When in the Netherlands and travelling to the city of Utrecht on the A12 highway, near the town of Veenendaalen, you will see the latest hotel of the Van Der Valk chain. It is a noticeable site.
This congress hotel is in full operation since in December 2014. It is the floor with 15 congress halls where three Foxtrot systems play one of the most interesting managerial roles. B & R Custom Design company a Dutch partner of Teco, a.s., finalized a project where Foxtrot systems control and coordinate the distribution of audio and video signals to all halls, control projectors, projector screens and large screens with 4K resolution. Foxtrot also controls shutters, blinds, lighting and ventilation systems and of course, also the temperature in every room. The entire system in the congress halls is connected to the booking system used by ITesso hotel, and Foxtrot – using the established event time plan, creates a comfortable interior climate.
And how is this done?
AV signal control
One of the technical rooms is fitted with a distribution cabinet completely filled with audio / video equipment, along with three OEM Foxtrot systems. Each system controls between three and six halls out of the total of 15.
Two multi-room audio amplifiers made by BOSE are on the top. Each putting out 4 kW of power output, which may be divided between 2 and 8 channels. Switch matrix ESP00 is underneath, also made by BOSE. A pair of video signal switch matrixes 4 × 4 HDMI made by CYP is also used. There are also sources of AV signals: Internet radio and 10 wireless microphones. The resulting AV signals (HDMI by CAT6) are distributed to large halls using the same cable as TCP / IP data. User control interface is done via Foxtrot web pages controlled by ID-28 touch panel in each hall. The control web pages are available on larger sites as well through portable iPads.
Control of each room
Ceiling in each room is equipped with a small unit fitted with modules 1 × C-HM-113mm with discrete and analogue inputs and outputs and with 1 × SC-1101 serial channel RS-232/485. These modules control sunscreen blinds, air conditioning system, projector lift and the actual projector, projection screen and blinds between glass panels facing the hallway. There are also motion detectors and wall movement detectors installed between rooms. Automatic logic reconfigurations that control all installed components are based on these sensors. Each room is equipped with a control table fitted with a control box and touch panel ID-28, power socket, and HDMI connector. Tables may be moved around and are connected to power sockets and LAN sockets located in terminals hidden in the hall floor.
Lighting system control – control of all LED lights via DALI
Helvar supplied the hotel with lighting units controlled via 18 DALI routers equipped with lights, lighting sensors and several relays. In order to control the light in congress halls using the the same control panel and according to needs of a particular event, the control page of each room had to be added with 6 different scenarios. This allows the user to use this page to set any combination of parameters such as the intensity of each group of lighting units in the room for each scenario and at any time. PLC Foxtrot stores these control commands and transfers them to UDP command which is then used to control the relevant DALI Helvar router.
Linkage to the hotel booking system and room climate control
The hotel uses iTesso booking system. Every day Foxtrot systems take information from iTesso based on the schedules of events planned for each room and display them using Brightsign Narrowcasting player on Samsung displays placed in each room and in public areas of the hotel. The information is also used for temperature and ventilation in each room. One hour before the event starts, the temperature is set at 21.5 ° C and during the event, the user may adjust the temperature by plus or minus 2.5 degrees. One hour after the event ends the temperature is set back to the standard 19 ° C and the room is ventilated intensively.
Reconfiguration halls
Two large congress halls may be divided by moveable walls into three smaller rooms, or you may create one large hall or large hall with two-space separated combinations. The actual configuration may be entered manually. However, thanks to sensors in the moving walls, the system recognizes the specific configuration and uses this configuration to self-synchronize and control shielding, lights, screens, projectors and AV signal distribution, while making sure that the same program is projected on two or three screens.
Wireless microphone control and central supervision
The office at the Congress floor is equipped with an iPad placed in a removable holder which may be used to oversee all rooms at once, or provide remote assistance to the user of the hall. The office is also equipped with a charging “nest” for all ten wireless microphones. Five of them may be attached to a strip and five are regular hand-held microphones. When microphones are distributed one touch assigns a specific microphone to a particular room. Several microphones may be assigned to a single room. Foxtrot then directs the signal to the right speakers.
