OnQ ALC Wiring help

[jmark71]

Hi Guys,

I've been lurking around these parts for a while now, but now it's time for a question.

I'm in the process of finalizing the LV details of our new house and thanks to the awesome information around this site, I think I've pretty much saved a LOT of future heartache! However, the builder's LV guys are a bit green when it comes to On-Q ALC wiring and initially tried to convince me into a Control4 lighting solution. Thankfully, I stood my ground and they agreed to do the pre-wire for On-Q ALC lighting.

HOWEVER... the way they invisage doing this wiring is basically running CAT5e from the basement to the second floor and then daisy chain each light switch together before returning the CAT5e on the final leg back to the basement. They'll do a similar thing on the first floor - run the CAT5e to the first floor, daisy chain each light switch and then back down to the basement. Where there are 3-ways, they'll do a jumper from one switch off to the other in the 3-way.

Reading the stuff on the SETNET site, it seems this is NOT the way to wire for On-Q ALC. Or is this just another way that'll work? Can someone ease my concerns here and tell me that the way they're proposing to wire will work fine? The house has about 35 light switches probably spread pretty evenly between the two floors if that's of any informative value?

Thanks,
Mark

 

[AceCannon]

That will work fine, although some people would argue that the more optimal, versatile, and "trouble-shootable" method is to homerun each switch's LV wires.

 

[jmark71]

That will work fine, although some people would argue that the more optimal, versatile, and "trouble-shootable" method is to homerun each switch's LV wires.

Okay, that makes me feel better - thanks for the quick response... I know I'm going to eventually HATE running up and downstairs from the basement when I get around to hooking up the hubs etc., but that's life I guess...

I presume that as long as each floor doesn't exceed the 31 device limit, I can simply connect each floor's cables in the basement to seperate branch hubs and then connect the branch hubs to the main controller?

 

[Herdfan]

That will work fine, although some people would argue that the more optimal, versatile, and "trouble-shootable" method is to homerun each switch's LV wires.

While I would agree that from a trouble-shooting perspective this is better, but from an easier to fix and go forward perspective, the HR loop is a better way. :blink:

 

[beelzerob]

I presume that as long as each floor doesn't exceed the 31 device limit, I can simply connect each floor's cables in the basement to seperate branch hubs and then connect the branch hubs to the main controller?

There's a total-wire length limit too....I forget what it is.

Also, be aware of aux switches...they eat up 3 wires in the cat 5 bundle each. It's good your jumpers will take care of that, but if you put in a 4-button aux switch somewhere, that takes 12 wires. be aware.

What I did in my place was run cat5 to a few switches, and then homerun back down. So wherever a group of switches was, I'd hit it with the same cat5 cable. Perfect would be cat5 PER switch...but meh, I was busy.

 

[felixrosbergen]

My plan is to run a main line from the control is the basement to an hub in the attic and then homerun each switch location to there. The aux's will connect to their masters on the hubs this way and the whole thing is easier to troubleshoot.

For the ground floor I will have some distro modules in the structured wiring cabinet in the basement and everyhting will be homerunned from there as well.

What your LV guy is planning sounds feasible though......just be carefull with the lenghts....with that many terminaton points on the same line i would be worried about the reliability. For all you know the sheetrockers nick the main line before you even start to use it and it won't even be a loop at that point.

Initially i was going to run each light switch all the way to the basement wiring room, but the hubs in the attic seem to make more sense. Actually the hubs will be in a 2 gang LV bracket in the wall of the walk-in closet so they're not exposed to the environment in the attic.

No sure how far you're out....within a week or 2 i will start my install and will keep my showcase updated since there seems to be a lot of interest.

 

[Herdfan]

For all you know the sheetrockers nick the main line before you even start to use it and it won't even be a loop at that point.

And that is the benefit of a HR loop. If the wire gets nicked at some point in the run, you still have a good route back.

If it gets nicked twice, well then you have a problem. :blink:

 

[jmark71]

My plan is to run a main line from the control is the basement to an hub in the attic and then homerun each switch location to there. The aux's will connect to their masters on the hubs this way and the whole thing is easier to troubleshoot.

For the ground floor I will have some distro modules in the structured wiring cabinet in the basement and everyhting will be homerunned from there as well.

What your LV guy is planning sounds feasible though......just be carefull with the lenghts....with that many terminaton points on the same line i would be worried about the reliability. For all you know the sheetrockers nick the main line before you even start to use it and it won't even be a loop at that point.

Initially i was going to run each light switch all the way to the basement wiring room, but the hubs in the attic seem to make more sense. Actually the hubs will be in a 2 gang LV bracket in the wall of the walk-in closet so they're not exposed to the environment in the attic.

No sure how far you're out....within a week or 2 i will start my install and will keep my showcase updated since there seems to be a lot of interest.

I'm a ways out from actual wiring... we had a 21 day window from contract signing to nail down options... I'll discuss with the LV guy some more though - I'm sure as long as he gets paid, he won't mind making some changes if necessary (one hopes!)...

