Probably the backup battery is 150 years old & the plugpack has given up trying to charge it
Greetings
I have a Networx NX 16 alarm installed at home. The problem is there is no power getting to the sensors or the alarm pad. If the back up battery is flat, would you expect there to be no power in the system whatsoever? Or would I assume there may be a problem with the 24 v transformer plugged into the wall socket.
Cheers
Phil
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Probably the backup battery is 150 years old & the plugpack has given up trying to charge it
The battery is about five years old and the power plug was plugged in. Do you guys know if the bettery is flat, it would result in loss of power? I would have thought the back up battery is only used when there was a 240v power outage.
If the battery is clapped out, and these days it usually is at 5 years, then yes it can actually cause damage to other components of the system by creating excessive load. The other scenario is that there's been a power surge/spike and it's popped the plug pack. Either way, you'll need to replace both the plug pack and battery at this point.
unfortunately, 5 years is a very optimistic life span for SLA batteries,
even if it only ever had a constant float charge over the lifespan and never
had to actually do work. They sulphate up internally and loose capacity.
You should try disconnecting the battery, and see if your alarm panel powers up.
If your plugpack is working, the panel should work. I know my sol16 panel, with battery disconnected will still operate normally - bar the battery alarm.
There are some panels that will not power up at all if there is not a serviceable battery connected
Are you sure the transformer is 24V? The specified input voltage for an NX alarm panel is 16V AC. This may be causing all your problems. Also, the NX panels are fussy about which order they are powered up (battery first or AC first).
A little-known fact is that the alarm backup battery does all the work - the AC transformer is only there to provide charge to the battery (via the on-board circuitry). Even if you were to never use your alarm for say 5 years, it will still eventually come up with a battery "FAULT" as the battery is tested by all Solution panels under load every 4 hours, and on arming.
Try placing a decent load on a Solution panel (say 2 horn speakers and 2 screamers sounding) without the battery connected, and see what happens.
you may have a short on one of your power out circuits ie codepad, detectors, check it with your test meter.
My process would be to first disconnect the battery. Is the problem still there?
If yes, take out all of the power from the detector aux terminals in the panel. Problem still there?
Take out the sirens and strobe cables. Problem still there?
How many codepads have you? If more than one. Disconnect and leave only one connected. Problem still there?
Disconnect that codepad and reconnect the other one. Problem still there?
With all devices disconnected is there power coming out of the aux terminals?
Just try basic fault finding. Take one set of things out at a time and when the system becomes operational again start adding things one at a time until the fault returns.
Does the system have expanders? All it takes on a NX/Reliance system is a fault on one of the devices, codepad, expanders etc, and it shuts everything else down. I've had a few codepads die on me and cause this problem.
Cheers.
PS - invest in a multimeter, $9.95 from jaycar, can make a big help in circumstances like this.
Hi Guys,
fault finding 101!
I used a multimeter on the Volts range to check across each fuse in the system. One fuse showed 4.6V across it. The 2A fuse was intact, but the current flow was in excess of 4A. Pulled the fuse, and the system came back to life! A low resistance short had occurred in one of the peripherals!
Second example. Brand new alarm panel. Tested ok, but 2 days later, sirens running, but no keypad, or strobe. Powered down and back up. All appeared normal, until the alarm was triggered again. External sirens running but no keypad power. No Piezo running, so disconnected it from panel. Panel came back to life, and keypad worked normally. Faulty Piezo after only 2 days!
Makes you wonder why they bother putting fuses in the NX at all
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