Can't hold off external sounder - Texecom Premier 24

Hi. I'd be grateful for some help please.

I need to turn off the power to my Texecom Premier 24 (V8.00) to do some upgrades, but I can't get the bell into hold-off mode so it goes off when I remove the power to the main panel.

I think (but am not sure) that the bell is a Texecom Odyssey (though suspect it's quite old). It's hexagonal, with blue plastic at the bottom with a white strobe and two red leds on the left and right and side of the blue bit. The proportions look a bit different to the current model though - the shoulders are smaller. It's branded Town & Country.

I've tried pulsing the strobe three times within 30 seconds using the panel. Engineer Utils > Bell Test > Test stobe, then pressing yes several times quickly to turn the strobe on and off. That's supposed to put the bell into hold off mode, but doesn't appear to do anything (the two red comfort leds still flash intermittently). it still sounds when I pull the power. The strobe light does flash when the strobe is turned on, so clearly the wire is connected/functioning.

Did the older Odyssey bells not have hold off mode? Is there any other way easily to hold the bell off? Can I connect the 12V bell supply and Bell- wires (from the bell) directly to the 12V battery, and then disconnect the power from the panel please?

Thanks

Andrew

It's not a Texecom bell, they have green LEDs rather than red. Connect the 12v and 0v (not the bell -) to the battery, this will stop the bell from sounding when you power the panel down.

Thanks, that's really helpful. Can I double check I've understood.
On the panel, the bell is configured as an SAB. That suggests that bell- is driven to 0v to sound the bell. I'd inferred from that that I'd also need to hold bell- at 12v to keep it quiet. What am I missing?

You shouldn't need to do anything with the bell trigger wire (except keep it away from 0v/tamper return) on most bell boxes. Some do have trigger wire monitoring but you'd probably have some kind of pull up resistors between the trigger and 12v if that was the case. Won't do any harm to conect it to 12v but not really required.

power the bell by connecting it to the panels back up battery directly if it does sound when disconnecting.

Thanks everyone for your help.

To confirm, it is enough (as you've all said) just to connect the bell 12V and 0V directly to the battery. I actually left all the wires connected into the panel, but added a new break-out connector wired across the bell 12V/0V lines the other end of which I could connect directly to the battery when required. I then pulled JP9 on the panel (to stop the temporary bell 12V supply leaking back into the panel) and turned it all off at the mains. Silent bell!