Now I do have a couple of questions though. If I am stuck with the daisy chain method, I don't quite get how the controller/hubs etc. will get wired:

From what I've made out, the first floor and second floor will be distinct loops of let's say 20 locations upstairs and 15 or so locations downstairs. Bare in mind, these are switch locations, NOT the number of switches - there will likely end up being 30-40 switches upstairs (I lost count too many times looking at the blueprint!) and a somewhat smaller number downstairs. The way the daisy-chain will end up being wired will leave me with basically 1 cat5 on one end of the loop and one on the other end... what do those wire into? It seems like I'll easily breach the 31-device limit on switches in retrospect... if this is the case surely, the daisy chain method won't work? Comments?

Is a "hybrid" method a better way... like Beelzerob mentioned, daisy chain a number of locations together before homerunning to the basement (or as Mavric suggested, to the attic in the case of the second floor - although I'm having 4 2" conduits run from basement to attic so it would be trivial to run those back down to the basement). It looks to me that there is 9-switch limit on branch hubs, not 31 (I presume each switch has it's own ALC device number, correct)? What am I missing?

This all seemed to make sense when I read the stuff on SETNET, but the daisy-chain method has really just confused me to no end... maybe it was just my Mom who thought I was smart :blink:

 

[jmark71]

Aha... okay, a quick (well, not quite "quick"!) re-read of the mammoth 27 pages (and counting) [topic="8015"]hardwired system thread[/topic] answered my main pre-wiring question...

As folks have already said, daisy chaining will work just fine (although it's not the preferred method for some), BUT with the following rather important caveat: The number of addressable devices on any one daisy chain cannot exceed 31. This will impact us as a cursory count of switches from the blueprints we have have getting on for 40 switches upstairs, so I'll ask the LV guy to either run a couple of daisy chains upstairs and downstairs or go with the homerun method to each switch 'bank'.

I'll worry about my other questions about hooking up the branch hubs etc. a little closer to the time... I must say that the thread above was what sent me down the ALC rabbit hole to begin with, and is a treasure trove of information for anyone looking to go the ALC route.

 

[beelzerob]

Make sure you aren't counting aux switch locations against that total.

 

[jmark71]

Make sure you aren't counting aux switch locations against that total.

Thanks... Just to be sure, you mean the 3-way 'slaves', right? Or do you mean the scene switches? As you mentioned these will require 12 wires (since I have access to the 2nd floor from the attic and the 1st floor from the basement, I should be able to run additional cat5 myself if need be.

 

[AceCannon]

Thanks... Just to be sure, you mean the 3-way 'slaves', right? Or do you mean the scene switches? As you mentioned these will require 12 wires (since I have access to the 2nd floor from the attic and the 1st floor from the basement, I should be able to run additional cat5 myself if need be.

The slave switches for 3-way (and 4, 5 way) do not count toward the 31-device branch limit.

The scene switches DO count towards the device limit. They require only 2 LV conductors. (plus 120v hot, neutral, and ground). They work through the lighting controller to generate scenes.

The 4 device aux switches are dry-contact only, so they are not on the communication bus, do not count towards the device total. They can essentially act as slave switches to 4 regular ALC switches (or they can act as 8 momentary SPDT switches, I assume, so they could be used to command an automation panel like the Elk to fire scenes). And, I understand they can only fit in a single-gang box.

Others will proofread and correct my analysis, I am sure!

 

[beelzerob]

Ace ace'd it.

 

[broconne]

Thanks... Just to be sure, you mean the 3-way 'slaves', right? Or do you mean the scene switches? As you mentioned these will require 12 wires (since I have access to the 2nd floor from the attic and the 1st floor from the basement, I should be able to run additional cat5 myself if need be.

The slave switches for 3-way (and 4, 5 way) do not count toward the 31-device branch limit.

The scene switches DO count towards the device limit. They require only 2 LV conductors. (plus 120v hot, neutral, and ground). They work through the lighting controller to generate scenes.

The 4 device aux switches are dry-contact only, so they are not on the communication bus, do not count towards the device total. They can essentially act as slave switches to 4 regular ALC switches (or they can act as 8 momentary SPDT switches, I assume, so they could be used to command an automation panel like the Elk to fire scenes). And, I understand they can only fit in a single-gang box.

Others will proofread and correct my analysis, I am sure!

Ack! Somehow during my planning stages I missed that the scene switches require HV! I thought they were LV only.. There goes my plan of attaching an LV gang to the HV gang, running my CAT5 there and putting in a scene switch in that extra plate...

Ok, and just to verify - I can piggy back off adjacent switches hot and neutral right? I don't need an extra line?

Damn! My plans are foiled.. Good thing they haven't even started to pour the basement yet.

 

[Sokoloff]

You can definitely piggy-back unswitched hot and neutrals from switch to switch.

I'd also have never known (and never suspected!) that the scene switches also needed 110VAC!