0.01 to 10.00s.

Factory Default: Fully ON

This drop down menu allows you to select whether the lights are allowed to turn ON to the full working brightness (which means the last user-set brightness) or a partial ON restriction is applicable.

Many energy conservation regulations such as ASHRAE 90.1-2010/2013/2016 do not permit occupancy sensing to automatically turn on the lights to full brightness for most interior commercial space. The regulations demand that the automatic ON brightness level to be ≤ 50%.

If you select "Partial ON" the software would lets you specify the automatic ON brightness level. 50% would normally meet the codes, although it is possible to specify a lower brightness if the application permits it.

If the lights has been automatically and partially turned on to say 50% brightness, then to turn on the lights to full brightness, the user must press the manual switch once. Note that this restriction only applies to automatic lights ON. If you manually press the push button switch when the lights is off, they will be turned on to the full brightness.

If you select "Fully ON" option from the drop down menu, the software would automatically set the controller to turn on the lights to the full working brightness when occupancy sensor detects the presence of people.

0: Disabled.
Range: 1-32767s (9h 6m 7s)

Factory Default: 900 s (15 minutes)

When set to a non-zero value, the lights will be dimmed down or turned OFF when no motion (vacancy) has been detected for this period of time. Time may be entered in seconds only or directly as "Xh Ym Zs", which represent X hours, Y minutes and Z seconds.

0: Disabled.
Range: 1-32767s (9h 6m 7s)
Factory Default:0 s (disabled)

When the user manually switch on the lights (either via push button switch or from a computer), the lights will stay ON for this period of time before being turned OFF or dimmed down to the "Partial OFF" brightness value. This essentially turn ZC001 into a timer-OFF switch.

Note: "Manual Timer" is seldom used when vacancy timer is already in used. However, it is possible to enable both timers at the same time. If BOTH "Manual Timer" and "Vacancy Timer" are enabled, the light will ONLY be dimmed down when BOTH timers have expired.

Applications: if you are working at a location where motion sensor cannot reach but you do not want the vacancy OFF timer to kick in every 10 minutes, then if you set this value to 3600s you can turn on the light manually and it will keep the lights ON for at least 1 hour before the vacancy timer starts to act.

Factory Default: 7.00s

The total time it would take for the lights to dim from maximum to minimum brightness.

Acceptable range: 0.01 to 10.00s.

Factory Default: Fully ON

This drop down menu allows you to select, after the vacancy time out, whether the lights are to be turned OFF completely (either in dual-stage or single-stage) or to dim the lights down to a low level and stay indefinitely until the occupancy sensor is triggered again.

This setting employs a "dual-stage lights-OFF" strategy - When the vacancy and/or manual timers have timed-out, the lights will first be dimmed down to the "Auto-Dim Minimum (%)" level ( set via the "Advanced Config." screen) and then a "Delay-Before-Off" timer will start to countdown. When the "Delay-Before-Off" timer also expires, the controller will cut the supply power to the lights and the lights will be switched OFF immediately.

You can set the "Delay-Before-Off" countdown value via the text field below the "Delay Before Lights OFF" icon. As you realize, this "Dual-Stage" lights off strategy is a unique capability only found on ALEC lighting controler, and it completely eliminates one of the most annoying and unwanted potential side effect of typically vacancy off system, which is that the lights can suddenly be turned OFF if the occupant has not been active in the region for a period of time that exceeds the vacancy off period.

In this settings, when the vacancy and/or manual timers have timed-out, the lights will dim down within the Fade-OFF period, and then turn off completely.

In this setting, a "Partial OFF" icon will appear with a text field that you can enter a value between 1 and 100%. What it means is that after the vacancy and/or manual timers have timed-out, the lights will remain ON but will be dimmed down to this brightness level and stay DIM at this brightness indefinitely, until the occupancy sensor, a scheduled event or manual switch action changes the light level again.

Applications: For many public locations where there should be some lights for safety or for security reasons, and the lights should not be completely turned OFF when vacancy is detected you can set the light to be dimmed down to an acceptable brightness level. E.g. At 10% brightness level a typical 50W LED fixture will consume around 5W which is equivalent to a night light consumption but gives substantial brightness and save 90% of energy that would otherwise be wasted.

