Modern Commercial Lighting

Seven-Delta-FortyOne

Seven-Delta-FortyOne

Goin’ Down In Flames........
Location
Humboldt
Occupation
EC and GC
I have very little experience with most modern commercial lighting, besides basic occupancy sensors, lighting in ceiling grids, photo cells, etc. So basically, none.

I haven’t worked with lighting contactor panels, 0-10v dimming, ceiling mounted occupancy sensors, and some of the more complicated systems that I’m seeing on these smaller commercial jobs that I want to bid.

I’m not a big “watch a YouTube video and now I’m an expert” type, I prefer to find and read the national standard textbooks, and then seek out professional training when I want to branch out.

Does anyone have a personal favorite for getting up to speed on some of the new things coming out?

One job I was looking at bidding, the lighting supplier added the startup from the manufacturer to the bid, and told me it would be a good idea if I hadn’t done it before to have them do the initialization.

But I’m not even familiar enough with what part I would be doing and what part the supplier would be doing, so I passed on bidding it. But I’d like to be able to maybe branch out into this, since it appears to be the wave of the future.

Thanks for any advice.
 
LED stuff keeps changing so fast. I installed some high bays last summer. Guy decided he wanted one more for a certain location last fall or winter but they had already discontinued the ones I used. Had one that was very similar that I ended up going with. Can't recall what the difference was, but kind of recall it was basically same thing and was kind of presuming any differences were basically "improvements" to an existing product.
 
I’ve installed high bays in commercial shops, and quite a bit of other lighting.

Specifically, I don’t have any experience with 0-10v dimming. I see that there both line voltage switches, and low voltage. I guess some go to a relay panel, and I have no clue how many get wired on one switch.

I look at these plans, they spec the lighting, spec “0-10 volt dimming”, but other than that, I haven’t done any of this, so it makes bidding a little hard.

I’m looking for either find the right job and bid it low just to get the knowledge, or maybe talk to my lighting supplier about some kind of manufacturer training.

Or if someone here offers a basic tutorial on the systems, I’d pay for that.
 
Seven-Delta-FortyOne said:
don’t have any experience with 0-10v dimming
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Most 0-10v dimming may be specified for programmed lighting control panels, or Energy Mgmt. Systems.

I've seen line cable with integrated control wiring, so 0-10v can run to devices, but never actually seen a switch with terminals for both line voltage, and 0-10v dimming.
 
Seven-Delta-FortyOne said:
I’ve installed high bays in commercial shops, and quite a bit of other lighting.

Specifically, I don’t have any experience with 0-10v dimming. I see that there both line voltage switches, and low voltage. I guess some go to a relay panel, and I have no clue how many get wired on one switch.

I look at these plans, they spec the lighting, spec “0-10 volt dimming”, but other than that, I haven’t done any of this, so it makes bidding a little hard.

I’m looking for either find the right job and bid it low just to get the knowledge, or maybe talk to my lighting supplier about some kind of manufacturer training.

Or if someone here offers a basic tutorial on the systems, I’d pay for that.
Click to expand...
The main power still needs to be run through a switch if you want it completely "off".

The 0-10 volt dimming is pretty much all on board the driver and your dimming control is mostly a variable resistor to adjust feedback voltage to the driver to signal it what level of output to deliver. Multiple luminaires on same control are just connected in parallel and one series segment of this circuit runs to the switch.

Purple and pink leads for dimming are the norm now - used to be purple and gray, then someone decided that can be confused as a neutral conductor I guess and they went to pink. So you may find older units with the gray lead. All you need to do is tie all purple together and all pink leads together. A dimmer switch will also have purple and pink leads for the dimmer leads. They don't have to be run separate from power conductors, they are just treated like class 1 signal and control conductors, so if running with power conductors you do need to use 300 or 600 volt conductors.
 
ramsy said:
Most 0-10v dimming may be specified for programmed lighting control panels, or Energy Mgmt. Systems.

I've seen line cable with integrated control wiring, so 0-10v can run to devices, but never actually seen a switch with terminals for both line voltage, and 0-10v dimming.
Click to expand...
There are so many options. First off, there are two major ways to control 0-10v dimming. Either a controller/relay installed above and a low voltage cable to a dimmer switch in the wall. That gets just 2 or 3 wire cable. The other is a line voltage switch with 0-10v dimmer wires from it. Those usually have pink and purple pigtails and either terminals or additional pigtails for the line voltage. Care must be taken with the second option, for example Accuity brands are Class 1 wiring only, but I didn't find that out until I had one in my hands. There was a tag on the wires, but no information about that on the cut sheet.
 
