Accenta/Optima G4 Alarm (bell time) problem

[Dave W L]

I have set up an Accenta/Optima G4 alarm system in my house that comprises of 1 remote LCD control panel, an external siren/strober, 5 PIRs and 2 magnetic door sensors.

I set the Timers for the alarm as follows:
Bell Time = 05 minutes
Bell Delay = 00 minutes
Rearm Count = 1

For the first 6 weeks I had no issues with the alarm (including no false activations) and the alarm was set on a daily basis.

On the night I left home for a 2 week holiday abroad my alarm activated and the external siren sounded continuously all night (11.30pm - 07.15am) until the system was reset by a relative entering the house and putting in the code the following morning. My relative informed me that they had to enter the code twice before the external siren turned off. As you can appreciate I was not a popular person with my neighbours on my return home!

My question is - why did the external siren not stop ringing after 5 minutes?

I checked the event log on my return home and one of the zones was activated (shows as 'intuder' on the event log) which appears to have triggered the external siren. There was no forced entry into the house so this was a false activation.

There are a few 'intruder' on the event log on the same zone within a few seconds of each other but after 5 minutes the event log shows 'rearm'. A few minutes later there is a further 'intruder' on the same zone that activated before. Again, 5 minutes later there is a 'rearm' on the event log. After this second rearm there are no further 'intruder' and no further events on the log until my relative arrives in the morning when 'code entry' and 'system unset' are shown (with same time stamp) and a few seconds later 'user reset' is shown. I presume these are the two occasions my relative entered the code.

According to neighbours the external siren did not stop ringing at any point from its first activation to it being stopped in the morning. This is despite the event log stating 'rearm' on 2 occasions.

Have I programmed something wrong or should the external siren have stopped after 5 minutes?

 

[Nerdish Nerd]

Did you set any bell cutout on the bell box itself? That would have stopped it after x minutes.

 

[Dave W L]

Did you set any bell cutout on the bell box itself? That would have stopped it after x minutes.

The bell box is a Honeywell AG6 and I did not change any settings within the bell box prior to installation. I have just checked the manual that came with the bell box and it states it is equipped with a cutoff timer which by default is set to 15 minutes but can be changed to 3 minutes. Obviously this did not work as a cutoff as the alarm sounded for over 7 hours.

 

[Nerdish Nerd]

You checked anything to do with power going to the bell box and to the panel? If power going to the bell box is lost then it will ring until the battery in the bell box is depleted, hence 7 hours. I gather the system went into alarm meaning the bell box subsequently sounded? If I'm thinking right, the AG6 is set to SAB mode instead of SCB mode. SCB mode removes the negative for the bell and SAB mode applies negative. Since the Accenta/Optima range of control panels use SCB and not SAB, you'd have to move a jumper in almost any bell box from SAB mode to SCB, otherwise the bell will be looking for a negative to be applied instead of being removed. With the negative being removed the bell box runs off it's own battery and will sound because the hold off negative has dropped out and it thinks it's being tampered with.

 

[Doggit]

Plus you could have a faulty PIR as well; which ones are you using, and which one went off. As it went off at night, there could be something in the house trigering a signal in the wiring. I've seen something similar to this situation before, but haven't worked out a solution yet.

 

[sparkymarka]

You checked anything to do with power going to the bell box and to the panel? If power going to the bell box is lost then it will ring until the battery in the bell box is depleted, hence 7 hours. I gather the system went into alarm meaning the bell box subsequently sounded? If I'm thinking right, the AG6 is set to SAB mode instead of SCB mode. SCB mode removes the negative for the bell and SAB mode applies negative. Since the Accenta/Optima range of control panels use SCB and not SAB, you'd have to move a jumper in almost any bell box from SAB mode to SCB, otherwise the bell will be looking for a negative to be applied instead of being removed. With the negative being removed the bell box runs off it's own battery and will sound because the hold off negative has dropped out and it thinks it's being tampered with.

Wrong ....ADE panels use the standard SAB mode and if the power to the bell was removed it would ring 15 mins cut off time only ...that's what the timer is designed for ! More than likely the bell hasn't been ringing for all that time neighbours tend to say that

 

[Nerdish Nerd]

Wrong ....ADE panels use the standard SAB mode and if the power to the bell was removed it would ring 15 mins cut off time only ...that's what the timer is designed for ! More than likely the bell hasn't been ringing for all that time neighbours tend to say that

I had a feeling that I wasn't thinking straight. It's been a long time since I owned anything to to with ADE, since there was an Accenta 6 in the house originally. Gave it away since I wouldn't install it anywhere else and the friend I gave it to needed one so I haven't used or looked at an Accenta or Optima in ages.