Elk - Low battery
- Thread starter Stef
- Start date
felixrosbergen
Senior Member
Possibly...have you checked the battery connections? Not sure if it differentiates between 'low' and 'no' battery.
Most alarm batteries only last 3 to 5 years so 4 is about normal for replacing.
In the ELK Keypad menu there is a menu option to see what your standby current draw is (expressed in milliamps). If you have only burg devices multiply that number by 4 and if you have any fire devices multiply that number by 24. The result will be how many amp/hours of battery you need. Then round up to the next size battery (5 ah, 8 ah, or possibly 2 of the 8 ah batteries). The 5 ah is the ELK-1250 and the 8 ah is the ELK-1280.
Since your in Canada you should check out AAR Tech. If the exchange rate is favorable you can check out Automated Outlet.
Spanky
Senior Member
As Digger said 4 years is a reasonable time for a sealed lead acid battery in an alarm system to last. The M1 does a load test every 24 hours at 4PM and if it finds that the battery cannot sustain the load for a 30 second test period, the low battery signal is activated. You can press the * key to silence the 30 trouble beep. When you replace the battery, turn the power off then on which will reset the low battery trouble display.
Stick with the ELK batteries. I have been doing a lot of battery discharge tests on a new commercial panel at work using several brands of batteries. Even at 49 C (the panel is in an oven for the test) the ELK batteries hold up no problem. Most of the other batteries could not hold up to the test under regular temperatures let alone 49 C. The ELK batteries have a very good chemistry and we were able to pass the UL testing with them (with room to spare) where others did not hold up. They also have a 2 year warranty from date of mfg which not many batteries have any at all.
11.1V is not good. Sounds like this battery should have been replaced a while ago. I have an HAI panel, and it will send a warning way before the battery gets that low.
AutomatedOutlet
Senior Member
You should also check to see how much load you are putting on the system.
Spanky
Senior Member
Elk has been doing a lot of battery testing and chemistry analysis of batteries lately on the industries sealed lead acid batteries. There is a great deal of difference in battery quality across all the batteries available.
The one biggest observation to keep in mind is not to let your sealed lead acid battery go to a deep discharged state and stay discharged for any time period. Serious current delivering capacity degradation will result if the battery is not recharged within hours of the deep discharge.
If your control does not have a low battery cutoff built in, add a low battery cutoff module to it, such as the ELK-965 Low Battery Cutoff Module. The cutoff module will save replacing your battery after a storm or power outage and give you a power cutoff switch to power down the control when servicing it.
Deep discharging can cause other problems with batteries like individual cells can short out. If a cell should short out, the battery will be getting an over voltage charge on the remaining cells.
A deep discharge would be letting a 12 volt battery drop below 6 volts.
The same holds for your car battery. Don't run it all the way down and not recharge it immediately.
The M1 has a low battery cutoff module built-in that cuts off the battery at 8.5 volts.
Another industry problem is if the power to some controls is not cutoff when the battery gets very low, the control may get into a low voltage eratic operation like beeping keypads that can not be silenced.
Batteries and charging can be a whole educational program into itself.
The one biggest observation to keep in mind is not to let your sealed lead acid battery go to a deep discharged state and stay discharged for any time period. Serious current delivering capacity degradation will result if the battery is not recharged within hours of the deep discharge.
If your control does not have a low battery cutoff built in, add a low battery cutoff module to it, such as the ELK-965 Low Battery Cutoff Module. The cutoff module will save replacing your battery after a storm or power outage and give you a power cutoff switch to power down the control when servicing it.
Deep discharging can cause other problems with batteries like individual cells can short out. If a cell should short out, the battery will be getting an over voltage charge on the remaining cells.
A deep discharge would be letting a 12 volt battery drop below 6 volts.
The same holds for your car battery. Don't run it all the way down and not recharge it immediately.
The M1 has a low battery cutoff module built-in that cuts off the battery at 8.5 volts.