Seven-Delta-FortyOne said:
I have very little experience with most modern commercial lighting, besides basic occupancy sensors, lighting in ceiling grids, photo cells, etc. So basically, none.

I haven’t worked with lighting contactor panels, 0-10v dimming, ceiling mounted occupancy sensors, and some of the more complicated systems that I’m seeing on these smaller commercial jobs that I want to bid.

I’m not a big “watch a YouTube video and now I’m an expert” type, I prefer to find and read the national standard textbooks, and then seek out professional training when I want to branch out.

Does anyone have a personal favorite for getting up to speed on some of the new things coming out?

One job I was looking at bidding, the lighting supplier added the startup from the manufacturer to the bid, and told me it would be a good idea if I hadn’t done it before to have them do the initialization.

But I’m not even familiar enough with what part I would be doing and what part the supplier would be doing, so I passed on bidding it. But I’d like to be able to maybe branch out into this, since it appears to be the wave of the future.

Thanks for any advice.
Click to expand...
I would not worry too much about it. If you are just talking about lighting controls, put money in for running the additional dimming wires, and bid either an Accuity system or a Wattstopper system your first time. Have them include startup. Throw in 15 minutes a device to support startup and learn by doing. I am assuming 10,000 to 20,000 square foot job for this. If larger or smaller, may need to rethink. If you have a half decent engineer they will have details and part numbers so you can look and see the nuance of the devices you are using. Each has different parameters, like Nlight or DLM that are Cat 5 connected or Leviton that tends to be only DIY.
 
Strathead said:
There are so many options. First off, there are two major ways to control 0-10v dimming. Either a controller/relay installed above and a low voltage cable to a dimmer switch in the wall. That gets just 2 or 3 wire cable. The other is a line voltage switch with 0-10v dimmer wires from it. Those usually have pink and purple pigtails and either terminals or additional pigtails for the line voltage. Care must be taken with the second option, for example Accuity brands are Class 1 wiring only, but I didn't find that out until I had one in my hands. There was a tag on the wires, but no information about that on the cut sheet.
Click to expand...
I find it rather pointless to separate and call the 0-10V class 2 when they terminate in same location as the power conductors. There is some separation but still incidental contact risk. If anything you do lessen capacitive/inductive effects, but not by much if running nonmetallic sheathed cables right next to one another.
 
Strathead said:
I would not worry too much about it. If you are just talking about lighting controls, put money in for running the additional dimming wires, and bid either an Accuity system or a Wattstopper system your first time. Have them include startup. Throw in 15 minutes a device to support startup and learn by doing. I am assuming 10,000 to 20,000 square foot job for this. If larger or smaller, may need to rethink. If you have a half decent engineer they will have details and part numbers so you can look and see the nuance of the devices you are using. Each has different parameters, like Nlight or DLM that are Cat 5 connected or Leviton that tends to be only DIY.
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Thank you kindly
 
ramsy said:
Thank you for sharing this.
Never seen 6 wires from one device.
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I never seen one that wasn't combination single pole/three way. Also almost always used them as single pole switch. But even the line voltage dimmers and fan speed controllers are trending to be this way lately from my observations. at least the ones with "Decora" face to them seem to be that way.

I have noticed that the old school 1000-2000 watt dimmers are difficult or even impossible to get anymore. Needed one a couple years ago for a food warmer case in C store. It had heat lamps inside the case and the dimmer switch was a lutron 1000-2000 watt (don't remember exactly which ) but couldn't find any as it apparently is discontinued now. They told me they never dim the heat lamps, so I ended up putting a non dimming switch on it.
 
Great info, and I appreciate you all taking the time to assist me. 👍

Every set of plans I’ve bid, the lighting system has been spec’d, and almost always it’s an acuity system. I will certainly add the factory startup on my first few projects.

For the low voltage, do you just usually run #16 or 18 mtw, or just 14/2 MC cable for the LV as well?
 
Seven-Delta-FortyOne said:
Great info, and I appreciate you all taking the time to assist me. 👍

Every set of plans I’ve bid, the lighting system has been spec’d, and almost always it’s an acuity system. I will certainly add the factory startup on my first few projects.

For the low voltage, do you just usually run #16 or 18 mtw, or just 14/2 MC cable for the LV as well?
Click to expand...
FYI, we use factory startup on any Acuity system that includes a lighting control panel or anything nLight. Even with a fair amount of knowledge in the company.
 
Strathead said:
FYI, we use factory startup on any Acuity system that includes a lighting control panel or anything nLight. Even with a fair amount of knowledge in the company.
Click to expand...
Factory keeps spare keys for rival service, but extreme transients further up the grid thins out everybody touching this stuff.
 
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