Sick: exhibit monitoring by laser

Sick: exhibit monitoring by laser. Protecting old masterpieces with state-of-the-art technology – the LMS100 laser measurement system manufactured by Sick achieves this in numerous museums. Accurate to the millimetre, it creates an invisible veil in front of one or more pictures, allowing unrestricted viewing but, at the same time, quickly and reliably detecting touching, damage or an attempt at theft.

The protection function benefits not only paintings but also their frequently high-quality and centuries-old frames. Both frequently require a high restoration effort if touched or damaged, apart from the fact that the exhibit is not available to the museum during this time either. The task of protecting exhibits against such dangers is not new one – but the new aspect is that monitoring can be set accurate to the exhibit without impairing the room architecture, close consideration by the art-lover, reading of information signs on the exhibit itself or cleaning work for instance beneath the picture or around it.

In addition, laser measurement systems allow flexible use of the rooms and wall areas since a change in room structure, e.g. as the result of putting up walls or sculptures or exchanging pictures of various sizes, can be allowed for very simply.

Laser Measurement Offers Functional Protective Monitoring

In the sector of protecting buildings and protecting installations, laser measurement systems are an economical and technical alternative and also a practical add-on for camera surveillance systems in many applications. Regardless of the lighting conditions in a room and protected effectively against bright incident light or targeted dazzling, the new LMS100 laser measurement system offers maximum detection reliability.

The measurement system’s active scanner sends an invisible laser pulse in the form of a fan at an angle of 270°, with an angular resolution of 0.25° and scan frequencies up to 50 Hz, and measures the time until the reflections are received. Since the LMS100 units operate with a low laser safety class, they are unable to either injure persons or damage the exhibits.

Double-pulse evaluation of the measurement points in conjunction with integrated rangefinding makes the field surveillance system extremely stable and allows very precise localisation of tampering with the field.

Regardless of the size and geometry of a room or an installation, the up to ten monitoring fields of the LMS100 can be set to any size of exhibit and to how this exhibit is positioned and arranged on the wall. As soon as a person encroaches on the protected field, this leads to a changed propagation time of the emitted light pulse – and thus to issuing of an alarm signal.

Since the system is able to detect not only the person as such but also the position of the person in the room, it is also to possible to aim and focus surveillance cameras with pinpoint accuracy via the LMS100. Persons with the intention to steal the exhibit or vandalise the exhibit can thus be crucially detected before getting to work and a security team can be alerted.

No Possibility of False Alarms

It is crucial that false alarms of the system be reliably avoided in order to maintain the protection function of the LMS100. This is achieved, on the one hand, by programming the monitoring fields to limit them such that they allow working in the room, e.g. cleaning work on floors or information signs next to the picture, without tripping an alarm.

On the other hand, the scanner technology in the LMS100 is designed so rugged that, for instance, changes in temperature, lighting influences or radio waves do not impair the monitoring function. Moreover, the LMS100 has a working range of 18 m, thus allowing it to be attached at a remote location in the room – protected against prying eyes and out of the reach of persons themselves. Practical use bears witness to the functional reliability of the LMS100: no false alarms have yet been tripped during the entire period of over two years on the systems in use.

Ideal Solution for Security Functions

Basically, the system can be linked to a surveillance system via Ethernet, RS 232 or a frontpanel programming interface. The CAN bus interface also allows direct communication between two LMS100s, thus offering an entirely new capabilities in the case of specific tasks, e.g. setting up one monitoring plane near to the exhibit and one further away from the exhibit. With its input voltage of 9–30 V, housing contacts and floating switching contacts with optionally integrated resistor.

The LMS100 is ideal for security functions in the sectors of building services management and installation monitoring.

Other Systems for Secure Indoor and Outdoor Areas of Museums

The LMS100 is the perfect addition to the Sick portfolio of measuring laser scanners for security and surveillance engineering. In addition to this device designed for indoor use, the LMS111 is also a 270° system, but a system that can be used in the open air. It is capable of detecting persons – regardless of whether it is daytime or nighttime – also by emission of a fan-like laser pulse and propagation time evaluation of the reflected individual pulses.

The outdoor version also feature software modules that ensure secure monitoring of facades and open areas even in the case of rain, snowfall or fog. Several alarm zones can be defined within the monitoring field. This allows generation of segmented alarm signals, e.g. graded in line with the increasing proximity of a person to the building.

This information allows various detection measures to be taken, depending on the risk to the installation – from triggering a siren through to calling a security team. In addition, the important parts of the picture itself can be switched to the monitors of the surveillance staff.

Be it LMS100 or LMS111 – both laser measurement systems offer ideal characteristics for protecting valuables, preventing vandalism and theft and allowing art-lovers free access to the masterpieces.

Security, Hall 9, Stand 331

Contact:

Sick Vertriebs-GmbH,
Düsseldorf, Germany
Tel.: +49 211 5301 0
Fax: +49 0211 5301 100
info@sick.de
www.sick.de