94-302-vert Posted November 24, 2009 Share Posted November 24, 2009 I have a PC kit (1 of 4) that I put together and mounted (in the basement) last year. It worked great for Christmas 2008 then for Halloween a month ago. Today when I powered up the board it blew the breaker and keeps blowing the breaker.I tried to power only the left half of the board, same thing. No light connected, no data cable, etc.Any thoughts? Unfortunately it is mounted in a way that I can't really see if anything on the board is burned up easily.Just lookign for ideas on what to look at tomorrow or Friday when I have time. I have already decided to start and potentially run my show without the 8 items that were going on that board (I wanted to have spare channels as I burned up a triac at Halloween that I have not replaced yet)... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max-Paul Posted November 24, 2009 Share Posted November 24, 2009 Well Chris,I would say that you have gone further than I would. Trip the breaker and for me it is time to stop and consider what is going on. Trip it twice and it is time to pull the offending device off line and do some serious looky see. That means both visual and with an ohms meter. It sounds like a mouse or other critter got between the board and the metal box(?). Or some other item that will conduct got between the board and some ground point.There is no question in my mind what you should do next. Pull the power off of the board safely. Pull all connections be it comm or individual output circuits. Pull the circuit board or the whole box. With the circuit board seperated from the box. Give all of the back side of the circuit board a good going over with a magnifier. Look for black arcing signs. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
-klb- Posted November 24, 2009 Share Posted November 24, 2009 On the left side of the board, nothing is connected to the neutral except the neutral lugs. So the most likely issue is something shorted against the card, or something shorted in the inlet cord... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
94-302-vert Posted November 25, 2009 Author Share Posted November 25, 2009 So when I take it out and I use the meter I should only be able to detect o ohms between each neutral and also to the neutral on the triac rigth? Where shoudl I be able to detect 0 ohms on the power side? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max-Paul Posted November 25, 2009 Share Posted November 25, 2009 Son, you are messed up! There is no neutral attached or near the Triac. That tab (all 16 of them) sitting next to the Triac and the opto coupler is a switched hot.First get the card out and give it a visual inspection for any thing that looks shorted out. Something that has some black around it. Maybe what looks like black smoke painted on the board.Then put the black lead of your meter on any of the neutral tabs (provided you have the jumper in place. Otherwise put the probe on the same side as you are going to work on). The take the red lead and start probing the fuse, both sides.You should not see anything in the 1 - 5 ohm range unless you probe a neutral path or a bad componet. Remember right now you are having a short circuit problem. So, 0-5 ohms is a bad thing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
94-302-vert Posted November 25, 2009 Author Share Posted November 25, 2009 So basically you are saying to do what I figured I had to do...I was hoping this was a "commin" thing and someone would have said "Check this or this and you will be good to go"...DOH... It is on the list for Friday I guess.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max-Paul Posted November 26, 2009 Share Posted November 26, 2009 Well there are what seems to be two common things, maybe 3.One of them is that the person with a problem says that he has not changed a thing. yet in a recent thread here or on PC we find out that the person had both plugs from a PC Kit in a single socket via a 3 way. And just recently put the two plugs on different outlets on different breakers.. And it appears that one of the outlets was wired wrong. And that they had a jumpper connecting the two halfs of the neutrals on the board.Then there is the snail on the circuit board that shorted things out and actually burnt a hole through the board.And then I just read how someone here on this forum had a spider blow out a triac.So, you tell us that you have not done anything different to the controller. That the only thing you have changed is the actual loads / lights. So if the power coming into the controller is the same. Then how could a short all of a sudden come to be? Leaves me with ony a few choices. Either a critter got across the hot and neutral or ground leads. Or some componet has failed big time. I presume this is at least a 15A breaker. If it is, then I would expect one heck of a pop where ever the short is at.Sometimes you learn more by doing the hard stuff. Either way, I wish you luck finding and repairing what is causing you all of this grief. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
94-302-vert Posted November 27, 2009 Author Share Posted November 27, 2009 it is a 20A breaker. If I plug it in with the breaker off then flip the breaker it immediately trips. If I plug teh board into a live outlet it sparks pretty good then trips.No sparks on the board during all of this... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max-Paul Posted November 27, 2009 Share Posted November 27, 2009 Strange, a good sparking display at the outlet, but you have not metioned a blown fuses. Just wondering if the short is between the plug and the fuse. What will happen if you remove the fuse? Do you have an ohm meter? If so, put it on ohms and with the fuse removed. Probe the hot and neutral prongs on the plug. What does the ohm meter read? If it is only a few ohms, then you need to review how the power cord is rounted to make sure than nothing is sliced or crushed to the point that the insolation is pinched and thus the copper wire is squeezing the insolation out so the two bare copper wires are touching. Or, make sure how the wires are terminated? Dont have both the black wire and white wire on terminals that are common to both.But if the ohm meter reads what is an open, and the breaker will not trip if you plug it into an outlet. Then it is on the board and I agree, call LOR. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tim Benson Posted November 27, 2009 Share Posted November 27, 2009 If you are blowing a 20 amp breaker just by plugging the controller in, then you most likely have a dead short across the 120V input. that could be a sloppy solder joint, corrosion, mis-wire in the 120V supply cords, or a blown transformer. Although I am very curious why the fuses on the board are nor blowing.So, Remove the fuses from the controller board. Plug the unit in.Does the breaker still blow ? If so you have mis-wired something in the supply cords or have a really bad short on the board somewhere.Try setting the controller up with a single supply cord and test it.If you have a single cord, perhaps the jumper from the left to right side of the board is incorrect.If none of this makes any sense to you.. STOP. It's really easy to hurt yourself with electricity. Send the board in for repair.Tim Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
