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Wiring New Pirs To Old Alarm Panel Help Needed Please!


tapgrove

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Hiya,

I seem to be a bit stuck and was hoping someone maybe able to help me get my alarm system back up and running.

Basically - I've just finished renovating a house which had an old alarm installed in 1996 - it seems to be a Castle Care-Tech 1600 system.

There is a door contact and 4 x PIRs each in their own zones. It all worked fine when I moved in about 9 months ago but I took down all the old dated and dirty PIRs when replastering and have replaced them with I think units from Activ8 (or Active8?) which seemed neater.

I wired these up how I thought the existing ones were done, but now everytime I try and set the alarm I get 'F' then '1' flash up on the keypad display. From the manual this seems to imply a wiring fault I think? but I've tried loads of combinations of PIR wiring and all seem to produce the same result.

I was hoping someone could point me in the direction of what may be wrong - I've taken a picture of the insides of the alarm control unit and they are at http://jhserver.jhorsfield.com/IMG_2813.JPG and http://jhserver.jhorsfield.com/IMG_2814.JPG . I was guessing from this that the white and green wires should go to the contact terminals in the PIRs (does it matter which way round?) and the PIRs also have power (black and red) and also blue and yellow wires to them which I've wired up to the tamper terminals of the PIRs (these are connected together in a chocolate block in some sort of pattern at the other end in the alarm panel and then wired into terminals A and B on circuit7 - again I wasn't sure if these had to be wired a special way round or not?

does this all sound ok - or have I missed something important in the way the PIRs should be wired back? I've had a qoute from the company to have a look but they want

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I dont know that panel but it may be telling you that a fuse has blown F1 perhaps????

In fact it looks like 1 is missing on the RH side of the PCB.

The opinions I express are mine and are usually correct!

(Except when I'm wrong)(which I'm not)

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Guest anguscanplay

for goodness sake johnathon dont do as another poster did the other day and replace it with a standard mains fuse

it may be that your questions show you are slightly out of your depth on the final part of the reinstallation of your system and i always recommend the final setting is best left to a competant engineer the price you qouted is a good deal to ensure the system works and is safe for you to operate

take pride from getting this far and saving a substantial sum but it is false economy not to get the system set up proffesionally imho

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F-1 System (SAB or Box tamper)

F-2 Mains Failure

F-3 Over or Under Volts

F-4 Battery Fault

F-5 Telecom Line Fault

F-6 System Re-start

F-7 Keypad generated alarm

Before anyone complains, this is taken from the User Manual

Someone told me I was ignorant and apathetic, I don't know what that means, nor do I care.

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Hiya,

I seem to be a bit stuck and was hoping someone maybe able to help me get my alarm system back up and running.

Jonathan

Hello Jonathan, I'm a DIY-er too. And a regular visitor here for some years.

From your post you appear to be doing this without an engineers/installation manual. If that is true my simple and definite advice is DON'T. :ninja:

You may get a user manual here, but not an installation manual. Without it you really won't get anywhere.

If it's an old panel, as seems to be the case, either buy a new one with manuals, or get a professional in.

If you ask here you'll get plenty of good advice on both of those options. :yes:

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Tapegrove,

Just a silly question but have you the control panel box open when you power up and go to the keypad and test.......if so then you will get a box tamper and same goes for the bell as i presume that will be open when you power up the system and wire in the battery on the external bell.

If you make sure these 2 devices are closed and backed up by battery then test the system all should be ok . That is the only way i can think of that you are doing wrong so far.

cheers

!

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HHi,

thanks for all the comments so far..in response to a couple ofthem the missing fuse is the backup battery

fuse which i took out whilst rewiring the pirs to stop the alarm going off due to the tamper switches

being activated..and the panel cover was fully screwed back before powerng up and i made sure the microswitch is being depressed when it's put back on. the Outsidde bell box is the existing one which is untouched and worked fine when i moved in. I had seen in the user manual that f1 related to the sab fault potentially but i

think it also said elsewhere it could be a wiring fault. Agreed this is nearly impossible without an installation manual, but hopefully someone might recognise somethng i've done wrong as i really can't afford to get someone out at the moment.

