sd6446 Posted December 1, 2008 Share Posted December 1, 2008 My dad has currently got an Optima G4 panel, connected to a couple of PIRs and doorswitches. Previously these sensors were connected to a Maplin alarm panel, and had worked fine for many years. Recently, having changed over to the new Optima G4 panel he has noticed that occasionally then a light switch is turned on or off, it triggers a tamper alarm (and hence sounds the internal alarm and outside strobe). None of the alarm cables are run near mains cables, but the alarm panel itself is not on a seperate fuse on the consumer unit. Could this be the problem? Could it be that the Optima panel is more sensitive than the Maplin panel? Any pointers would be much appreciated. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
miaren Posted December 1, 2008 Share Posted December 1, 2008 Is there a PIR or Door contact near to the light switch, with a loose lid or connection? Try tapping the sensors gently to cause the fault. Try linking out each each tamper circuit in turn, and operating the switch. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lawandorder Posted December 1, 2008 Share Posted December 1, 2008 Is there a PIR or Door contact near to the light switch, with a loose lid or connection? Try tapping the sensors gently to cause the fault.Try linking out each each tamper circuit in turn, and operating the switch. Also check the battery in the panel, occasionally mains spikes can cause alarm problems and these are more likely to occur if the battery is a bit iffy. Could also be worth fitting a filter on the power supply, ACT used to do a rabge of supply filters and members with more current experince could probably confirm whether or not these are still available. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
magpye Posted December 1, 2008 Share Posted December 1, 2008 Also check the battery in the panel, occasionally mains spikes can cause alarm problems and these are more likely to occur if the battery is a bit iffy.Could also be worth fitting a filter on the power supply, ACT used to do a rabge of supply filters and members with more current experince could probably confirm whether or not these are still available. This is the filter mentioned >> http://www.actmeters.com/1313-1414-Spike-Suppressors.php magpye Someone told me I was ignorant and apathetic, I don't know what that means, nor do I care. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IAS Posted December 1, 2008 Share Posted December 1, 2008 change the bulb ............................? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sd6446 Posted December 2, 2008 Author Share Posted December 2, 2008 Wow! Some great suggestions. Many thanks to all. I shall be going to see if I can help him out at the end of the week, so will see if I can source a replacement battery and filter just in case. One last question - in the absence of a free fuse at the consumer unit, which circuit should the control panel have been connected to? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
magpye Posted December 2, 2008 Share Posted December 2, 2008 Wow! Some great suggestions. Many thanks to all. I shall be going to see if I can help him out at the end of the week, so will see if I can source a replacement battery and filter just in case. One last question - in the absence of a free fuse at the consumer unit, which circuit should the control panel have been connected to? NOT a lighting circuit. Someone told me I was ignorant and apathetic, I don't know what that means, nor do I care. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lawandorder Posted December 2, 2008 Share Posted December 2, 2008 Wow! Some great suggestions. Many thanks to all. I shall be going to see if I can help him out at the end of the week, so will see if I can source a replacement battery and filter just in case. One last question - in the absence of a free fuse at the consumer unit, which circuit should the control panel have been connected to? This can be a contentious issue and depends on the type of consumer unit which is fitted. On a more modern split load consumer unit I would tend to connect to a lighting circuit as lighting is not usually protected by an RCD. RCDs are prone to tripping spuriously and the last thing you want is for the power to the alarm to drop out just because the RCD has thrown a wobbler whilst you are on holiday! The best method IMHO is a dedicated fuse/circuit breaker but if this isn't possible then I would connect to a circuit which isn't protected via an RCD. The problem you have described is well known but in my experince quite rare, I did work on a system once (Scantronic 9100) which triggered every time the central heater fired up, it turned out the boiler casing wasn't earthed properly and curing this solved the alarm problem. Unfortunately these type of problems are notoriously difficult to pin down as they aren't ususally very consistent. It might help if you can narrow the problem down a little, is it just one light switch that causes the problem (possibly arcing contacts, change switch). You may well find that moving the panel supply to another fuse will solve the problem. This can be a contentious issue and depends on the type of consumer unit which is fitted.On a more modern split load consumer unit I would tend to connect to a lighting circuit as lighting is not usually protected by an RCD. RCDs are prone to tripping spuriously and the last thing you want is for the power to the alarm to drop out just because the RCD has thrown a wobbler whilst you are on holiday! The best method IMHO is a dedicated fuse/circuit breaker but if this isn't possible then I would connect to a circuit which isn't protected via an RCD. The problem you have described is well known but in my experince quite rare, I did work on a system once (Scantronic 9100) which triggered every time the central heater fired up, it turned out the boiler casing wasn't earthed properly and curing this solved the alarm problem. Unfortunately these type of problems are notoriously difficult to pin down as they aren't ususally very consistent. It might help if you can narrow the problem down a little, is it just one light switch that causes the problem (possibly arcing contacts, change switch). You may well find that moving the panel supply to another fuse will solve the problem. Final note, flourescent lights and modern low energy lamps are more likely to cause problems as they do tend to put all sorts of weird spikes down the mains supply as they start up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sd6446 Posted December 2, 2008 Author Share Posted December 2, 2008 Thanks once again - will let you know how I get on. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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