Engineers Demonstrate Control Equipment

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32036, 10 July 1969, Page 18

Engineers Demonstrate Control Equipment

Two Christchurch engineers have designed advanced electronic equipment which will prevent electric power blackouts in widespread supply areas. Their equipment is based on the design of equipment used in the reception of information and transmission of commands between ground stations and manned and unmanned space flights. The engineers, who are employed by Vigilant Alarms, Ltd, demonstrated the equipment to colleagues in commerce, industry and local and central government in Christchurch yesterday. They showed how the equipment could centralise the control of operations in 20 substations of an electricity supply area by the use of telephone lines. They said that the equipment had already been bought by the Franklin Electric Power Board for the' control of its sub-stations. The equipment is able to control more than one pair of telephone lines, up to 100 different industrial and engineering activities and at the same time relay to the control

centre 250 distinct operations. The control operator is also able to speak over the link while other information is being carried back and forth. The equipment is said to enable large industrial organisations to control automatically the move of a factory or group of scattered installations with no time delay when emergencies such as storm or earthquake damage occur.