Which Access Power Supplies Do You Use?
Which brand or model of power supply do you use most often on access control?
I ask because I noticed this latest release from Securitron: AQ Series Power Supply
It looks nice, and with up to 16A models, 'autorestart', Form C relays and so on it is hard-loaded.
They also start at ~$250 street and get pretty pricey, $500+. I do not recall spending more than $150 per power supply from vendors like Altronix, and often used cheaper distributor bargain-bin specials for access, but I don't know if that's typical?
Surprisingly, power for access has been a bit of a recent new product development hotspot with releases like Customized Access Control Cans (Altronix Trove) and various Life Safety Power cans.
What power supply do you use/prefer? Are you picky? Why?
I really like the LifeSafety power supplies, modular so as to be configured for whatever you need.
Altronix AL600 and 400 mostly ... cost-effective and do the job well for mag lock jobs. Nothing fancy, but I don't have many clients that have the desire to remotely monitor and receive alerts from their power supplies.
Have quoted and used the Life Safety Power enclosures for use with Mercury controllers. The project had a high degree of visibility from a "who will see it" standpoint (most times, very few people actually see inside the power supply enclosures after the install is finished), so the tidy and organized nature of using an enclosure where everything had a place and a place for everything came in handy and saved some panel shop labor.
We mostly use Lifesafety Power enclosures for mercury hardware but for systems that do not fit that type of enclosure we typically default to Altronix. I like Altronix for its simplicity and availability. Anyone can set them up with little instruction needed.
Lifesafety Power is nice because it fits just about every use group and i like how each module is connected on a bus so i can use a single input on my access system to monitor for power supply faults. My one gripe with lifesafety is that their fire alarm interface is easy to screw up if your not familiar with it.
We have started using the Altronix Trove series. These used to be really expensive but in the past year the price has come down and they have back planes for use with many of the major Access Control manufacturers. Instead of using the CTX cans for Mercury boards and then buying a separate Altronix lock power supply, or even more expensive and using a Hoffman enclosure, these work really well. Now you can get eight doors and e everything you need into one enclosure thus reducing wall space, which is surprisingly becoming a premium these days. For our standard install now we order the pre-built Trove2M2 and the technicians really like how everything fits. Power supplies and distribution boards are pre-installed and wired. Labor wise this is less expensive as well when ordering the kits.
LifeSafetyPower always. Being able to mount the Mercury boards and power supplies in the same can was what got me started on them. Then I discovered the network monitoring and configuration of the boards and was hooked.
I basically will not do anything other than a 1-2 door access project without them anymore .
Altronix (Trove) was way too slow on the uptake on both of those items, and they still lag way behind LSP in terms of outright functionality.
Agree with UI#4. We have transitioned to Life Safety Power and it's now our standard. We are mostly Mercury-centric but have recently put together an AMAG system using it as well. It's been a real training benefit for our technicians to have a single standard.
When we moved to LSP a few years back, Altronix wasn't anywhere close to them. Now we see them getting there, but we are really locked on to the LSP enclosures. We can go up to 16 doors in a single enclosure, with batteries, and it makes for a very clean and professional installation in the IDF's where our gear always ends up.
We've been very happy with the reliability as well and have had great support when we needed it.
Greg
Im curious of those who are using trove and lsp, are any of you buying them prewired vs wiring them yourselves?
For the most part we buy the Trove prewired with the power modules. I know I can buy Life Safey through Lenel fully prewired so all we have to do is install the Mercury hardware and push on the power/485 bus connectors. Problem with that is those are way too expensive even factoring in the labor. Sure the Life Safety is great but too expensive IMO and you can’t go and buy replacement parts from your local distributor.
We use Life Safety Power, we primarily install Mercury based access systems.
With this how many of you are utilizing rack mount enclosures. We had to install one for a customer due to the nature of the install in a data center and now they want these to be the standard. As Altronix doesn't have a rack mount enclosure yet we had to go with the Life Safety rack mount enclosure. These are fairly expensive for only being able to do just 4 doors per enclosure. Years ago rack space was a premium and it seems now wall space is starting to become a premium. Has anyone ran into this yet?
Shannon;
We have. To date it's only been one or two clients, but we've used the LSP rack mount enclosures a few times. They are limited as you say, but they make for a very clean install when the customer doesn't have any available wall space. Our experience so far has all been positive.
Greg
We tried out some LSP rack mount enclosures for a Mercury based system. As Shannon said they are pretty expensive for their capacity. One thing that i found really irritating is that the rail kits are very low quality. We had 3 different rails lose their ball bearings while we were handling them on a bench. For the price i expected higher quality. I hate when manufacturers use poor quality rail kits.
I would reluctantly use them again but would like to find another rack mount alternative if one exists.
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