23 Fewer Things to Worry about on Sunday Morning

There’s only so much that can be expected of a volunteer tech team, so the faster the production team can get an alert providing details of a failure, the quicker they can reach out, and the faster they can solve the issue–--hopefully before it impacts a service.

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Geoff Franklin is an AVL systems engineer and designer at Church of the Highlands, based in Birmingham, AL. With 23 busy campuses to support each weekend, troubleshooting can be a nightmare.  “We might be a large church,” says Franklin, “but we keep our support team very small so that we can do more with what we have. When you have just a few people managing the technology at 23 locations, the ability to receive alerts about any problem is very important.”

One of the most important features of LynTec panels for houses of worship is their ability to raise an alert when something goes wrong.

Fortunately, they have tools to help them, but one of their most valuable tools isn’t found in the control room or backstage. In fact, it’s typically hidden in a closet. It’s LynTec’s RPC, a remote control breaker panel that guarantees that the team can control and monitor power for complex production and systems, even at distant campuses.

There’s only so much that can be expected of a volunteer tech team, so the faster the production team can get an alert providing details of a failure, the quicker they can reach out, and the faster they can solve the issue–and hopefully before it impacts a service. “LynTec saves us a ton of time when it comes to troubleshooting,” Franklin adds.

While Franklin relies on the remote capabilities of LynTec panels, he is quick to point out the benefits for local teams, especially volunteers. “The proper power-up of equipment is an important consideration for churches of all sizes,” says Franklin, who started as a volunteer on the lighting team. “A safe power-up sequence is particularly important for audio, where components need to come on in a certain order to prevent damage,” Franklin notes that the design tool in the RPC software is very helpful for building out power-on sequences. “You can set fire rates with pauses or breaks inside a sequence order. So, if a piece of gear takes 15 seconds to boot up, you can set a sequence for 18 or 20 seconds to give it a buffer, then start up something else. That’s super helpful to be sure it all gets consistently done right.” For volunteers, Franklin says that that is just one example of how RPC panels can make a potentially complex task of powering on a lot of expensive equipment very accessible. “You really just have to press a button and wait a minute for everything to power up. It’s safe, efficient, and easy.”

One of the most important features of LynTec panels for houses of worship is their ability to raise an alert when something goes wrong. “If the power goes out and there's some sort of backup power source, like a generator, it can sense that,” says Franklin, “and fire off an email. When a facility comes back up on generator power or is back up on house power, it'll fire off those emails, too.” Among the panel’s other features are temperature sensing throughout the panel that can report if a panel is running hot, as well as presenting a history of alerts that can indicate hidden trouble, perhaps where a leg is tripping breakers regularly.

For advanced troubleshooting, the information provided by a smart power panel helps the production team solve issues faster. “For example,” he offers, “if I get a LynTec alert that a breaker has tripped because of a fault, I’m not going to continue troubleshooting anything data-related. I’ve already narrowed the issue to something power related. Then, I can log into the panel to see what might have tripped it. I can even ‘kick’ the breaker back on if I want, straight from the web interface. I don't have to travel to the site or direct someone to a power closet. I can access it all from the office. LynTec allows me to stay in one location and have fingers in everything.”

LynTec’s RPC panels combine controls for many advanced functions at the panel with new web-enabled control and smart monitoring capabilities. Based on the G3 Powerlink hardware platform by the well-respected manufacturer Square D, the RPC houses the latest remotely operated breakers and can control up to 168 circuit breakers with a single controller. In addition, its expanded interface options, which include DMX, sACN, HTTP, Telnet, and RS-232, allow users to monitor and control power from any remote location.

“We've been using LynTec remote panels since 2016 when we built our Tuscaloosa campus,” recalls Franklin. “It was installed by an integrator and, to be honest, at the time we really weren't sure exactly how to best utilize its functions. However, over the years we've come to count on the features of LynTec panels. It’s a very capable product.” The version of RPC used at Church of the Highlands campuses has a web GUI, but Franklin also appreciates that it's accessible via UDP commands, as well. “That allows us to communicate with remote panels on the network using other programs. Mostly, our Qsys Core provides us the direct access we need to the RPC panels,” he says.

In the course of building new campuses, Franklin has found LynTec engineers to be very responsive; some of a very few in the industry that will readily return a call to talk about your design plans or your panel. “Even if you have an electrical contractor, if you're reviewing your plans and have an issue, the LynTec staff is happy to speak with you directly. That type of attention is incredibly difficult to find nowadays, especially in the construction world, and it’s important for houses of worship. At LynTec, there's a heart behind the company that I've really, really enjoyed getting to know.”

For more information, visit lyntec.com.