Rapid takes control at the Daily Express building

The Daily Express Building

CP Electronics has supplied its Rapid lighting controls system to the iconic Daily Express Building in Great Ancoats Street, Manchester as part of a recent refurbishment project.

The restoration of the Grade II listed facility has resulted in the building now offering 77,500ft2 of contemporary workspace. Owned by Wittington Investments, the building was originally built in 1939 and has a futuristic art deco design with receding top tiers and curved corners. The building is clad in a combination of opaque and vitrolite glass, which was considered highly radical at the time of construction.

Working with contractor CSK Electrical Ltd, CP Electronics supplied its Rapid fully addressable system with daylight compensation, which had to be carefully planned due to certain containment and wiring routes within the building. The light fittings could contain up to three LED sections all requiring independent control, which was achieved using area controllers and DALIG64’s. With little room for cable management above ceilings, CP Electronics’ BVITM6 lighting control modules were used as a marshalling box, providing CSK with a local isolation point whilst still being able to control each independent unit as required.

With the lighting mounted into plasterboard ceilings as opposed to recessed fixings, this presented the challenge of PIR sensitivity, so in order to overcome this, CP Electronics suggested using its EBR-MINPIR-DALI Mini. This presence detector detects movement using a PIR sensor to turn the load on. When an area is no longer occupied, the load will switch off after an adjustable time out period. The compact size, together with multiple mounting options, makes this product ideal for mounting in, or attaching to, luminaires to provide local control of individual fittings.

An adjustable internal light sensor provides light level information to the lighting control system, allowing lights to be kept off if sufficient daylight is present, and to enable maintained illuminance for dimming systems. For this project, the EBR-MINIPIR-DALI could be installed in the small panel between each LED section – this also meant that no extra cabling to the PIR was required, as they could be connected onto the DALI Bus already present in the light fitting.

Reconfiguration of rooms within the building meant that local switching combined with absence detection was required. To achieve this, CP Electronics suggested using its EBR-BB-IN-DALI, which meant the interface could be connected to the DALI Bus and control the lighting without the need for extra wiring. The EBR-BB-IN-DALI input unit is the perfect interface between a Rapid lighting control system and external devices such as switches, security systems and AV equipment. The unit features seven volt-free switch inputs that can be activated by the contact closure of push-buttons, switches or relays.

The lift lobby floor area lighting was not dimmable but required interfacing with the CP Electronics control system. The perfect solution for this was to use the volt-free relay within the DALIG64 that allowed for the lights to be turned off and on using the presence detectors already installed on the floor. The staircase and WC areas were not required to be fully addressable, so standalone 230v presence detectors were installed.

CP Electronics, cpelectronics.co.uk

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