Scene Toggle Saturn and DLT

We have a customer who is trying to toggle a scene (with a single button) on multiple keypads (Saturn and DLT). The scenes are housed in a Mark II. The method used is to set the secondary application on the keypads to Trigger Control, use the Trigger Group as a Group address with Key Function set to ON/OFF. This Trigger Group is associated with the two scenes in the Mark II with Action Selector 255 set for the ON Scene and Action Selector 0 set for the OFF Scene.

This works with a single keypad, but if trying to duplicate the button on another keypad, the second keypad doesn't mimic the state of the Trigger Group. For example if a button on keypad 1 and keypad 2 are both set up for this, either one of them will toggle the scene, but if keypad 1 set the ON Scene with the first press, keypad 2 doesn't reflect this change of state of the Trigger Group. In order for keypad 2 to set the OFF scene, the key first has to be turned ON, then turned OFF. If this was the case, the key on keypad 1 would still be ON - even though the OFF Scene had been set.

It seems that the Trigger Group state is not shared between keypads. Any thoughts on this? Any suggestions of how to have a scene toggle for the same scenes on multiple keypads?

I know we could use logic, but the customer has the same loads in multiple toggled scenes and wants the keypad indicators to be accurate vs. the current scene.

-Duke

 

Messages on the Trigger Control application are processed differently inside key units when compared to other units. This is because Trigger Control is normally associated with dedicated Scene keys inside the unit, where the state of the Scene and it's indicators is carefully managed to ensure that the indicators do what people expect when scenes get set, broken, etc.

Using the Secondary Application like you've done will result in exactly what you're seeing here. The key on the DLT thinks that it's just another regular lighting key, so it is not aware of the need to change it's state in response to other Scenes being set.

If the Scenes are only a few groups you might be able to do it by simply assigning the one key on the DLT to multiple blocks/groups in the unit. This will be especially attractive if the second page is not being used.

Whilst it's not generally recommended, you can assign the key to a lighting group and then trigger the scene from this other lighting group, rather than the trigger group. For a bit of protection against confusion, you can create another lighting application just for this purpose and call it something like 'Lighting - Special Scene Triggers'. The DLT's will then process the level changes on the group address you're using to set the two scenes as regular lighting messages and the indicators will update.

Another option is to do it out of logic. Assign the keys on the DLT's to a new lighting group address and then set the appropriate Scenes out of Logic when that group changes state.

Note that with these approaches the indicators will not extinguish if another unit on the network changes the state of any of the groups in the scene.

 

Thanks for that suggestion Newman this does solve the issue with indicators not updating when toggling remote scenes from multiple DLT's.
What I am finding though is that when the scene is broken the indicators remain on.
Is there anyway I can get around this problem?

 

I have come across the same problem but managed to get the system working by editing the units and the scenes in a certain precise order. I don't know why and I can't remember how but it is possible to get it to work but it is a pain in the ass. I use it to enable/disable the PIR's in the hallway from about 6 DLT's/saturn switches. All worked great until recnetly I updated the program - now I have to remember what order to program the system again