Creating a scene in Oxford

24Jun

Diners at Oxford’s Quod Brasserie, can now enjoy their food in style thanks to the installation of a new lighting control system.

Quod Brasserie is renowned as a meeting place for locals and visitors alike. To continue to achieve a relaxed atmosphere and pleasant ambiance, a new lighting control system was required that would allow staff to create a number of lighting profiles that could be easily changed throughout the day.

Ben Truesdale, General Manager of The Old Bank Hotel & Quod Brasserie says: “Simplicity is essential with the new system but energy efficiency was also a key concern and it was important to us that the two worked in parallel.”

A Carlo Gavazzi smart building system was chosen to meet both objectives. The system provides the brasserie with the ability to pre-define set scenes in an energy efficient manner through the integration of lux sensors and dimmers.

A smart building controller forms the central hub of the new system. Specially designed for building automation applications, it is based on the robust Linux platform and contains the core programme to provide the necessary control of the lighting. Programming is achieved using the pre-defined functions contained within the configurator software and thanks to the 2-wire bus concept there is always the potential to expand the system in the future by adding further components to the existing bus cable.

Installer, Nathan Bayliss of Simply Advanced said, “The smart building controller allows the setting of pre-defined functions. Once these are created within the central controller, the scenes can be changed by staff at the touch of a button using one of seven Aurora light switches which have been installed throughout the brasserie.”

He continued, “The ability of a lighting control system to eliminate the unnecessary use of lighting is well documented but it can be quite difficult to get it absolutely right in a restaurant which needs to cater for the needs of a wide range of customers at all times of day. The use of LED lighting can also prove to be problematic because although LEDs are more efficient to run there can often be compatibility issues which leads to flickering and poor dimming performance.”

In order to meet the requirement for energy efficiency, Simply Advanced installed a lux sensor which controls the interior lighting in relation to daylight levels and ensures that lighting is only switched on when it is required. The company also installed fifteen SH2 500W dimmer modules which have been specifically designed to function with LED lamps. The additional benefit of these modules is that they were small enough to allow the existing control panel to be re-used which saved on the cost of building a new one.

The resultant installation of the smart building system is proof that ambient lighting and efficiency can work together and the results have led to it being rolled out across the hotel to provide lighting control in all of the bedrooms.