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Author Topic: X10 gone wild  (Read 9094 times)

kkoncelik

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X10 gone wild
« on: October 27, 2011, 07:31:35 AM »

I have had problems with my x10 for since I installed it.  Recently however it has been more abusrd than ever. Yes lights go on without help but last night was the crowning glory.  I had an issue with the coupler and X10 replaced it so I installed it.  All of a sudden my screen showing the items hooked up cleared up and I had only green in the correct locations.  But within an hour lights stated to turn on and switched did the same.  This morning when I got up I looked at the chart and every square had a color in it.  The green were still correct but the remaining squares were yellow or red about evenly split. 
So its one step forward fifteen back.
Almost none of my 80 units work.  Any suggestions.  I have a scope and cannot find any line noise.
I do see triggers.  Last night I did not have the scope at home so I did not look at it since this mess came up.
I see from the posts I am  not the only one with these problems
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Dan Lawrence

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Re: X10 gone wild
« Reply #1 on: October 27, 2011, 07:38:33 AM »

We need more information, like what version of AHP, any plug-ins and anything else you have.
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Brian H

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Re: X10 gone wild
« Reply #2 on: October 27, 2011, 09:52:43 AM »

Maybe power line problems.
Something maybe changing.
Anything new in the home? Like a new cell phone charger or an AC run devices?
Sounds like you do have some troubleshooting experience.
On the chance you have not had a chance to read some troubleshooting tutorials.
http://jvde.us/x10_troubleshooting.htm
http://www.act-remote.com/PCC/uncle.htm
http://www.davehouston.net/
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JeffVolp

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Re: X10 gone wild
« Reply #3 on: October 27, 2011, 11:26:40 AM »


Did the electric company perhaps install a new "smart meter"?

Jeff
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Brian H

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Re: X10 gone wild
« Reply #4 on: October 27, 2011, 12:40:55 PM »

Jeff; It sounds like the Smart Meter question will have to be part of our troubleshooting checks.
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Noam

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Re: X10 gone wild
« Reply #5 on: October 27, 2011, 12:59:16 PM »

It could be a neighbor who just installed X10, and/or added a signal booster?
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Dan Lawrence

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Re: X10 gone wild
« Reply #6 on: October 27, 2011, 01:38:11 PM »

Considering X10 has NEVER mass marketed ever. it's highly doubtful that someone on the same transformer has X10.  I've had X10 since the middle 1980's and I'm the ONLY X10 user on my street in Baltimore.
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kkoncelik

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Re: X10 gone wild
« Reply #7 on: October 28, 2011, 05:53:28 AM »

I have been responding to x10 for some time and the detail is more than i can put here but I have scoped out the line and I see no line noise.
My neighbors do not have x10 as I am the neighborhood handyman and have done a lot of work including electrical at their houses also and I am at the end of a dead end street so the houses are a bit apart and there is nothing for a half mile behind me.
I just replaced the coupler and my lights since then have been going on by themselves a lot.
In the past I have removed all rf devices including my panasonic 3d tv that does emit rf for the ed glasses plus I put a filter on that line.
I have added the dryer filter and in the past but not now have had in two line filters.
My history is my company does converters and repeaters for rs484/232/422 etc. but sending a signal down electrical wires is a different field and I am lost like most people on it. 
The weird thing is that in August after a year of working to get i going the system ran pretty good.  Most of the switches and outlets worked so at one time this system was 95%. 
Since then I have added one outdoor circuit for my back yard and right now only a pond pump is running on it.

I have added a lot of wire to the home since I bought it and most is 12-2 w ground and some 14-2 w ground.  The X10 was added when I did my new addition so most of it is in the new addition. running out of room will post additional info next post.
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kkoncelik

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Re: X10 gone wild
« Reply #8 on: October 28, 2011, 06:03:21 AM »

In the initial installation when things were 95% the only thing not working was two switches in the new section over the fire place and in the room. They were LED lights and it was the basic on off switch. The lights would go on but not off.   I added the filters there but no change.  Then I changed to dimmers and they worked.
The switches were on a 4 gang wall plate all using the same power.  The other two were the exact same LED lights with a set of two and a set of 4.  The LED on the dimmer had to be changed to a dimmable led.

In the past I have removed all rf devices from the home or removed batteries this included keyboard and mouse I used X10 from a touchscreen monitor so no rf devices were there.  Nothing changed.

To back up a bit things stopped working when we lost power.  Nothing in the house was damaged by it and I did replace some units just in case but the new units reacted the same way.

