Digital Panelboard Covers / Directories

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Kansas Mountain

Kansas Mountain

Senior Member
Location
Oklahoma, United States
Occupation
Lighting and Lighting Control Designs
Think there would be a market for something like this?

Thinking if it had a touchscreen on the interior door, or maybe LCD screen w/ buttons, could be updated with an app, or maybe use a cable for secured connections by authorized personnel only? You could also use this to re-name panels during renovations/expansions.

No more excuses for every panelboard circuit directory to not be up-to-date at all times.

OR . . . is there already something similar to this out there that anyone's aware of?
 
Kansas Mountain said:
Think there would be a market for something like this?

Thinking if it had a touchscreen on the interior door, or maybe LCD screen w/ buttons, could be updated with an app, or maybe use a cable for secured connections by authorized personnel only? You could also use this to re-name panels during renovations/expansions.

No more excuses for every panelboard circuit directory to not be up-to-date at all times.

OR . . . is there already something similar to this out there that anyone's aware of?
Click to expand...

Pencil and eraser.??

Seems like a lot of dollars to put in something that normally doesn't get changed all that often. My HMI software gets at least 1 change a year. Going back to that one project 10 to 15 years later, you would be lucky if the product even had support anymore.
 
Reminds me of the (debunked) story of how NASA spent a butt load of money developing a pen so that astronauts could write in zero gravity, where as the Russians gave their cosmonauts pencils...

Although not true, the basis of the fable was that some problems don't need overly complicated solutions. 30 years ago I invented a push button that had a little tiny dot matrix vacuum fluorescent panel on it so that you could make the actual button head tell you what it does instead of using an engraved nameplate, you could even change it on the fly, allowing one button to have multiple functions. Engraved nameplates were too cheap by comparison and the multi-function aspect came out in touch-screen HMIs about a year later. Lucky for me I had sold the idea and been paid for it. Not a lot, but undoubtedly more than the company that paid me made on the idea...
 
Jraef said:
30 years ago I invented a push button that had a little tiny dot matrix vacuum fluorescent panel on it so that you could make the actual button head tell you what it does instead of using an engraved nameplate, you could even change it on the fly, allowing one button to have multiple functions.
Click to expand...

Your idea hasn't died:you can now buy a computer keyboard where the top of each key is a miniature display panel-- you can change what's on the keycap on-the-fly.

I also saw it on a security number pad-- it had a you-can't-see-what-button-I'm-pushing shield around it, and the numbers were randomly placed on the keypad for each use. You couldn't tell by which button was pushed what number it was. The name the company used was 'scramble pad.'
 
PaulMmn said:
Your idea hasn't died:you can now buy a computer keyboard where the top of each key is a miniature display panel-- you can change what's on the keycap on-the-fly.

I also saw it on a security number pad-- it had a you-can't-see-what-button-I'm-pushing shield around it, and the numbers were randomly placed on the keypad for each use. You couldn't tell by which button was pushed what number it was. The name the company used was 'scramble pad.'
Click to expand...
Oh damn! My brother was even in the security systems business, I never thought of that potential use...

NKK out of Japan is who ended up with those switches, although now they have a tiny little LCD screen on them and you can even put pretty little color pictures on the display, kind of like what they use at McD's for the people behind the register (since many of them cant read).
 
PaulMmn said:
Your idea hasn't died:you can now buy a computer keyboard where the top of each key is a miniature display panel-- you can change what's on the keycap on-the-fly.

I also saw it on a security number pad-- it had a you-can't-see-what-button-I'm-pushing shield around it, and the numbers were randomly placed on the keypad for each use. You couldn't tell by which button was pushed what number it was. The name the company used was 'scramble pad.'
Click to expand...
That scramble pad idea has been implemented for many applications for computers, using an on screen touch or mouse button press. That will also guard against most key press and mouse click recording malware.


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