Oddly cheap emergency lighting

True, you have to be wary even if someone has the badges, but usually a good starting point.


Also true that ultimately the client sets the standard and unfortunately more than a few I've come across are crooked or ignorant or both.

And another thing.


The advertising material says they comply with BS 5266 and BS EN 1838. That is interesting as those standards are not product standards, so how can that statement be true.

So the client gets the Declaration of Conformity from an independent test house, The BSI Kite Mark would be good, and the photometric data or a plug in for the illumination design software. The designer uses this data in his/her design calculations and verify if this change is compliant. If this is not done it is non-compliant from the word go!

I've seen several recently that seem really cheap. I think this is because the electronics can be mass produced and LED lamps means the battery doesn't have to be nearly as big as it used to be. I bought one for £35 in 2010 which is still going and it wouldn't surprise me if they are cheaper now.

Thanks Harry, thing is I suppose you get what you pay for, fittings need to be robust and well made, and my gut tells me this is too good to be true as the price difference between it and the standard known brands like Thorn or Ansell seems a bit too big. Maybe a different project might suit, but there are a fair few of these on this job and a bit risky to go with something that is not familiar and not even equivalent to the spec. The minute anything goes wrong, the designer will be blamed for approving the fitting.


Plus the client is a dodgy b***** and anything this type of person puts forward really warrants extra scrutiny. Apparently he has screwed up other things on site by ordering wrong materials or products so potentially becoming a car crash job already .

The figures are interesting. It suggests 1000 lumens lit normally and 300 lumens in emergency mode. Looking at the reverse of the gear tray in the advert, it appears to have a 14W driver for normal operation and a 1.5W driver for battery operation. A quick calculation on the battery rating also suggests that the 1.5W value is correct. . . 


Regards,


Alan.

So in emergency operation, 300 lumens at 1·5 W. That's 200 lumens per watt. LED is pretty efficient, but I did not think it was SO efficient as that!

Exactly. I was comparing it with 1000 lumens at 14W on mains, which is 71.4 lumens per watt. Even if the mains driver isn’t particularly efficient, something doesn’t quite stack up here. 


Regards,


Alan.

I've been caught out by the switched type of Emergency lighting recently. The type that switches on and off with the normal lighting but comes on if there is a power cut.

The old way of doing this was to have a switched and an unswitched live (and neutral).

Now some fittings do the switching at low voltage so you need an unswitched live (and neutral) and a LV pair, one extra wire. It is bad enough being caught out by this on a new install but for a replacement you have to take the fitting back and ask for the other type - but the trouble is that the outside of the box doesn't tell you which type it is - unless things have changed since I last bought one.

In an expensive but tricky corner where you have not got enough wires for the desired  switch solution you may find the wireless light switches useful - they are just a pair of contacts controlled by a switch with no wires. (and with the 16A receiver you can control heaters from the same grid switch as the lights, if you wish to)
examples