Cbus unit causing havoc

Greetings

we have a cbus system installed in our house, and I honestly have no idea what I’m looking at. My late husband had it done and managed it all, and took all his knowledge with him a few years ago

Late last night we lost power to half the house, almost every light came on, and all the switches stopped working, or start flashing in disco mode if you press them. Some lights would turn off after about 5-10 minutes.
Approx every 10 mins or so the power returns to the rest of the house, stays on for about half a second, then cycles off again. When it comes on, all lights turn off. When it goes off again, the lights turn on. Even the ones we have since managed to turn off.
I have no power to any bedrooms, the garage, the laundry, the hot water service, or the office area where we have our computers set up.

our cbus cabinet has four sections in it, and I don’t know what I’m looking at. The second from the top is flashing and looks like it is trying to restart or something? The unit and cbus lights turn out completely for a few seconds every now and again, and when this happens all units lose the cbus light (bottom left light on the panel). I have posted a photo and video to Twitter, here: https://twitter.com/kelisha/status/1566420767725977600?s=21&t=6y7oiLv1ipQqmlN7kDsRnw

I’m also a widow and don’t have a lot of money to throw at this, and attempting to run a startup company from home (an attempt to correct the above to the best of my ability, but I need power to the office for that).

Any clues what I can do in the short term to get my house working again? I honestly can’t afford to pay an electrician, nor can I afford to not keep plugging away at getting this company running, nor can I afford too many more nights attempting to sleep through all lights coming on/off/on/off uncontrollably (kids don’t cope well with lack of sleep. Solo mums don’t cope well with grumpy kids and lack of sleep)

 

Where do you live. Looks like the cbus unit has failed, it supplies cbus power ( see the 200ma text) to power the cbus network eg switches, there will be others that also supply power. If there is not enough power then the cbus will go down. Also if the power is “noisy” it will interfere with the cbus messages. The switches flash because the can’t communicate with the devices they control. I’m in Sydney NSW pm if you need more advice/help.

 

Welcome to the forum @Kelisha. Wish it were under happier circumstances. Like @lcrowhurst said, that relay unit is likely cooked. I had to replace a dimmer that was doing bad things to CBus. It brought everything down when connected despite there being plenty of power.

For the short term taking that relay out of the network might get the lights back under control (assuming there is enough power without that unit power supply for the network to function correctly). That might help with sleeping until a solution can be found. If there's no power to hot water then presumably that's being switched by the likely faulty relay unit.

By "no power to any bedrooms, the garage, the laundry ... or the office area" do you mean lighting or power points?

 

I was going to say about removing the relay off the cbus, however it’s in an elecrical board that should only be done by an electrician .

 

Thanks for your feedback guys. Kelisha called me yesterday and I was able to replace the failed 12 channel relay unit that was causing the problem. The on-board power supply was the issue as you guys had highlighted. Luckily I had a 12 channel relay with power supply on board so could replace it quickly. Failing power supplies in output units are by far the biggest issue I see and find I am replacing 1-2 units per month in homes where this happens. This is most frustrating as we all know how expensive dimmers and relays are and there is no alternative (we are not allowed to repair mains rated products due the risk of altering a manufactured product) and Schneider do not offer this service.

 

Check in with @Trevor about the potential for future repairs, Mr Conformist. Not sure where he's at.

 

I've had a brief chat to Trevor about this offline already. It's a compliance issue. As soon as a change is made to the mains circuit that hasn't been implemented by the original manufacturer, a can of worms be opened. I'll follow up and see where he is at as you've suggested. There would need to be buy-in from (his) product liability insurer.

 

Hi All, Yes i have been investigation the repair of the relay and dimmer units. So far i have found that over the years there have been numerous hardware updates/upgrades to the units, meaning that finding a 1 fix fixes all is not possible at this time and depends on the type of unit being repaired. There is the obvious failing capacitors and these can be replaced without problems. I have seen units that use different input transformers for AC step down voltage, some are available and some only if you purchase a production run of 1000+ pieces. Some aren't available at all.

Other problems i have found is blown fuses, (Some have 2 inside). We are still evaluating the viability of going forward and offering a repair service for the relay and dimmers at this time. This may also include some other C-bus products that incorporate the same/similar power supplies internally, Eg the 5500PS.

One major issue even before attempting repairs is opening the units as so far about 50% have the tops glued in place, and are damaged during disassembly.

Once the above has been addressed we will look at offering a repair service, but at the moment we would be looking at early next year.

If anyone has any relays/dimmers/other c-bus units that are otherwise going to go to the rubbish, i'd like to have them for R&D

And of course I'm always on the lookout for second hand 5080CTC colour touch screens to purchase for spare parts to keep the repairs going.

Regards
Trevor Callaghan
JEA Technologies
0404 887 463
Unit 36, 41-49 Norcal road
Nunawading 3131