UPB severe problems started yesterday

[Basildane]

I have a house with about 20 UPB devices. Everything has been perfect for years. I have an HAI phase coupler (split phase in my house).
Woke up yesterday and 15 of the devices were not responding to commands. They do operate normally locally. At the same time I found a circuit breaker tripped. I also have a Leviton whole-house surge suppressor.

So, I loaded Upstart and got zero response from most of the devices. To make a long story short, I cut off breakers until I got to my office UPS, which is an APC 2200 RM.
When I cut THAT off, the signal jumped back up to excellent on almost every device. (2 of them are damaged and will not reset).

The UPS seems to be sucking the UPB signal down to zero. Upstart says "zero" for noise. I've never seen any reading for noise. Does that feature even work?
Anyway, this UPS has been running for over 5 years. Longer than I've had the UPB equipment. And it went from perfect to unusable overnight.

My theory is that we had a spike that killed two of the UPB's, and damaged the UPS.
What to do? Isolate the UPS from the line? Would a "noise" filter work in this case?

 

[mustangcoupe]

IMHO,

If you think you had a spike which damaged the UPS I would replace it. Yes it might still provide backup power, but will it protect your computer in the future to additional spikes?

 

[JonW]

The surge protection capability of most units degrades as it takes hits from the power line. If the UPS is putting out that much noise, then it means that something is not operating within spec any longer. I'd look to replace it.

 

[Basildane]

According to Upstart, noise level is zero.

I have never seen any reading at all for noise in 2 years. So I wonder if we are talking about noise, or about "sucking" the signal.

Yes, I'm thinking about the UPS but damn its like over $1000. I'm concerned that I might get another UPS and it sucks the signal too. I read many posts about UPS's and UPB.
That's why I was looking for advice to isolate the UPS from the house.

 

[pete_c]

I've recently installed a "few" older / some newer UPS's in the house. A mix of sorts older APC, newer Tripp Lite and Cyber power.

Concurrently I also have been migrating my X10/Insteon switches over to UPB. My X-10 /Insteon switches controlled via X10/OPII/XTB amplifier are all working fine.

While not done yet with the second floor (all on the same PIM phase), I have installed three switches on the opposite phase (main floor). (this signal levels are much lower than the same phase signal levels)

I have not seen UPB "noise" on the lines yet except for one day. So far I cannot pin point the source other than maybe the neighbors pool pump. Around the same time I had a Malibu Landscaping transformer failing; removed it and the noise continued that night and into the next day.

The noise that occurred prevented the PIM from talking to my UPB switches. It was an odd occurrance and I haven't seen it again.

Relating to "sucking the UPB signal"; my UPB signal strengths have been the same with no changes every day except for the one day there was noise on the line.

I am guess then so far the UPS's that I have installed have not been detrimental to the UPB switches that I have installed. (nor X10 switches and appliance modules at this point in time).

 

[Steve]

I've never had issues with UPS signal sucking on UPB either. Just noise, and not from the UPS. Is that UPS 'monitored/logged'? Can you look and see if you had some sort of event like overvoltage or a power failure or anything? Does the UPS have any diagnostics you can run? If everything in the house is normal with the UPS off and turning the UPS on kills things then I would agree that unfortunately something happened to the UPS. Does your Leviton suppressor still show that it is protecting? Hard to imagine a spike strong enough to go through the Leviton without damaging it but taking out the UPS, but electricity can do strange things. Or, maybe it was an internal event - maybe the UPS died somehow and sent out a spike on its own? Either way it sound like the UPS is an issue.

 

[Basildane]

Nothing in the log, however, I have noticed that APC's don't seem to log anything that is short, like a spike. Overvoltage will log if it is sustained. Log is clean though.

Leviton shows green lights.

The UPS doesn't even have to be on to kill the UPB signal. Just plugged in.

 

[JonW]

I have 2 APC 1500's and 2 other smaller units and they don't bother my UPB at all.

Funny story - when I started testing UPB about 5 years ago, I plugged the PIM into a power strip in my wiring closet and then started setting up devices. When I was done programming the devices, I went back to the wiring closet to move the PIM from a computer to my HomeVision unit. At that point, I realized that the power strip that the PIM was plugged into was actually running off one of my APC UPS's. I did all the programming with it transmitting through the UPS. That really sold me on the capabilities of UPB.

 

[Basildane]

I have 2 APC 1500's and 2 other smaller units and they don't bother my UPB at all.

Funny story - when I started testing UPB about 5 years ago, I plugged the PIM into a power strip in my wiring closet and then started setting up devices. When I was done programming the devices, I went back to the wiring closet to move the PIM from a computer to my HomeVision unit. At that point, I realized that the power strip that the PIM was plugged into was actually running off one of my APC UPS's. I did all the programming with it transmitting through the UPS. That really sold me on the capabilities of UPB.

Yes, I did my initial programming through the UPS too.
Everything worked perfectly for several years.

 

[ano]

I have 2 APC 1500's and 2 other smaller units and they don't bother my UPB at all.

Funny story - when I started testing UPB about 5 years ago, I plugged the PIM into a power strip in my wiring closet and then started setting up devices. When I was done programming the devices, I went back to the wiring closet to move the PIM from a computer to my HomeVision unit. At that point, I realized that the power strip that the PIM was plugged into was actually running off one of my APC UPS's. I did all the programming with it transmitting through the UPS. That really sold me on the capabilities of UPB.

Yes, I did my initial programming through the UPS too.
Everything worked perfectly for several years.

As others have said, I think replacing the UPS might be a good idea, but you can also now get UPB filters. Just plug the UPS into that and it should solve the problem.

 

[Basildane]

As others have said, I think replacing the UPS might be a good idea, but you can also now get UPB filters. Just plug the UPS into that and it should solve the problem.

Actually, I'm not clear on that at all. I haven't found any 20 amp isolators. In fact, everything advertises "noise filters" and Upstart says the noise level is zero. It has never moved from zero for the 2 years I've had it.

So I am still not clear that a noise filter would act as an isolator.

 

[wuench]

As others have said, I think replacing the UPS might be a good idea, but you can also now get UPB filters. Just plug the UPS into that and it should solve the problem.

Actually, I'm not clear on that at all. I haven't found any 20 amp isolators. In fact, everything advertises "noise filters" and Upstart says the noise level is zero. It has never moved from zero for the 2 years I've had it.

So I am still not clear that a noise filter would act as an isolator.

Noise filters are also isolators. They prevent the often overly aggressive filters in devices like the UPS from sucking the signals off the line.

 

[Basildane]

As others have said, I think replacing the UPS might be a good idea, but you can also now get UPB filters. Just plug the UPS into that and it should solve the problem.

Actually, I'm not clear on that at all. I haven't found any 20 amp isolators. In fact, everything advertises "noise filters" and Upstart says the noise level is zero. It has never moved from zero for the 2 years I've had it.

So I am still not clear that a noise filter would act as an isolator.

Noise filters are also isolators. They prevent the often overly aggressive filters in devices like the UPS from sucking the signals off the line.

Got it!

 

[BraveSirRobbin]

I also have a Leviton whole-house surge suppressor.

I might not be understanding the situation, but I think you should also call Leviton and ask them if they had any sort of guarentee of protecting devices with their surge unit.

 

[Penman]

I also have a Leviton whole-house surge suppressor.

I might not be understanding the situation, but I think you should also call Leviton and ask them if they had any sort of guarentee of protecting devices with their surge unit.

I have an APC UPS plugged into the same outlet as the UPB PIM that is connected to the computer running my home automation system that controls about 55 UPB devices in my house. Never had any problem with signal reduction when I installed the UPS.