94-302-vert Posted November 28, 2009 Author Share Posted November 28, 2009 Tim Benson wrote: If you are blowing a 20 amp breaker just by plugging the controller in, then you most likely have a dead short across the 120V input. that could be a sloppy solder joint, corrosion, mis-wire in the 120V supply cords, or a blown transformer. Although I am very curious why the fuses on the board are nor blowing.So, Remove the fuses from the controller board. Plug the unit in.Does the breaker still blow ? If so you have mis-wired something in the supply cords or have a really bad short on the board somewhere.Try setting the controller up with a single supply cord and test it.If you have a single cord, perhaps the jumper from the left to right side of the board is incorrect.If none of this makes any sense to you.. STOP. It's really easy to hurt yourself with electricity. Send the board in for repair.TimI pulled the board out. Ohmed the inputs at 2kohm and it is over 2kohm resistance. If I plug it into a gfci that has been tripped (test) and try to reset the gfci it does not reset (trips imediately).This is with only a supply coard and no jumper wires.Then I took off the heatsinks and I see no signs of carbon on either side of the board.So what actually get's power when there is no fuse? is the fuse for everythin OR is it just for the outputs??? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max-Paul Posted November 29, 2009 Share Posted November 29, 2009 Ok Chris,One fuse is for powering everything. The other fuse is for just supplying power to the triacs. In your last post I am to understand that you had both fuses pulled? And you have two supply cords, correct? And you had just plugged in one supply cord, correct? And it still popped the GFCI that you are now using. But did not pop the breaker?What was the actual configuration? Heat sink on or off? What are you doing with the ground wire? Where was the board? On paper (newspaper) glass table top, wooden table top. metal table top that is grounded?With the fuses removed and with the circuit board not touching any ground conductive surface. and still popping a GFCI (scratches head). And not the breaker. I still think you have some kind of short. But insteed of a hot to neutral. I am thinking it is hot to ground. But I need to know what you are doing with your ground lead or is the heat sink sitting on a conductive to ground surface like a metal table top that is grounded.Have you replaced any of the Triacs?Here is a test for you to use your volt meter on. It is dangerous and you must be careful of electrical shock. Put the circuit board back in the heat sink if you have not yet. DO NOT attach the ground wire, might of fact tape it off. Put all on top of a piece of scrap wood. Now plug it in. Do not touch the heat sink. With one probe, probe a neutral wire. With the other probe, probe the heat sink. Do you have 110vac?If you have replaced a Triac, and you have voltage between neutral and the heat sink. Then the triac does not have an isolated tab as it should have .If all above is true, then replace the traic that you have replaced with an isolated tab type triac.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rafter Bar R Posted November 30, 2009 Share Posted November 30, 2009 I would be checking the nuetral lug banks to see if the hot from the input cord may have been accidentally connected to one of the lugs. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tim Benson Posted December 1, 2009 Share Posted December 1, 2009 Yep, I agree with the above. If a GFI is blowing then you have a path from Hot to ground. Believe it or not, a short from hot to neutral will not trip a GFI because the current in and out will be the same.. Found that out the hard way ! So checkfrom ground to hot with your Ohmmeter.You didn't accidently connect ground (the green wire) to the neutral wire bank (white wires) did you ?Tim Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tim Benson Posted December 1, 2009 Share Posted December 1, 2009 Ok. I just checked 2 controllers I have, They both Ohm out at 173 ohms across the right side power input and many megaohms across the left side power input. that makes sense because the transformer is on the right side. so when connected with a single cord, the resistance at the end of the power cable is 173 ohms. your power connections should look like this:Tim Attached files Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tim Benson Posted December 1, 2009 Share Posted December 1, 2009 and this: Attached files Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
94-302-vert Posted December 1, 2009 Author Share Posted December 1, 2009 I'm not as neat and orderly as you are with the wiring but that is how I have mine wired.Here is an interesting way to look at it... My entire box (with 4 controllers) is NOT grounded...I have an industrial 30" x 12" x 8" deep metal box for discnnects that I mounted my controllers in. This is not grounded and is actually mounted to a piece of plywoiod that is mounted to the cement wall of my basement. No ground there.To power the controllers I am running a 2 wire cord (SPT2) and I multiplex my orange extension cords so I have two hots to 1 neutral.Let me look at the different items tonight... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
94-302-vert Posted December 1, 2009 Author Share Posted December 1, 2009 lonewolvie wrote: I would be checking the nuetral lug banks to see if the hot from the input cord may have been accidentally connected to one of the lugs.Nothing that obvious.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max-Paul Posted December 1, 2009 Share Posted December 1, 2009 Vert,You may not have a hard ground per say. But lets see you mounted this heavy metal box to a sheet of plywood. I wonder how you did this. If you ran a bolt head on back side and then the threads through the wood and into the box with a nut, maybe washer and lock washer? Ok, maybe you ran a wood screw through from the box to back of plywood? If you have any kind of metal anchor from the metal box into the plywood and it contact the concrete basement wall, you have a soft earth ground. Might just be enough to cause the GFI to trip.God this is got to be madening to you as it is for us. Sorry we have not be able to help you pin this down. I am at witts end with no more suggestions. Just wish I was there to help.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max-Paul Posted December 1, 2009 Share Posted December 1, 2009 BTW Tim,Nice looking box, wish I was that clean with my wires. How did you get the neutrals tied together? I do not see a jumper. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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