Control/Dimming SWC's and Outlook Presets

[jddgg22]

Hey everyone,
I know just enough about lighting to make things dangerous, therefore I apologize if my terminology is inaccurate or confusing during this post.
The band director at our school has recently started training his own “personal technicians” by giving them access to the booth and telling them to “push buttons and figure it out”. During this highly articulated processed the students managed to somehow program a series of overhead stage lights into the SWC control panel presets so now whenever the custodians, administration, or theater director try and use the SWC panels to turn on the house lights from the halls into the theater it also turns on the stage lights.

After trying to make sense of the Strand manuals I’ve downloaded online the only solution it seems to offer is physically programming the presets on the dimmer racks. Not only does that seem extremely difficult and potentially hazardous to everything (because I know very little past basic patching), but I also don’t know how those students would have gotten access to the dimmers downstairs to patch them.
I have a Strand Palate 100 board, two multi-switch SWC panels (with manual options, on buttons, off buttons and other presets) and four single button SWC panels (which are the panels that have the stage lights in the presets).
If anyone has any information about how I could potentially take these lights out of the presets, or even patch lights into the presets more intentionally I would really appreciate it!

Thanks for all of your help in advance!

 

[cpf]

Hold-to-learn is probably enabled on the panel the meddling kids had access to. If so, fixing it is easy.

I'll assume that you have a lighting board, and that you can control/override the offending lights from the board. What you need to do is use the board and set all the lights as they should be for the preset, then press and hold the preset button to program that scene in. On my system I think it's a 20+ second hold time.


Edit: If your system has an RS232 programming port kicking around, and if it is what I'm thinking, you can actually disable this feature to prevent future mishaps. You'll need the old Vision.NET designer that's buried somewhere on strands site - pm me - and an XP laptop. You can then go in and globally disable hold-to-learn, or just turn it off on certain stations/presets. It's a bit complicated though.

 

[derekleffew]

...After trying to make sense of the Strand manuals I’ve downloaded online the only solution it seems to offer is physically programming the presets on the dimmer racks. Not only does that seem extremely difficult and potentially hazardous to everything (because I know very little past basic patching), but I also don’t know how those students would have gotten access to the dimmers downstairs to patch them. ...

It's not difficult to correct presets at the dimmer rack. Even I've done it, by following exactly the directions in the CD80sv manual.

But that doesn't solve your underlying issue(s), so follow cpf's advice/directions.

 

[phenry]

If your wall stations are master stations, (faders as well as buttons) then press to learn is probably enabled as CPF said. Those stations are designed to record by hitting manual, setting your faders to the desired level, then pressing enter, then holding the preset button you want to record to for about 10 seconds. It can also be done in the rack. Also as the station is only telling the rack to record the look and not the station itself, you can also record presets by raising levels with the 100 console rather than the faders on the stations.
Call if you need anything. 1800 4 strand works 24 hours.