Hi guys;
Have been looking at Arduino stuff for a while, but have not bought nor built nothing yet. That is why I have a few questions, of which some might be very basic. I have basic soldering and electronic skills, plus fabrication skills. Programming is new to me, all I have done is a few HTML websites many years ago ( I wrote the code in Notepad by hand..)
This is what I have: a workshop area that will have about 40 fluorescent fixtures 2x58 watts each. Further, there is a small room for metal fabrication machinery with 6 fixtures, a storage/warehouse area with 10 fixtures and a separate car wash area with 8 fixtures.
This is what I want to do: the workshop area is the one that will be in use most of the time. Lighting power is 4.2kW, so I would love to automatically shut some of the lights off, as daylight level increases. The fixtures could be wired in certain groups, so the ones closest to windows would go out first. As daylight increases more groups could be shut off. Vice versa, when it gets darker in the afternoons, the process should reverse. I think there should be a significant delay in the evaluation of the daylight sensor, if there is a cloud passing the sun it shouldn't cause light swithing, same applies to passing cars with headlights illuminating my windows. Of course, depending on where the daylight reading sensor is.
It would also be nice to have a few different lighting modes, say the above is "automated on". A amnual on would be nice, as also just a slight illumination for closed hours, say maybe 2 or 3 fixtures switched on. Or a few LED lights that are not part of the working hours lighting.
I have an alarm system which has a few programmable relay outputs, one of these could be a input signal for the lighting control Arduino, to either shut everything off when the alarm is triggered, maybe to turn on nighttime mode when alarm is armed etc.
The fabrication room, storage area and wash area could be easily fixed with conventional motion sensors, but if there is an Arduino present, I like to think why not fix everything with that while you're at it.
If the shop fixtures are wired in say 6 separate groups, plus I have these 3 other areas, what Arduino board should I go with? Or is it easier to build on a basic one using several relay boards? I think I will have the Arduino to control a set of relays, because it is easy to put a few switches in the system in case the Arduino fails (how reliable are they?)
Any ideas how to get started with a keypad for light control, maybe with a LCD display?
Thanks very much in advance. Any help and/or comments appreciated.