How Merging Access Control and Power Pays Dividends

Learn about the many benefits that can be derived from consolidating your specified brand of access controllers together with distributed power and accessories.

How Merging Access Control and Power Pays Dividends

An easy way to simplify access control design and installation in a highly efficient manner is to consolidate your specified brand of access controllers together with distributed power and accessories all into one streamlined housing.

This new “all-in-one” approach to access control and power integration entails an enclosure and a variety of backplanes, which accommodate access controllers from the industry’s leading manufacturers.

The enclosures and backplanes feature the appropriate mounts by manufacturer and knockouts, enabling speedy and efficient deployment.

Many benefits are derived taking this approach, including substantial labor and cost savings, ease of maintenance and service, and increased return on investment (ROI).

A major benefit is ease of design and installation. The all-in-one integration approach allows technicians to quickly configure and test all of the required access and power components prior to onsite installation.

Theses access and power integration solutions offer additional benefits, including ample room for the required access and power products, as well as backup batteries and highly organized wire management options — all of which make installations smoother and more profitable.

Another important benefit is easier system troubleshooting. In the past, multiple enclosures were typically installed to house access control equipment, power supplies and sub-assemblies.

By consolidating all of these components into a single enclosure in each communications room, it’s easier for technicians to remotely diagnose and pinpoint issues, and implement the best remedial action.

Healthcare Facility Case in Point

One of the earliest field installations of this access and power integration solution took place mid-2017 at a major healthcare facility located in the Upper Midwest. The massive new facility’s initial design included more than 600 doors that all needed to be wired for access control and video surveillance.

After reviewing and evaluating several different approaches, the healthcare facility’s integration and installation partner recommended these relatively new to market all-in-one integration housings.

After careful evaluation, both the integrator and installer found this all-in-one access and power integration solution to be both significantly easier to deploy and highly cost-efficient.

The specified enclosures and backplanes allowed the integrator to mount the access controllers, power suppliers and peripheral equipment prior to onsite installation.

In fact, the integrator’s technicians prewired everything at their shop, tested each enclosure configuration, marked the specific install locations on each unit, and shipped them to the site on a single palette.

Upon arrival, the units were unwrapped, hung directly on the wall in their appropriate locations, wired for AC power and connected to the various door hardware specified for each door location.

This accelerated installation workflow played especially well with the tight construction and system installation schedule the integrator was provided and mandated by the overseeing general contractor.

Another significant factor was the ability to incorporate more access control and power boards into a single enclosure, resulting in an overall smaller footprint. This was most important since the communications rooms at the new healthcare facility are significantly smaller than normal.

The use of smaller communications rooms is an emerging trend with architects as electronics devices in general continue to shrink and the price per square foot of real estate continues to escalate.

The combination of simplifying board layout and wire management, streamlining the process of configuring, bench testing and deploying the access control systems all contributed to significantly reducing installation time.

This all translated into huge cost savings for both the installers and end user alike. Since the healthcare facility’s opening, approximately 50 more doors have been added, which are also all connected to the centralized access control system using this integration solution.


Ronnie Pennington is National Sales Engineer for Altronix Corp. Contact him at [email protected]

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