Monitoring Altronix Aux Power Supply for Low Voltage and AC Fail

SteveInNorCal

Active Member
I installed an Altronix eFlow4N8 auxiliary power supply to power my energy hogs: Uplink 4800 GSM radio and strobe.
 
I'm stumped on how to properly monitoring the eFlow with the Elk M1 Gold. Can you help?
 
The M1 G has built-in self monitoring of AC Power (SR01) and Low Battery (SR11) which report to my alarm monitoring company CS.
 
The eFlow unit provides power supervision via two Form "C" relays:
  • AC fail supervision. Form “C” contacts (NC, C, NO). Indicates loss of AC power. Relay normally energized when AC power is present.
  • Battery fail & presence supervision. Form “C” contacts (NC, C, NO). Indicates low battery condition. Designed to connect to an alarm panel. Relay normally energized when DC power is present. A removed battery is reported within 5 minutes and battery reconnection is reported within 1 minute.

  • Low power shutdown. Shuts down DC output terminals if battery voltage drops below 71-73% for 12V units and 70-75% for 24V units (depending on the power supply). Prevents deep battery discharge.

I wired the two eFlow relays to two input zones on the Elk M1 G and set them up with Zone Definition #13, "Auxiliary 1 24 hr." Elk says "This zone can trip anytime (armed or disarmed) and send a communicator report, but there is no audible alarm output or keypad indication provided. It is displayed in the event log. A Whenever/And/Then rule can be written from the RP software to do other things with this zone type. Resets upon restoral."
 
Zone Definition #32, "Power Supervisory 24 hr: says "For supervising an external power supply which provides alarm/trouble contacts. Wire the power supply contacts to open the zone in a Low Battery event and short the zone in an AC Failure event."
 
Questions:
  1. It seems like overkill to monitor AC Fail on BOTH the Elk and the Altronix because both are connected to the same unswitched circuit (both cans are about 6 inches apart and the same AC feeds both of them). So I presume I can rely on the Elk M1 G AC Fail monitoring and reporting to the CS. That will free up one input zone on the Elk.
  2. The Elk M1 G provides its own battery monitoring, but I DO need to monitor the Altronix battery. I conclude I should use the Altronix Battery Fail & Presence Supervision relay output, connect it to an Elk input zone, and use Zone Definition #32.
What I don't understand is the Elk instruction above for Zone Definition #32 which says "Wire the power supply contacts to open the zone in a Low Battery event and short the zone in an AC Failure event." It's easy enough to open the zone in a Low Battery event with the right relay contact. But, when I have a charged battery and the relay is energized, I'll short the zone. I don't want this recognized as an AC Failure event.
 
What do you experts think?
 
 

 
 
Let me ask this...
 
What do you want to happen if the Altronix power supply fails?
 
What do you want to happen if the Altronix battery is low?
 
You're reading too much into this.
 
You want to supervise the supply's AC power. Supplies fail all the time and if the input portion fails, it can fail with AC still present and then run on battery for quite a time if the batteries are sized appropriately. You also want to know about the LB because, while it's not going to tell you the condition of the batteries, in the case of any connected hardware to the supply, on a LBC, it can get VERY interesting for runaway signals, especially if there's expanders on the supply and the voltage sags to 12VDC or less. Also, as a failure mode, plenty of times the charging output of the supply fails or bad batteries drag down the output power of the unit.

Cascade your relays into each other. Single zone annunciates all conditions and only a single pair needed.

A quick sketch of how to do this is connect the panel to the NC of the LB relay, NO of the AC relay, install EOLR across NO and C of AC, jumper the C's together. Done.
 
Thanks, DEL. Just what I needed.
 
 
With EOLR across NO and C of AC, what Zone Definition do I use? I presume...
ZN001
  • 01: Description = 32
  • 02: Type = 0 (EOL supervised)
I think your suggested series configuration of the relay contacts meets the Elk requirement "Wire the power supply contacts to open the zone in a Low Battery event and short the zone in an AC Failure event." I see how this config will create 2200 Ohm in normal condition; shorted on AC fail, and opened on LB. Right?
 
Lastly, do the Altronix NO and NC states refer to the relay condition when the PS is AC-energized? I haven't checked this out yet. It would seem to only make sense if "normal" is the relay condition when the AC PS is energized, not in the relay "on the shelf" condition.
 
EOLR.
 
If you follow the wiring and EOLR and the change of states affecting the zone, that's half the battle. Altronix' circuit board is labelled in their "normal" state off the top of my head. Using a meter is an easy check.
 
The single pair will see the 3 zone states easily and the short will be removed by the circuit opening on LB. You can't maintain a short circuit when the circuit becomes open.
 
DELInstallations said:
You're reading too much into this.
 
You want to supervise the supply's AC power. Supplies fail all the time and if the input portion fails, it can fail with AC still present and then run on battery for quite a time if the batteries are sized appropriately. You also want to know about the LB because, while it's not going to tell you the condition of the batteries, in the case of any connected hardware to the supply, on a LBC, it can get VERY interesting for runaway signals, especially if there's expanders on the supply and the voltage sags to 12VDC or less. Also, as a failure mode, plenty of times the charging output of the supply fails or bad batteries drag down the output power of the unit.

Cascade your relays into each other. Single zone annunciates all conditions and only a single pair needed.

A quick sketch of how to do this is connect the panel to the NC of the LB relay, NO of the AC relay, install EOLR across NO and C of AC, jumper the C's together. Done.
DEL
 
Thanks for this info, nice solution and saved me lots of research. I've had the Altronix running for months but just now got around to adding the supervision.
 
Mike.
 
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