Scantronic 9448+ Alarm Fault - Seems Dead!

[rwiddowson]

Got a call from my elderly aunty earlier today.

She has the above alarm.

She said she had to come downstairs at 3am this morning because the panel was making a noise.

Her neighbour says they looked out of the window but could not see the light flashing on the front. It didn't appear to be going off though it was clearly trying to and making a funny noise.

I am sure a few of you hear how difficult it can be to get any real constructive information out of an 80 year old!

Anyway, there are 3 fuses inside the panel. They look OK but I am going back down in a minute to check them with a multimeter.

There is clearly no supply to the board as the green light is not light.

There was a slight glow when I turned up when she was pressing some buttons but that soon ceased.

I am guessing that the board is dead.

I have brought the battery away. It was 6.42 Volts. I have charged it for an hour on an Optimate trickle charger and it comes up with a red light so it isn't accepting the slightest of charges. The Optimate is for my motorbike and goes through a test phase for 30 minutes and then checks to see if the state of the battery has improved.

I guessed the battery would be dead.

My Scantronic has a power light like hers but also a Standby light. I do not think the 9448+ has a Standby light though.

This gives me confidence that it is simply the battery but surely the power light would still be on even if the battery was dead.

My own unit with battery unplugged only has the Standby light on.

I would appreciate some advice on this as tomorrow I intend to swap out the main panel if no lights appears on it when I plug my battery into her alarm. My battery has ample charge.

Many thanks.

 

[Europlex]

I'd suggest the problem is just the battery. Replace it with a new one.

Having 12/13v available means nothing, it's the current available that is important, you would need a multi meter to check that.

Replace it.

 

[rwiddowson]

Thanks for the response, Europlex.

Been down. Forgot to take my multimeter but took a volt stick.

Brought the fuses back. One looked spiral rather than straight. Confirmed as duff!

Battery definitely not good. Mine was new recently so took that and keypad lights.

One remaining technical question I have though. The manual I found online for installation mentions 3 fuses but there is no diagram.

Two are 1A slow blow and another is 1A Fast Blow.

On inspection, all fuses look identical. Does anyone on here know how they would be marked differently?

 

[Europlex]

Fuses
F1 - Battery = 1A Slow Blow
F2 - 12V AUX = 1A Fast Blow
F3 - 21 VAC = 1A Slow Blow

Marked on the end caps, difficult to read sometimes

 

[rwiddowson]

Thanks again.

My issue remains in that I cannot find a diagram anywhere of where each one goes blow goes.

I have inspected them under a jeweller's loupe and initially I thought they were all marked T1A L250V using a magnifying glass. Turns out there is an F1A L250V.

A slow blown one is the culprit.

And I found this, below, on the internet, just for refererence for myself and anyone else in the future.


MINIATURE

Miniature Fuses are typically used to protect electronic devices, laboratory and measurement instruments, stereos, TV’s, VCR’s etc. They are available in four sizes with a current range of 20mA to 20 Amps.

Miniature Fuses are manufactured according to VDE 0820 part 1, VDE 0820 part 2, IEC publication 127, CEE publication 4 and actual DIN standards.

Slow
Typical Marking: “T”
Medium
Typical Marking: “M”
Fast
Typical Marking: “F”
Super Fast
Typical Marking: “FF”

 

[Europlex]

My issue remains in that I cannot find a diagram anywhere of where each one goes blow goes.

I'm a little confused, not a good day at work.

Are you meaning the location of each fuse on the circuit board?
I expect not, but if you do, the fuse holders on the board are marked F1, F2 & F3.

 

[rwiddowson]

Hi Europlex.

I'm here at the moment. Sorry to hear about your day.

It looks as though the unit is dead.

The circuit board is clearly marked as you say. Seems a well made piece of kit.

Getting power to the transformer but appear not to be getting 12V to the purple connector from the transformer.

Will it be 12V DC that is supposed to be supplied to the board do you happen to know or is there anything I can do to bypass?

Is it worth snipping the two purple wires from the transformer and connect them to the back up battery?

If board is dead, can't do anymore harm?

 

[rwiddowson]

My typo didn't help!

 

[bernardgreen]

Is it worth snipping the two purple wires from the transformer and connect them to the back up battery?

If you like indoor fireworks then yes it is.

The output of the transformer ( assuming it is a transformer and not a PSU ( power supply unit ) will be AC.

Connecting AC from a transformer to a battery will destroy the battery and that destruction could be explosive.

If the battery is charged the transformer is likely to be damaged,

DO NOT TRY IT

 

[rwiddowson]

Sorry. Should have made that clearer.

I mean snip wires. Leave connected to PCB and connect snipped ends of purple wires to back up battery.

If transformer (as I call it) PSU steps down to 12VDC which it must, I am just taking the wires from it, clipping them and supplementing power from PSU (which I suspect is dead) with 12VDC backup battery power.

Does that make more sense? It will totally destroy the unit but if there is not 12V coming from PSU to PCB then it is shot anyway.

Unless it is stuck in engineer's mode!

 

[sparkymarka]

no its 19 - 21v ac on scantronic transformers have you checked for ac out of transformer ?

 

[sparkymarka]

also does the unit power up on battery only ?

 

[rwiddowson]

Update:-

No! The unit didn't power up on battery only.

In the end, I decided to do a full reset and it came alive.

The only problem then was that I did not know all the Zones. It is complex because there are PIR's from another system wired in and they did not signal on a chime test even though they are lit.

My aunty couldn't tell me if they were wired in but I am guessing that they are but because they are not from that system, they are not giving whatever triggers the signal for the chime on the panel?

Got everything up and running apart from the strobe and bell do not trigger in Alarm Mode. Might have to do a Factory Reset again.

In Test mode, the bell sounds (not checked strobe) but that was working yesterday before it appeared to die.

 

[rwiddowson]

BUMP!

 

[josh451]

Power up on mains only. Don't know why you've done a factory reset, faulty batteries can send all sorts of problems to the panel.

And get a new battery.

When you are triggering the bell, and you say it isn't working, are you triggering an entry/exit zone? There is a fixed 30 second dual ply timer where the bell and strobe are suspended until this timer has expired