Code Requirement

All Current energy codes requires light that are located in the "Daylight" zone (near side windows or skylight) must be separately controlled and is able to reduce the lights either continuously or via mult-level lighting control.

The controller has a built-in light meter (lux meter) that continuously measures the amount of light in the space that is below its installed location. When enabled, the controller uses close-loop "PID control" technology to adjust the brightness of the luminaires it control in order to maintain the same brightness. Hence the brighter the daylight the dimmer is the artificial light (down to the "Auto Dim Mininum" value defined in the Advanced Config.).

If this is the first time the controller has been installed at a location, you must calibrate the daylight harvesting sensor the PID parameters used for the daylight harvesting control. Simply click on the "Calibrate" button to proceed to calibrate the daylight harvesting sensor. Calibration is automatic and takes about 15 seconds to complete. The calibration algorithm measures the actual lux contribution by the artificial lights at OFF and maximum level, and then sets the P.I.D. parameters it uses to carry out the daylight harvsting function. The P,I & D parameters can also be manually set in the Advanced Config. after automatic calibration.

Code Requirement

None of the current building energy codes mandate this feature but it could be included in future revisions. This feature is therefore optional and may be use with any of the energy codes selectable in this setup.

Our opinion is that with this new technology in place it is unneccessary to mandate the 50% maximum auto-ON restriction because the reason for the restriction is no longer valid. We hope that in the future revisions of the energy codes this restriction can be lifted if a controller is equipped with smart energy saver feature like ALEC.

Most current building codes do not allow artificial light to be turned ON automatically to 100% brightness by occupancy sensing. The reason behind this regulation is to avoid energy wastage that could result when a person casually walk past a zone without the intention to stay. If the lights were to stay fully lighted for the entire 20 or 30 minutes that obviously be a waste of energy.

ALEC zone controller solves this problem with its intelligent algorithm that measures the amount of activity in the zone after the occupancy sensor has detected the presence of people. If the activity level is low, ALEC Smart Energy Saver algorithm will set the time-out to only a fraction of the full time out value. The lights in the zone that was turned ON by the brief occupancy will be turned OFF after a fraction of the full vacancy time-out setting.

For example, if you have a zone with Occupancy-partial ON and Vacancy OFF after 20 minutes (ASHRAE 2013 requirement for most interior spaces), and you happen to walk into the space to pick up a notebook and then leave immediately, ALEC Smart Energy Saver will turn off the light after only a minute or two instead of leaving the lights ON for the full 20 minutes. This would save you a lot more energy than what you could possibly achieve with traditional vacancy sensor controlled lighting. However, as you spend more time in the space, ALEC will learn that you are active in the space and increment the vacancy time out up to the maximum 20-minute setting, so that you may never experience the vacancy off dimming as long as you are in the area.

When you enable "ALEC Smart Energy Saver" feature, a "Sensitivity" textfield appears which allows you to define the sensitivity of the Smart Energy Saver feature. The acceptable sensitivity is from 1 to 10. The higher the sensitivity, the quicker it is for the vacancy timeout to increase up the preset "Vacancy Time-out" value.

Smart Energy Saver Sensitivity Settings:

(0: disabled (uses vacancy time-out setting immediately)
1: least Sensitive (Reach max. vacancy time-out slowly)
10: Most Sensitive (Reach max. vacancy time-out quickly)

For example, a corridor that often only a handful of people may walk pass, the sensitivity can be set low (e.g. 1) so that if a person happen to walk pass it quickly, the vacancy time-out may occur after only a minute or two instead of the fully 20 or 30 minutes as allowed by the building energy codes.

When you first open the "Basic Setup" screen the current parameters set in the controller will be automatically retrieved. The corresponding lighting control function, the Daylight Harvesting and the Smart Energy Saver selection options are automatically updated.

After you have made your selection of the energy codes, the lighting control strategy, daylight harvesting and the Smart Energy Saver option, you must click the "Update" button for the software to configure the new settings and write these new settings to the controller.

If you have changed the selection but would like to abandon your choices you can retrieve the past settings from the controller by clicking on the "Retrieve" button.

Some of the settings you defined here can also be changed via the "Quick Setup." and the "Advanced Config." screen. You can easily switch between this "Basic Setup" screen, the "Quick Setup." and the " Advanced Config." screen by clicking on their respective tabs.