Figure 1. The blue dot indicates the location of the master Air485, and the red dots indicate the locations of the slave AIR485. That being said, I first was introduced to a product called the AIR485 by Joey Dalessio in 2010. Joey mentioned there is a company called Cansec Systems Ltd. from Canada that has been in business for 23 years. He said they have some interesting, innovative solutions in the access control market — one being wireless RS485 communications. I thought that was interesting, but I was skeptical about wireless. But, aſter I pur- chased my first Cansec products in 2010 using the Smart Lock system, I was amazed at the ease of the install, pricing, perfor- mance and the excellent technical support from Cansec. If you were to ask any salesperson who calls on me, they would tell you I am not an easy sell — especially when it comes to electronic products. I invest countless hours of my time attending trade seminars, clinics and classes yearly searching for what I feel fits best for my company so I can provide the best solutions for my clients. To tell you the truth, since 2008, the dynamics of busi- ness have been fast-changing; one aspect is that not all companies attend trade shows, WWW.ALOA.ORG but they may have great products. Also, in the past decade, products and services were marketed as “security solu- tions,” but now marketers have retooled that phase to calling it “offerings.” Pardon my crudeness, but a lot of these offerings of- fer a lot of droppings, which can be egg on “THE AIR485 USES LOWER POWER WITHOUT INTERFERING WITH OTHER WIRELESS COMMUNICATIONS IN THE AREA.” your face. Sorry for the rabbit trail, but as an integrator, you have to find a balance to be open-minded and use prudent measures when selecting new products or services. To make a long story short, I purchased the AIR485 in 2010. It sat in my shelf for two years until I had a need to test the product before I proposed it in my bid for control- ling six gate operators at the Lancaster Air- port. Now, in 2015, I am here to vouch that the AIR485 from Cansec does work, and works very well. We just completed four buildings with 115 doors using the Cansec Hurricane system, which is an Enterprise system that provides many more features then the Smart Lock Pro. Again, we used the AIR485 commu- nications, which saved us time and money in the overall installation — especially when one of the buildings had a footprint of 285,000 square feet. The AIR485 not only works on a line of site of up to six miles, but it also works great in- side spec, for a range of 1,300 feet line of site. We noticed that when using the AIR485 for inside installs, the 1,300-foot specs are con- servative; we achieved a much longer range than 1,300 feet on a building that consisted of a lot of steel, concrete and plaster walls. It works very well in this environment, and the IT department loves it because it doesn’t put a strain on company’s network. FEBRUARY 2015 KEYNOTES 43
