steve synek Posted August 2, 2013 Share Posted August 2, 2013 Here's my story.I am completing the installation of 6 CCP's to outline my house. Over the course of the last two weeks I have been installing the controllers in different concealed locations around the roof line for testing. The wife has been teasing me for the last week that my work is causing electrical issues with the wiring in the house. Some things were just batteries going dead in some devices. The wireless mouse on her computer started to malfunction. A replacement wireless mouse is also acting up. My garage door open was the biggest problem. The range of the remotes became very sporadic or stopped working. I reprogrammed, bought new batteries, kicked and jiggled wires, checked the photo eye. Nothing seemed to work , so I had the wife schedule a service call to the installer. Today on my lunch hour he reprogrammed everything and didn't have an answer as to what what was happening. (two remote openers and a wall mounted remote at the door) The openers used to work from 150 ft away and now you had to be right at the door and pretend you're aiming at the opener or beat on the buttons to get sporadic operation- you know the drill we all do when the battery starts to die. Tech was saying new communication towers in the area could be causing the problem. He could not figure out the problem definitively. He was starting to sell a possible upgrade to high security boards with special frequency operators when the thought went off in my head - new frequencies in the area. Hmmmmmmmmmmmm- 2 new controllers plugged into the opener circuit in the attic above. Bingo---------a simple flip of the switch controlling these two units and immediately the remotes operated with a simple push at close range. Further testing showed they worked simply( one quick push on the button- no aiming, no multiple pushes, ) at 75 ft. The afternoon test was over. ( This evening after dinner I did some more testing. The range seemed to stop at about 100 ft. I still had 3 more controllers plugged in on different circuit in other locations. Turning these off, I found the remotes would work at 200 ft. from the house. I turned the garage CCP's back on and the remote operators malfunctioned again. I will admit I know next to nothing about radio type frequencies/ or control over power- and my testing was very basic, but it seems some part of the CCPs are causing an interference. My next test will be to power the garage controllers from another circuit( not the door opener circuit) and see what happens to the remote control range of the door opener. Anyone have any ideas or suggestions? I am an electrical inspector and was a licensed electrician- so I am pretty confident in the house wiring itself. Suggestions for further testing? Steve Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gary Levelius Posted August 2, 2013 Share Posted August 2, 2013 Just for giggles, try plugging in just the power supplies for the CCP strings and see what happens. Leave the controllers disconnected from the power supplies. Almost sounds like the switching power supplies might be causing an issue. Also, how are you connecting the controllers? Cabling or power line communications? If powerline communications, that's the likely the source as your house wiring could be acting like a giant antenna. -Gary- Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
steve synek Posted August 2, 2013 Author Share Posted August 2, 2013 Gary CCPs don't have separate power supplies like ribbons- but just for the heck of it I will try disconnecting the light strings from controllers. I am using CAT5 for control-I will also try disconnecting it. I thought I read a proposal from LOR to have power line control, but to my knowledge that never happened. Keep those suggestions coming...... I also opened a help ticket. Steve Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ken Benedict Posted August 2, 2013 Share Posted August 2, 2013 Related topic: http://forums.lightorama.com/index.php?/topic/24316-ccp-interferring-with-garage-door/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ron Boyd Posted August 2, 2013 Share Posted August 2, 2013 This happened to me last year. I put the CCPs on a timer. Set it for 1 hour prior to showtime and shut off 1 hour after. One other thing, While speaking with Dan Baldwin at the Christmas Expo a few weeks ago, We discussed a problem I had last year. I actually had water in all 4 of my controller boxes and 2 went belly-up. Of course LOR replaced the controllers. The black material that surrounds the wires entering the box was not UV resistant. Dan said after some time in the sun, it would start to break down and thus, let water in. That problem has since been rectified. Just another bit of info for the CCP controllers from last year. If yours were bought this year, it should be fine. Might want to cover the boxes up if you haven't already. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
steve synek Posted August 2, 2013 Author Share Posted August 2, 2013 Related topic: http://forums.lightorama.com/index.php?/topic/24316-ccp-interferring-with-garage-door/Thanks Ken and Ron...........I read a lot here, but I never did a search.................Looks like there isn't an answer to this problem.......more like a work around by turning the units off and on between each show. I might have saved a service call $$$$$ if I had read this first. Steve Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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