Room 9-101a

Lighting Lab

Lab Director: Frank Smith

Courses Offered:

ECE 490, ECE 492L, EGR499L, ECE435L, Various courses in lighting and day lighting taught by the college of architecture, including ARC332

Laboratory Size: 1563 square feet

Average # of students per year: 75

Lab Function:

Demonstration of lights, light sources and lighting controllers; Measurements and techniques to measure and characterize light and light sources; design, characterization and evaluation of lighting controls; measurements of various illumination related hardware; Special senior projects in instrumentation and development of special measurements techniques.

The lab will also serve Poly by serving Industry and helping Industry make Cal Poly a real word class illumination center. Major industrial services are in line of testing, measurements and evaluation.

Lab Status:

This laboratory is being used as a Lighting and Photometric Laboratory where experiments can be performed on lighting systems and measurements can be made on the photometric characteristics of light sources and the electrical characteristics of lighting controls and sensors. The laboratory is being developed under a $87,319 National Science Foundation Grant. Several other funding sources are being pursued to create a Nationally recognized Photometric Laboratory. A summary of the equipment presently in the laboratory are shown in below.

Instruments:

  • Harmonic Analyzers
  • Programmable Power Supply-500VA, high order harmonics can be programmed.
  • Fluke 20 channel data acquisition modules, input from microvolts to 110 VAC.
  • Spectrophotometers by EGG, Labsphere, and Edmond Scientific
  • Integrating Spheres
  • Light Meters
  • Tensiometer
  • Oscilloscope (very old), 19 inch rack mount

Computers and Accessories

  • Five Pentium Computers
  • HP E-size plotter
  • Laser printer
  • Color Printer
  • Computer Controlled Lighting Distribution System
  • Window 95
  • Lab View by National Instruments
  • MicroSoft Office Fluke
  • PSpice professional version
  • Lighting Design-Several Programs including Radiance

Demonstration Equipment

  • Light boxes by General Electric
  • Several light Quality Demonstration Units by General Electric
  • Phosphor demonstration unit

Materials

  • Lamps-numerous sizes
  • Ballasts-numerous sizes
  • Lighting Controls-numerous types
  • Lighting Fixtures-numerous types
  • Extensive Lighting and Electric Controls Library
  • Thermocouples, wire, and connectors
  • Reflector material

Current Problems with the Laboratory:

  • The lab needs support in manpower to set up systems and maintain them. Currently, a large Backlog of equipment needs to be installed, commissioned and tested. It needs manpower support.
  • It needs permanent janitorial service

Equipment Needs:

  1. Temperature and humidity controlled environment to enable measurement that meet ANSI standards
  2. Equipment for monitoring the environment