Quick background:
- XTB-IIR
- XTBM
- AHP Running on CM15 (plugged directly into XTB-IIR at the panel box)
A few months ago, I ran into a problem with my three outside front lights that are on two separate switches and using socket rockets. Turns out that the bulbs I was using (100 watt incandescents) were creating too much heat and the socket rockets were overcome with the heat and unable to reliably turn off when AHP/CM15 tried. I 'fixed' this by changing the incandescent bulbs with equivalent lumen CFL bulbs because they ran much cooler.
It's been a couple months since then and everything was running flawlessly (100% really) until a few days ago. Then I started having issues with missed commands, lights coming on when they weren't programmed to come on, many extra dimming commands, etc. Always at night. Never in the morning. The AHP log showed me all the extra noise that was happening, so I got out my recently purchased XTBM and took a look at the readings. My signal strength was almost 5 (XTB-IIR is putting out an excellent signal). But the noise level -- which is normally .01 - .03 was .22 - .24
-- again only at night. So, I toggled all of the items that only run at night and found that although the CFL's in the outside fixtures had been running w/o issue for about 2 months or so, they were now creating a TON of noise. If I turned them off, the noise level returned to normal levels. So, I thought that since the CFL's I'd put in place were working well for 2 months, they were OK. Not so anymore I guess. I've put 75 watt incandescents in their place and all is well again.
So, I've learned two things from this:
- Although I knew that some CFL's were noisy, I thought these were OK since they ran well for 2 months or so. I guess CFL's can change after time.
- The XTBM is truly an indispensable tool for troubleshooting your X10 issues!
Lee
Author
Topic: XTBM Comes Through! (Read 19565 times)