help with home lighing system - rako???

[captain morgan]

I hope this doesn't sound like double dutch and someone can help with this

We're knocking the ground floor of our place into one open plan living space.

I been spinning my wheels looking at lutron, c-bus, futonix etc etc but these all seem a little ott for our needs

I was hoping to use Rako as multi-way switching/dimming rather that as scenes.
using RAK-4 mounted at a central point

e.g. we will have kitchen, dinning, lounge and study spaces each with there own lighting circuits (I think 8-12 a halgon down lighter circuit and wall mounted up lighter in each "space") .

I wanted to use Rako to get 3 or 4 way switching / dimming.

So switch 1 is in the kitchen and switches the kitchen, dinning, lounge and study light circuits individually via buttons 1-4

switch 2 in in the lounge and switches the kitchen, dinning, lounge and study light circuits individually via buttons 1-4

switch 3 dinning etc......

To use scenes I'd add a second switches in the lounge and kitchen dedicated to scenes

does that sound do-able?
does it even sound like English

Thanks in advance for any advice.....

[hornydragon]

HI i think you have your wired crossed a bit as to how the systems work the buttons on a Rako controller are scenes. The dimmer stores a scene, and the keypad recalls it there isnt a switch and a scene control.

Rako works on rooms, Room 1 2 3 etc if you set each zone as a room you can a group master whioch controls all 3 rooms within a group which will set every dimmer in the group to a scene, what it wont do is give you on and off of 4 rooms from one controller (at least not easily)

[captain morgan]

Thanks for the response Horny Dragon but I don't think I made myself clear can I have another pop?

Assuming I have 10 channels in the whole ground floor area.
Can I configure scenes so they only adjust targeted channels and not others?

e.g.
With the scenes configured below

sw1: B1: = Channel 1 100%
sw1: B2: = Channel 2 100%
sw1: B3: = Channel 3 100%
sw1: B4: = Channel 4 100%

At a start point of no lights on obviously B1 would bring C1 to 100%. What happens if I now press B2?

Will it kill C1 and bring C2 up to 100%
or
If C1 has not been addressed in the scene called by B2 will it stay at 100%?

I guess the next question is switching lights off?
Does the off button only work for the currently selected scene - if so that's livable as your only ever two buttons away from switching off a channel.

The ideal (for me) would be if there was a way of configuration the rako system to offer similar functionality as c-bus.
Where you have the option of a short button press will toggle lights on/off and long presses dim up/down.

If not can anyone suggest which is the next route to take as I see the ability to individually switch a light channel from 3/4 switch points as key to the system?

Thanks again.

[hornydragon]

Originally Posted by captain morgan

[SIZE=2]Thanks for the response Horny Dragon but I don't think I made myself clear can I have another pop?

Assuming I have 10 channels in the whole ground floor area.
Can I configure scenes so they only adjust targeted channels and not others?

e.g.
With the scenes configured below

sw1: B1: = Channel 1 100%
sw1: B2: = Channel 2 100%
sw1: B3: = Channel 3 100%
sw1: B4: = Channel 4 100%

[SIZE=2]At a start point of no lights on obviously B1 would bring C1 to 100%. What happens if I now press B2?

Will it kill C1 and bring C2 up to 100%

sw1: B1: = Channel 1 100% Channel 2-16 0%
sw1: B2: = Channel 2 100%Channel 1, 3-16 0%
sw1: B3: = Channel 3 100%Channel 1, 2, 4-16 0%
sw1: B4: = Channel 4 100% Channel 1-3, 5-16 0%

So this then means that if you re-call scene 1 for that room it will always be channelk 1 only on, YOu can do this using a 3rd prty control system and sending RS232 command of HX,RX,CX, Level X (where =X is the variable)

What you need to do is rethink how the lights work in terms of scenes you can tell a dimmer to ignore certain commands and other advanced features but you need to think of the lighting in terms of scenes not in terms of channels on/off


IF you must have the on/off control and then scene sets (not soemthign i would do) then look at Anylight as they are more based on your lines of thinking with panels for on/off and then seperate scene panels

http://www.anytronics.com/download/a...face%20WEB.pdf

These have the C-Bus type Fade controls your on about http://www.anytronics.com/download/a...y/out_stat.pdf

You select the channel controls for where you want channels on/off dim and scene controllers for where you want scenes

Any light do a 16 channel 2A per channel box (enough for 8 x 50W lights per channel) for £795 + Vat to that i think you need add a controller £215 + VAT (this will actually do 32 channels and 64 presets)
this means having 4 channels per zone so plenty of room.

The the controllers are £150 + vat for double gang and around £85 + vat for single so you could 4 channel controllers (one for each area and 2 scene controllers

THis will give you the functionality your after for about the same price as 3xRak4 modules + RXlink + 4xRCP07 controllers