As far as the lights going on per x10 reqest I changed the codes on the lights that frequently went on. Things were a bit quiet before I reinstalled the phase coupler.
The original one I felt was not working properly as I was seeing activity on the scope and there was no activity on the coupler (lights blinking) The replacement coupler was installed and now my lights as I said have gone wild.   But even when activated the coupler lights do not blink other than to turn off the unit then they blink one time only.  Last week on the usage chart all that showed were green now the blanks are either red or yellow.  I am at a loss. I have about 80 units installed between lights and outlets.                         
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kkoncelik

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Re: X10 gone wild
« Reply #9 on: October 28, 2011, 06:25:15 AM »

Last post for now I promise
I read some of the advice above and the triggers I see on some of the web sites is similar to what i see.  The x10 signal spike and thanks for the nice view of line noise. I do not have that.
One thing I read a lot on what distance.  I have a lot and I mean a lot of wire in my house. There is a couple thousand extra feet of wire added to the original house and when the system did work in August it had most of the wire in it but the outside wire added is on the circuit breaker that now goes outside.  Added to it is yet another at least 750 feet of wire.  If X10 disperses over all wire as one article suggests this may contribute. I am going to take this wire out and bring it back to when it worked by simply turning off the breaker and moving the phase coupler to another set of breakers.
Have to do that later need to go to work now
Thanks to all of you that responded so far.
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dave w

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Re: X10 gone wild
« Reply #10 on: October 28, 2011, 12:25:35 PM »

If you have over 80 X10 modules and "thousands" of feet of Romex, you need to burn your XPCR and get a XTBIIR.
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kkoncelik

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Re: X10 gone wild
« Reply #11 on: October 28, 2011, 11:03:13 PM »

To answer a few more of your questions back to me NO I do not have a smart meter we have the old fassion meters that have to be read.
I am going to purchase the XTBIIR and see if it helps.  I have AHP 3.316 and all the updates are also installed.

I also have the pyramids that I used to use to bring my remotes from upstairs to downstairs but they never worked reliable.  I switched to another product and absolutely zero problems from any distance. I realize that I kinda jumped subject here but It tells me there is a problem in the frequencies that these rf units operate and that rf problem may also be what I am seeing.  And by the way on my usage chart many of the squares that were blank then turned to yellow are now red.  I have almost as many red as green the strange part is it says its a detected object but there is nothing there.  All this happened after I installed the phase coupler XPCR.  Also I am to the point of trying to boost the signal as much as I can .  What is this forums suggestion for the best way to boost signal.  And last but not least I have 4 computers that run.  One for x10 only and one for my movie theatre room and upstairs TV. I see posts saying that computers cause issues.  Again what is the best way to filter them. 
I am going to start looking online for them as well.
thanks for your help. 
Ken
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kkoncelik

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Re: X10 gone wild
« Reply #12 on: November 05, 2011, 10:52:53 AM »

Here is a follow up.  I turned off all  the breakers in the house as directed by the technician at x10.
Tuurned on the one for the computer x10 is loaded on and moved the transmitter cm15a to the same outlet.
Also turned on the breaker for the monitor.  I plugged it in to a GFI outlet seperate from any x10.
No more red boxes (all yellow have turned to red at this point)
put scope across and turned on another breaker with 4 lights (ones described above LED) they never worked right now they do.
put on another breaker and it has 3 x10 switches on the second phase.
It works on the three outlets
Put on another breaker and now they do not work (3 x10 outlets) and the original outlets from the first breaker now will go on but not off
Played with a few more breakers and we are back to start. Nothing works.
Best I can conclude since my scope is showing no noise is that the power is way to weak.
The computer is sending and resending the signals but nothing is working.
I am buying two signal amplifiers in addition to the phase coupler and dryer booster I already have.
Coming to the conclusion that x10 does not work in houses with any decent amount of wire in it.
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JeffVolp

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Re: X10 gone wild
« Reply #13 on: November 05, 2011, 12:05:13 PM »

Coming to the conclusion that x10 does not work in houses with any decent amount of wire in it.

A few of my customers have very large homes (over 10,000 sq.ft.), with two or more 200A panels, and they have been able to get their X10 systems to work fine.  But it can take some effort, especially with the proliferation of noise sources and signal suckers in an average home today.

Jeff
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Brian H

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Re: X10 gone wild
« Reply #14 on: November 05, 2011, 12:54:45 PM »

You plugged the CM15A interface into the same outlet as the computer. Was the computer isolated from the CM15A by a X10 filter? Computer power supplies are known trouble makers.

The Dryer Outlet Booster. Is it the Smarthome Repeater or Passive Coupler model?
The repeater version has been known to sometimes make signal firestorms on the power lines.
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