Simple exterior 12v photocell for Title 24

[BaduFamily]

My electrician slinked up to me yesterday and begged that I put in an external photocell.

Just a photocell, somewhere, which he can point to and tell Mr. Inspector will turn off the dimmable, LED external soffet lighting when dawn arrives.

He's worried that Mr. Inspector will not accept the idea that the automation will understand just when daylight should be happening in northern California and turn off the lights. ( Elk and Vantage )

I thought to my self, sure, St. Google has the answer and spent a few moments poking around. Perhaps I can find something in a nice housing? Stick it out on the garage?

And now I'm asking here.

Am I going to have to make one?

 

[jpmargis]

Is this what you are looking for:

http://www.homedepot.com/h_d1/N-5yc1v/R-202197215/h_d2/ProductDisplay?catalogId=10053&langId=-1&keyword=photo+control&storeId=10051#specifications

 

[BaduFamily]

hmm it may have the right 'bits' in there. this looks to also be a relay of some sort. but the price is in the hackable range!
thanks

 

[gatchel]

Why not just use a standard photocell and have it turn on a Functional Devices RIBU1C. Use the output (dry contact) to a zone input?

The malibu one listed above says it's for 12vac.

 

[tmbrown97]

[color=rgb(2.459800%, 3.155600%, 3.224200%)]Outdoor Lighting. [/color][color=rgb(2.459800%, 3.155600%, 3.224200%)]All luminaires mounted to the building or to other buildings on the same lot shall be high efficacy luminaires or shall be controlled by a motion sensor in combination with a photocontrol, astronomical time clock, or energy management control system (EMCS). See Section 6.7 for information on residential outdoor lighting requirements. [/color]

I wonder what it takes to be considered an EMCS? You can also just call the inspector's office and ask - that's what I do whenever in doubt. I've had instances where I had to do something that the inspectors didn't like, but couldn't actually prevent through code. Talking to them in advance helped a lot.

 

[mikei-ma]

I had the same "request" (we don't have the law in MA) - found an old spotlight with eye on it at a garage (tag) sale and took it off the mount. There's always THIS available also at HD.

 

[Del91574]

Sunrise/sunset is clearly documented within the Elk sales literature and tech documents, but the inspector might want redundancy...only way to find out would be to ask prior to having your hand forced.

 

[tmbrown97]

There's a lot of title 24 type stuff that I hate, and un-did after buying this house. They force you to put the switch for the vanity lights further away than the crappy over-the-toilet fluorescent switch in the bathrooms; in the bedrooms the closest switch is the one for the unused switched outlet in the room, not the light; and in my kitchen and master bath, they put special fluorescent ballast cans right in between my regular cans (so they'd be the closest switch). Makes it so I can't put matching LED bulbs in those like I did in all the others, making their *required* fixtures my larger energy consumers now.

I already fixed all but one of the switch arrangements while installing my UPB switches, and use sunrise/sunset timers for my exterior lighting - and even some contact sensors on closets/pantry to handle those lights automatically, and turn them off if they get left on with the door open. Even still, I guarantee that if an inspector were to come through, he'd want it back the way code says, which is in many ways less efficient than what I have.

I hope they update the code to allow LED fixtures to be used instead and bypass all this crap - my way my whole kitchen only uses 56 watts, where their two required fixtures use 50, plus the remaining would've used an additional 300 as built.

 

[treo650]

I just finished building a new construction in so cal, Los Angeles County.. Got my certificate of occupancy 3-4 weeks ago.

The inspectors here allowed led throughout, no florlurescemt needed.

They also commended led, and stated that it's too costly, that's why many don't use it.

I installed about $5k worth of led lights for the house... Down to the last chandelier bulb use led, including all cree cr6 recessed lights, even in the kitchen

 

[tmbrown97]

No to go too OT, but which lights did you choose for the other areas, like Vanity down-lights, and bedroom ceiling fixtures? All the bulbs I've seen so far say they're not meant to be enclosed, so I haven't found suitable ones for the bedroom fixtures; and for the vanity, all the bulbs I've seen are someone unsightly, and project all their light straight down rather than in a nice outward fill with softer orange glow when dimmed down. I also want to replace all my outdoor bulbs with LED, but I need something with a good 360° fill, dimming, and 150watt equivalent.

They're not cheap - one little ceiling fan cost me $45 in bulbs, and it's nowhere near as bright as I'd like.

 

[treo650]

All restrooms were used with cree cr6 recessed, all areas of the house, and outside patio lights were used cree cr6 led...
Even the closets used the cree cr6.

They qualify for title 24 usage ONLY IF they are not screw based, so make sure you buy the ones with gu24 base, which includes the gu24 pigtail to mod your existing can.

As far as vanity, I bought the a19 led bulbs from Lowes... Inspectors were okay with them

 

[tmbrown97]

I was reading more about this last night, and I was just going to comment on that fact - that they can't be the normal screw base according to the code... looks like you figured that out and got around it (I was going to ask if they even noticed).

Is for the A19 LED bulbs, how do you guys feel about them? I'm looking for a comparable replacement for my vanity downlights, as I have about 30 across 4 bathrooms.

 

[Basildane]

This thread got me curious - I was not familiar with title 24 until now.
Phew. You have my sympathy. I lived in California for about 10 months and I think I left about 300 feet of burning rubber screaming out of there.

Are you actually allowed to live in your houses there or have they outlawed that too?

 

[tmbrown97]

You can live in them, but they have to be kept dark and you can't use the A/C much. Of course, it's hard to leave anyways because Gas is more expensive too. Your best bet is to get a job in Silicon Valley that has an all day cafeteria, on-site gym & showers, and works you 16 hours/day - that way you only have to go home long enough to sleep, and most days (except this week) it cools down enough at night you can open your windows to cool the place off.

Or you can try to fight it, like me, and have $800 summer electric bills, $800/month in gas, and I won't even get into the rest... And if you're really stupid, you move into a master planned community like where I live - they tell you what you can do to your house (screens, color, any changes) and have to approve everything you do, from planting a few flowers in your back yard, putting up a kids' swingset (no mulicolored cloth roofs? WTH?).

If you really want to blow your mind, look up Mello Roos (another California thing) that lets homebuilders stick the cost of improving the city's infrastructure to the future homeowners for the next 50 years instead of that coming out of their profits. On top of the normal $4500/year in property taxes, there's a 40-year bond attached to my house that costs about $450/month to pay for parks and schools that will never be built because the city squandered the money away improving other areas - but doesn't matter, we still have to pay the bond back and drive past the faded "future home of xxxx Middle School" and "future home of xxxxxx Park" signs.

:angry2: :angry2: :angry2: :angry2: :angry2: :angry2:
/soapbox.

 

[Basildane]

Sorry to disrupt this thread so badly (ok, I'm actually not sorry).

Yes, I did live in San Jose.
And, if CA is so wound up on regulating every aspect of every person's life, why don't they regulate the volume of the noise coming from those lowriders?
I think if I lived there one more month I would have gone completely deaf.

That was the primary reason I fled. I even bought ear-plugs and tried to sleep... Didn't help much. I think that's why you guys have so many earthquakes.