Thanks

jonathan

quote name='Scottish Engineer' date='Mar 20 2007, 10:56 PM' post='159485']

Tapegrove,

Just a silly question but have you the control panel box open when you power up and go to the keypad and test.......if so then you will get a box tamper and same goes for the bell as i presume that will be open when you power up the system and wire in the battery on the external bell.

If you make sure these 2 devices are closed and backed up by battery then test the system all should be ok . That is the only way i can think of that you are doing wrong so far.

cheers

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Think I may have managed to fix this now - it seems like the microswitch on the keypad in the hallway wasn't contacting properly ( I think I removed it when we plastered the hallway). I removed the front of the keypad and packed out the plastic lug which the switch sits on when closed and all seems to be working again! I didn't twig that the keypad as well as the control panel and presumably the bell box as well all had tamper switches, and the F1 code description didn't spell it out either unfortunately.

So - I guess the next step is to work out how to add another PIR in (in a new zone if possible)... does anyone know if this is just a case of wiring the new PIR into the spare circuit terminals in the control panel, or do I somehow need to programme the system to tell it there is another zone involved?

Regards,

Jonathan

HHi,

thanks for all the comments so far..in response to a couple ofthem the missing fuse is the backup battery

fuse which i took out whilst rewiring the pirs to stop the alarm going off due to the tamper switches

being activated..and the panel cover was fully screwed back before powerng up and i made sure the microswitch is being depressed when it's put back on. the Outsidde bell box is the existing one which is untouched and worked fine when i moved in. I had seen in the user manual that f1 related to the sab fault potentially but i

think it also said elsewhere it could be a wiring fault. Agreed this is nearly impossible without an installation manual, but hopefully someone might recognise somethng i've done wrong as i really can't afford to get someone out at the moment.

Thanks

jonathan

quote name='Scottish Engineer' date='Mar 20 2007, 10:56 PM' post='159485']

Tapegrove,

Just a silly question but have you the control panel box open when you power up and go to the keypad and test.......if so then you will get a box tamper and same goes for the bell as i presume that will be open when you power up the system and wire in the battery on the external bell.

If you make sure these 2 devices are closed and backed up by battery then test the system all should be ok . That is the only way i can think of that you are doing wrong so far.

cheers

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Think I may have managed to fix this now - it seems like the microswitch on the keypad in the hallway wasn't contacting properly ( I think I removed it when we plastered the hallway). I removed the front of the keypad and packed out the plastic lug which the switch sits on when closed and all seems to be working again! I didn't twig that the keypad as well as the control panel and presumably the bell box as well all had tamper switches, and the F1 code description didn't spell it out either unfortunately.

So - I guess the next step is to work out how to add another PIR in (in a new zone if possible)... does anyone know if this is just a case of wiring the new PIR into the spare circuit terminals in the control panel, or do I somehow need to programme the system to tell it there is another zone involved?

Regards,

Jonathan

hi Jonathan,

most likely it will be a case of removing the shorting link and connecting the pair of wires used on the C & NC connections of the new PIR, then wire the tamper switch in series with the tamper loop, finally the power taken from the 'AUX' supply terminals.

the proplems will arise if you want to isolate the new detection for 'part sets' used at bedtime, and if the zone has ben programmed as 'off' or needs programming to allow 'pass through' to get to the keypad or as 'part set entry'.

regs

alan

If you think education is difficult, try being stupid!!!!

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  • 2 weeks later...
hi Jonathan,

most likely it will be a case of removing the shorting link and connecting the pair of wires used on the C & NC connections of the new PIR, then wire the tamper switch in series with the tamper loop, finally the power taken from the 'AUX' supply terminals.

the proplems will arise if you want to isolate the new detection for 'part sets' used at bedtime, and if the zone has ben programmed as 'off' or needs programming to allow 'pass through' to get to the keypad or as 'part set entry'.

regs

alan

please check you pm's

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