when it comes to emergency exit signage there is one burning question that people really struggle
to answer clearly and that is should the arrow go up or down when the sign is positioned above
a doorway now we have looked hard to try and find this answer in the places you might expect
to find it the IET guide to emergency lighting for electricians the NICEIC snags and solutions
book for emergency lighting but we couldn't find a concrete answer so that meant we had to send Gary
around town to some of his favorite haunts to see if that would unveil the answer when it comes to
emergency exit signage now we think we've found the answer so stick around to find what it is and
what did you think so that's the time from that there's a high chance us electricians are going
to get it wrong and i can't think of anything worse and maybe sticking something on to emergency
life and trying to peel it back off when you've actually got them pointed in the wrong direction
however this Adler range from Ansell has got us covered yeah but you immediately
defaulted to the cheapest possible exit sign you could think of with the self-adhesive graphic
this range from Ansell looks absolutely gorgeous do we say that about emergency
signs well i think we can in this range it comes in two variants we've got the slim
exit box type sign here and we've got a double sided blade sign that we'll come back to
later as well but it's that flexibility in terms of the arrows from one product you can be covered
for most of the signage needs on a project because you can change them instantaneously
on site by putting the you've got the either interchangeable running person which can be
on the left or the right and the arrow can be up down left or right as well which again covers most
requirements on a project there's some other great features we want to highlight as well
isn't that there is so obviously stepping it's all about battery life so this battery is warranted
for five years which matches the warranty you get on the sign obviously being led it is a low energy
and with this you get 36,000 hours of lamp life to L70 great to see that quartered in the data sheet
as well you'll notice another great feature there is the exit box version itself slightly higher
power consumption than the exit sign because of this additional LED here that provides some of
that illumination you'd need for the escape route that in some installations you would have in the
past had to fit an additional unit alongside the exit sign when i think about emergency light
fittings i think about getting my large bunch of keys and obviously the key that operates the key
switch in order to check them regularly i call them fish keys Gary myself what's the audience
call them uh yeah and you've built an extensive range there Gary over the years just in case
you're in somewhere think i'm going to do a three hour duration test and have you got that problem
solved that is softer than this because these signs are all self-testing so that will do the uh
the monthly functional test and also a three hour duration test uh once a year which is obviously a
requirement under emergency lighting legislation but how many people actually do that have you
seen that update of the log book everywhere you go no but they're still gonna have to go around and
perhaps check the status led aren't they after that's happened periodically yeah so it's not
a central uh test so it doesn't report back to a central and email people off obviously watch
for that status indication and also that the sign is illuminated when it should be
and and yeah but that that pretty much covers most of your emergency lighting tests and needs and the
other thing is good you'll notice this one's black i don't yeah i noticed that i didn't know that
so think of that trend we see now in the modern building that people take away the suspended
ceiling and paint all the services black so you can have your exit sign in both versions in black
or white depending on the decor which i think another great little flexibility function from
Ansell this exit sign here looks as if it's got five members of the family but they only sent
one box through to us didn't it because it's a five in one this is literally like a swiss army
knife you can mount it direct to the ceiling you can mount it semi flush into the ceiling you can
mount it on the wall and you can actually suspend it from the wires as well so think of all those
different options you could have in a building you don't necessarily know when you're quoting or
when you're at that ordering stage which version you need they're pretty much all covered there
including also a side mount version as well well we seem to be circling around the answer does the
arrow go up above an exit door or below an exit door and i've had divine interventions i went
round the town because i think the church may have got it right well in god we trust Gary the rest of
it we turn to the ICEL committee because they're bound to have it right but before i got there
actually there was a lot of confusion even amongst us depending on what document you read about that
arrows who asked the audience because i was unsure yeah couldn't form a friend nearly 2000 votes
and the effects ordinance 63% think the arrow goes down okay and 37% think it goes up and as we've
asked the audience on YouTube that must be exactly the correct answer that arrow goes down but it's
not quite as simple as that depending on which of the standards we're following is that yeah so
the latest recommendation from ICEL is that you should follow up the standard given in IOS7010
okay remember reading it yeah it's incorporated in BS5266 which i'm sure you have read cover the
cover and the recommendation in there is that the arrow goes up ah so i come to an
exit door the arrow points up because i'm going forward forward through the door so that makes
up correct then is that true oh it is correct for most instances okay most instances yes unless you
were going to a door and then you were going to go downwards so downstairs it would point in the down
direction so that suggests to me that the church i went to got the signage wrong because the arrow
was pointing down and so were some other um place in Skipton i went to but they're not incorrect are
they well a bit like the eFIXX audience got stuck in the past because there was a previous version
of the EU signage directive which was the term when we started getting rid of the word
exit from a lot of signage and we meant to the the pictograms under that previous guidance there was
a slightly different colour of green right and the depth the arrow wasn't uh defined whether
it went up or down in those instances and now you mentioned that green is subtly different isn't it
yeah okay so in that case then maybe when i was in Greg's the bakers and the arrow was pointing
downwards under that directive it was probably right that i was exiting through that oh that's
that's a little bit not confusing but it takes a little bit of thinking now
if you go back to the pictures that we had earlier on in the presentation
you're going to see some correct and there's more correct but under two different directives now but
there is still some that are incorrect if you've spotted them make sure you leave a comment below
the great news is with this range from Ansell you can relax a little bit because they are covering
for most instances in terms of direction obviously colour illumination all the other things that you
have to worry about just be careful if you're in a building where there's a mixture of signage
between old and new and you may have to get some guidance off the local fire authority to get the
the right answer the keen eyed amongst you will have noticed this on the table my MFT testing this
plug-in light meter and in this video i'll show you how to use it in order to measure LUX levels