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Many original GE® or Remcon® low voltage lighting systems are still in
use today. But owners of buildings with the original systems installed
may find themselves faced with low-voltage switches, relays, or
transformers that no longer operate.
Low Voltage Wiring: Very thin copper wires, typically #22 gauge, is
used to connect the low-voltage switches to the
relays that each switch controls.
Touch-Plate® switches only have two wires. One being the common
wire and the other being the switch wire, and because of our single coil
relay, the same button is used to turn the relay on and off.
Check the building first for for sticking low-voltage switches. If all of the
switches appear to be working normally, then find the switching relays
that are misbehaving, and check for temperature exposure problems.
Switching relays that are too hot or too cold may not work properly.
Low voltage relays may not operate reliably if exposed to below freezing
temperatures, or to temperatures above 120 degrees. Depending on
where the building is located, these conditions can certainly be
encountered in an attic, and cold conditions may be encountered in a
garage or crawl space.
Touch-Plate offers a trivial fix for the cold temperature problem: place a
light bulb close to the relay panel. Turning the light bulb on during the
cold period will usually produce sufficient warmth to keep the switching
relays working. Touch-Plate® also advises "The best solution is to
contact the factory for assistance in upgrading the whole system to
current technology and relocating the panels to a garage, a basement, a
mechanical room, or closet that will avoid this altogether."
This can happen with age and use. But if the relays are burning up after
replacement or other repairs to the system, check the low voltage
transformer.
But what about homes using older GE® or Remcon® relays? Touch-
Plate® relays cannot be used to replace individual GE® or Remcon®
relays. The switching relays made by these manufacturers work
differently from those designed and sold today by Touch-Plate lighting.
For example, Touch-Plate informs us that the Touch-Plate® relay
(2500-B) is a single coil, 28VDC latching relay, whereas the the GE®
relay (RR-7) is a dual coil, 24VAC latching relay, and the Remcon®
relays (depending on the style) are a single or dual coil relay with an
internal power supply for each relay.
Also, two switching relays will not operate from a single button press in
older systems prior to 1986, they were designed to operate one at a
time.
But you can forget the details of just how your relays work if you just
remember that you cannot substitute a Touch-Plate® relay for either
GE® or Remcon® relays.
The switches and the relays they control in a building low-voltage wiring
system are designed to operate at 28-volts of direct current.
If you read a voltage higher than 3 volts and lower than 26 VDC from
the Transverter, then the transverter should be replaced.
If you are reading 28 - 30 VDC and still nothing is working then you
have a wiring problem: something is not connected (as in a wire coming
loose from under a wire nut) or something incorrectly wired (as in when
changing a component in the system and not re-connecting to the
proper wire).
Black wire and the Red wire are the On and Off lines between the low-
voltage switch and the relay. Unlike a conventional 120-V electrical light
circuit switch, the low voltage switch is talking not to the light, but to the
relay. The low-voltage relay is also referred to as a "latching relay". A
"latching relay" is a switch that "latches" into whatever position it is told
to enter. So such a relay needs to receive a separate signal to tell to it
to "Make" (turn on) or "Break" (turn off) the household current which the
relay is passing on to the light or other device it controls.
If an older low voltage transverter still has the labels by the output wires,
you may see labels reading "switch" and "relay". When wiring such a
transverter, connect the wire from your low-voltage switch to the
terminal marked "Switch". Similarly, connect the wire from the relay to
the transverter terminal marked "Relay".
Other power supplies may be found installed for for pilot lights. These
are simply little lights at switches that indicate if the device controlled by
the switch has been turned "on" or "off". If you see a silver box labeled
"PL-6" mounted above or below each relay this is a transformer for pilot
lights. Touch-Plate Lighting says that the the pilot light transformers for
the master switch stations are usually located in the master bedroom
and/or some other main living area.
Touch-Plate also points out that these transformers are not necessary
to operate electrical lights or receptacles in the building. If the pilot lights
were to malfunction or stop working, you would lose the indicator light
for the specific relay it is connected to, nothing more. That is, a PL-6
power supply has nothing to do with operating the relay itself, only the
indicator light that shows if a relay (and the device it controls) is
switched "on" or "off".
Otherwise we'd have to install new, much heavier gauge #14 or #12
electrical wires to support 120V switching directly. If a home has already
been wired to have an electrical control center or many-way switching of
lights or outlets (say 4 or 5 way
switching) the wire cost of converting to 120V would be substantial.
1. add LED's (if free wires are available, else you will have to run
additional wires)
2. add centralized building electrical control, from one location,
of many or even all lights and electrical features
in the home