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TIL about the 60 second window on hardwired zones

Was troubleshooting a false alarm at a house on Elm Street last week. Kept getting a trouble signal on zone 4 every night around 3 AM. Turns out the homeowner had a freezer compressor kicking on that caused a voltage drop on the wire. My old mentor never told me that hardwired zones have a 60 second delay before they trigger a trouble condition if the voltage fluctuates. Had to read it in the panel manual when I was about to swap out the whole board. Has anyone else run into weird voltage issues on 12v zones like this?
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2 Comments
rileyellis
Actually it's 60 seconds for the trouble to clear not to trigger, the delay happens after the voltage comes back.
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grant.nina
Right, the "60 seconds to clear" part is what got me too. That exact same voltage dip thing happened on a job with a walk-in cooler, drove me nuts until I realized the defrost cycle was pulling just enough juice to freak the panel out.
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