Another industry problem is if the power to some controls is not cutoff when the battery gets very low, the control may get into a low voltage eratic operation like beeping keypads that can not be silenced.
Batteries and charging can be a whole educational program into itself.
The storage temperature of a battery that is not being charged is also critical. The lower the ambient temperature (but still above 65 F) the longer the battery will remain "fresh".
Seriously though the ELK batteries outperformed the other 3 or 4 brands we tried all with date codes reasonably close together. With some batteries you could feel they were cheap just by picking them up and feeling how light they were. We tried to design the panel to pass the discharge test with the worst battery in the group. The one brand just did not make it no matter what we tried.
We did note that fairly similar testing with the ELK batteries at normal ambient (22 C or so) and elevated ambient (49 C) the results were very close. The loading and charging rate were a little different at normal ambient test was a 24 hour recharge period for Commercial Burg and the 49 C ambient was 48 hour recharge period for Commercial Fire. From the data it looked like the batteries were fully recharged in about 20 hours or so in both cases but the advantage the ELK batteries had over other brands were that they did not discharge as much (only down to about 23 V where others were down to about 18 to 20 which was a failure) so it was easier to refresh them quickly.
Just to clarify the above data we used 8 of the 12 V 8 ah batteries in series/parallel to create 32 aH at 24 V for the test. We did similar testing with the 12 V 18 aH batteries with excellent results on another product in the system.
Seriously though the ELK batteries outperformed the other 3 or 4 brands we tried all with date codes reasonably close together. With some batteries you could feel they were cheap just by picking them up and feeling how light they were. We tried to design the panel to pass the discharge test with the worst battery in the group. The one brand just did not make it no matter what we tried.
We did note that fairly similar testing with the ELK batteries at normal ambient (22 C or so) and elevated ambient (49 C) the results were very close. The loading and charging rate were a little different at normal ambient test was a 24 hour recharge period for Commercial Burg and the 49 C ambient was 48 hour recharge period for Commercial Fire. From the data it looked like the batteries were fully recharged in about 20 hours or so in both cases but the advantage the ELK batteries had over other brands were that they did not discharge as much (only down to about 23 V where others were down to about 18 to 20 which was a failure) so it was easier to refresh them quickly.
Just to clarify the above data we used 8 of the 12 V 8 ah batteries in series/parallel to create 32 aH at 24 V for the test. We did similar testing with the 12 V 18 aH batteries with excellent results on another product in the system.
I think its best to change batteries at a set time period, and NOT wait until the panel tells you to change them. I get ELK batteries (which are the best) and change them every three years. I actually use 5 batteries total for things like power lock backup, etc. From experience, if you wait until the panel tells you to change the battery, its FAR too late. Don't believe me? Take that battery that your panel is saying is bad and unplug the panel from 120V. I bet instead of the 8AH your expecting you may get 1 or 2 if your lucky. Which means your panel will be dead as a doornail WAY before it should be.
I have the M1G unit so you are saying it comes with the low battery cutoff module or should I get it? I ask cause it is just past 2 years and my unit is now saying low battery. I did not know how to silence the beeps, till reading this thread, so disconnected the battery and am still getting low battery message. Why is that? If these Elk batteries are good for 3 years then why is mine NG after 2? I have not had any power outages or anything to discharge it. Does anyone have their units on a UPS or would recommend it?
Sandpiper
Active Member
The M1 already has the low battery cutoff feature, so don't get it. If you unplug the low battery, the M1 will see no battery which is the same as low battery to the M1. You'll need a charged battery to clear the low battery warning. I cannot say why your battery is low for a 2 year-old battery. If it were me, I'd just get a new one. Just make sure the connections to the battery are tight. I have seen the "low battery" warning on occasion to be caused by loose battery connections. Once you put the new battery in, it may take a few hours to clear the low battery warning. Or you can cycle the M1 power to clear the warning.
I have unplugged the battery and am still getting the low battery warning. Whether the battery is connected or not if I recycle the M1 power it does NOT clear the warning.
