Discuss Floodlight PIR operating problem... Help appreciated. in the Electrical Forum area at ElectriciansForums.net

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TommyCockles

Hey guys,

I've recently come across an interesting fault that has me a little stumped, so thought i'd open it up for the forum and hear some of your suggestions as to possible causes.

I was called to a job in a rural area that i believe used to be a farm and has now been converted into multiple properties with adjacent garages. I was told that two halogen floodlights with PIR's (one on the front of the house, the other on the garage) were not working properly and may possibly need changing.

When i arrived i proceeded in checking the first light on the outside of the house, the owner had imformed me that she had changed the lamp but the fitting was still not working at all. When i took it apart i noticed that the arm that holds the lamp on the left hand side had been worn down to a flat plate and thus was not making contact with the lamp correctly, and there were also signs of arcing.

I informed the owner of what i had found and proceeded to change the fitting to a brand new one. When i switched the supply back on the light came on as expected and began going through its startup sequence. Once that had ended i of course expected it to switch off until the PIR was triggered. Unfortunately this didn't happen, what happened instead was that when the PIR had timed out and attempted to switch off it only did so for a fraction of a second and then was automatically switched back on again. Not by someone setting off the pir but for some other reason, it continued to do this for as long as you had the supply on.

Finding this strange i decided to have a look at the other halogen that was playing up while i thought about possible causes of the problem. When i spoke to the owner about the second light mounted on the garage she said it was working but not correctly. I should also mention that while both of these fitting were normally controlled via the PIR they also both have an in line switch for manual overide. And that the lux level control on this fitting had already been altered to operate during the day by the owner in her attempt to fix the problem. So i go into the garage and turn on the switch for the floodlight and again wait for the startup sequence to finish. Once it had the PIR switched the fitting off for maybe 3-4 seconds and then switched back on again, and again this was not caused by someone walking in front of the PIR. This fitting also continued to do this for as long as the supply was on. I decided to change this fitting to a brand new one as well and see what difference this made to the problem. Once fitted the only difference was that the 3-4 second off time changed to a fraction of a second like the fitting on the house.

So now both brand new fitting were showing the exact same symptom, a symptom that the old existing fitting was also showing albeit at a slower rate. And a symptom that could have possibly caused the arcing in the fitting that wasn't working when i arrived. I should also say that the two fittings are on completely different mcb's in the fuseboard.

Only having my voltmeter with me at the time meant i couldn't perform any tests on the circuits other than checking that the voltage was consistent and correct, which it was. I of course checked all the connections multiple times, no problems there. I switched off the mcb's to all the other circuits in the board except for the one that fed the house flood light, the problem still persisted. The same goes for the garage light, turning off everything else in the board had no effect. I did speak with the next door neighbours and both of there floodlights work fine and are not showing this type of issue. The owner of the house said the old lights had been working correctly at some point but not for a long time.

Unfortunatley this was all at the end of a busy day and a prior engagement meant i couldn't stay any longer to investigate further. So i am planning on going back sometime this week, but before i do so i'd like a clear plan of action as its a fair drive. I definitely want to take a fitting back down and hook it up to a neighbours proven working supply so i can rule out a bad batch of fittings, but i doubt this is the problem. I'll also be taking my Fluke 1653B to run some tests.

Anyone come across a problem like this before that could point me in the right direction and save me a bit of time? Oh, and sorry about the essay i wanted to be fairly thorough to help you guys out.

Look forward to hearing your comments.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Sorry,

i just realised i had the NoScript add-on for Firefox blocking this website and my ability to use paragraphs, sorted now.
 

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