Card Access
- Thread starter laketime
- Start date
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jumper
Senior Member
- Location
- 3 Hr 2 Min from Winged Horses
We installed some. Cost was about $350 with hardware. They are proximity readers, they are supposed to activate when you are close by without having to actually swipe the card. Has a keypad also.
Finding a decent card access system, is not the problem, having good insurance and bonding is, your electrical contracting insurance, will not cover work on card access systems. many times a company will get a price on a access installation, and then go shopping for someone cheap.
charlietuna
Senior Member
We have been installing them for many years and never had my liability insurance questioned. The installation is labor intensive because most of the time it requires installation of electrical controlled door locks. The cost of the card reader can get very expensive plus the cost of the cards. Basic one door system using magnetic lock starts around $1500. Caution must be taken to determine if the lock must be interlocked with the fire alarm system. We were set up to do the lock installs too.
The cost on these has a very wide range. Do you need a standalone prox card activated lockset? Or an access controller with one or more card readers which operates an electric strike, or a magnetic lock (this also needs exit motion sensor), or a solenoid that trips the latch in a mortise lock (such as used on double doors -PAIN to install as you have to drill through the center of the door from the mortise lock to where the wire comes out....and hope you dont drill out the face of a $1500 door). How many users does the system need to support? Are access logs required? IP connectivity? Fail safe or fail secure? Fire Alarm / Life safety interconnection? How much battery backup?
I also wonder, do you need to be licensed as a locksmith to install these?
I also wonder, do you need to be licensed as a locksmith to install these?
Why would anyone question your liability insurance, having the proper insurances in place, is your option, in the case of security devices, such as card access and locks, the liabality is way out there, an access point fails and allows access where an employee may be injured of even worse, or the doors not working, just looking at the access systems lawsuits, would be a red flag to insure to protect your business.
e57
Senior Member
- Location
- San Francisco, CA
Not sure what that is - but many states require other licensing/registration for access and security type work. You know - backround check, dead-beat dad locating, finger-printing etc.
jmargolis79
Member
- Location
- minneapolis
We install/repair one brand of card access systems and have to be a dealer for this brand. many brands require you to be a dealer. The cost of the reader and door lock are not that bad, but the cost of the sytem to run it can be in the thousands. They do make 1 and 2 door systems, that will save on cost but they do have limits to them. ie: number of cards, not all are connected to a network. and they don't always support all the extra features of a larger system.
If you are locking the door frame latch and don't want a card swipe for exit you won't a need a request to exit device. Also you wouldn't need to worry about fire alarms intergation as the door handle just would needed to be turned like a regular door to exit.
If you are locking the door frame latch and don't want a card swipe for exit you won't a need a request to exit device. Also you wouldn't need to worry about fire alarms intergation as the door handle just would needed to be turned like a regular door to exit.
No.
Nothing Access Control is reasonably priced. The labor to do it right makes it expensive. $1500 is right for a start of a 1 or 2 door system one door strike/maglock, card reader, REX, power supply possibly. Make sure all the variables are covered before quoting.
If you don't want to have to think too hard on this one, call ADI (any alarm supplier will work ADI is just the biggest,) they will put together what you need for a simple one door system
The separate locksmith, security licence crap is getting a bit much. (Extraneous License Fees are a great revenue source!!) A master electrician shouldn't have to jump through those hoops, but check anyway
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e57
Senior Member
- Location
- San Francisco, CA
I disagree on the two in bold - The labor doesn't make it expensive - the components do... And most electrical personel should not be exposed to lock-picks, or the liabilties of making keys IMO. Insurance is high enough....
That said - in the case of the controls themselves and the electrical components - under my license I could legally install such, as it is 'electrical' - but there is a fine line on anything past that... i.e. if itwere a fire egress door it might just cross that line , or required installation of additional non-electrical locks. (Although I have done both before) Then I would need a C-28.macmikeman
Senior Member
- Location
- Planet macmikeman
Hire an alarm company, mark up the cost and pass the job as a whole on to your customer. I used to do tons of access system stuff, and to do it right I had to equip myself with- coring drill system, rotary hammers, bits, plasma cutter torch for grouted metal door cutouts. I could probably think of some more gear that you soon find necessary. Like others said, when its egress doors there is lots to research, especially fire egress doors. Having said that, there is good money in access controls and cctv stuff.
charlietuna
Senior Member
Why would the liability be any different when my work also provides ALL surrounding functions of this door system? I install the fire system. I install the normal and emergency power to systems. I am an "unlimited state licensed electrical contractor". All aspects of the door control system is electric in nature. We have installed these systems for the City Police Department as well as a major Criptic Center for the for the U.S. Military Command. The burden of licensing falls on a locksmith for their knowledge of electrical installations, not a qualified electrical contractor. Many installs were for lock companies as well as Johnson Controls too, and all required Electrical Permits. To suggest that locksmithing has more liability than say, a fire alarm system, make little sense to me. This work is electrical in nature and should remain in the scope of electrical contractors.
dbuckley
Senior Member
- Location
- Canterbury, New Zealand
Make sure there is emergency egress - generally a breakglass - that fails safe.
zbang
Senior Member
- Location
- Roughly 5346 miles from Earls Court
Even if you don't need one for legal reasons, everybody I know uses a trained locksmith to install the unlocking hardware (strike, bolt, knob, maglock, etc). We pull the cable and configure the system, they do the doors. I, at least, never want to cut in an electric strikeplate again. (And don't even want to think about doing an electric knob.)
Kinda like concrete coring. Unless you do a lot of it, makes more sense to sub it out.
Kinda like concrete coring. Unless you do a lot of it, makes more sense to sub it out.
charlietuna
Senior Member
Well we do a lot of core drilling too ! I'm just considering the cost if i was to sub out certain parts of a simple system. My customers couldn't afford it. Just consider a mag lock. It's all electric. The interlocks are electric wiring and relays interface with the fire system. Of course we always consider emergency access and life safety issues. We even had a "jig" for drilling a door "side to side" for double door electric strikes. Locksmiths used to borrow it from us! This is a large field to turn over to the locksmith trade. And it's good work!!!
I disagree on the two in bold - The labor doesn't make it expensive - the components do... And most electrical personel should not be exposed to lock-picks, or the liabilties of making keys IMO. Insurance is high enough....
I don't know exacly what a C-28 license is. ( do not bother explaing it for my benefit, it does not matter). I do know it costs money and your time, which is money. We as an industry need to stop accepting the fact that just becuase there is an additional license needed makes it ok. It is not ok it adds to bottom line of the end user, and some day you might be that end user, or the consumer of your client, and now you are paying for that additional license. I did not say that you should be installing lock sets or making keys. That's not what was being suggested, and I agree electricans are not locksmiths. We should be free to install any device that is wired. Watering down the master
electricans scope of work, is like cutting off a toe or finger.
macmikeman
Senior Member
- Location
- Planet macmikeman
We made a jig for the exact same thing- the double doors with the strike on the passive side. I had a carpenter working for me full time that must have made a jig as he was passing from his mother. He made jigs for everything.
Side note- electric strikes on double doors are not the most secure thing, especially if there is luggage tugs driven by airport baggage handlers in the area of the doors, and somebody wants to go thru. A nice fat change order for mag locks on 750 doors put an end to that fairly well.
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