Problem with zone stuck on “faulted”

[Dillon]

I’ve been running this plugin for about 9 months without issue. Recently (maybe a month or so), i have one zone that always shows faulted. This causes the system to show faulted. All my keypads show ready, and all zones are normal. I did not update the plugin, but it lists the latest version of 3.0.1.0. I’m guessing it updated itself? The other issue is that my system does have a low battery warning (it’s been on for a couple weeks). This no longer shows in the plugin. It only shows faulted. The keypads do have the bat message. When I look on the advanced tab, I don’t even see a low battery option. How do I correct this? This is an out of the blue issue, it has been working fine.

[mnsandler]

(1) what vista panel do you have?

(2) and what zone is showing faulted in the plugin?

(3) have you resolved the system low battery?

(4) have you tried stopping and starting the plugin, or the plugin Monitor device (Vista 1)?

please enable debug mode, and post a few log entries from the plugin showing the panel messages received.

ps. i don't think hs or plugins automatically updates plugins. 3.0.1.0 is the latest release.

[Dillon]

Mark,

Thank you for the quick response. I had no events for almost a month. I don’t know what was stuck (HS, Plugin, or Ad2usb). I restarted everything and it’s working now. Thanks. I think what triggered it was a go control garage door control that died and was sent back for replacement. The day I did that the alarm froze in HS. This leads me to another question. I had a virtual zone for the go control to trigger. I am no longer able to select that zone in setting up the replacement go control. It shows in my devices, but I can’t select it in my event triggers. There are no virtual zones available to select. If I go to add a zone in the plugin, that zone number is not available. Is there a way to remedy this, or do I need to program my vista20p for another virtual zone and pick a new number? Thanks again

[mnsandler]

i wonder if the ad2usb stopped sending messages to the plugin.

Can you tell me how you setup the panel, the ad2usb, and/or the plugin to support this go control device?

[Dillon]

The go control is a Zwave garage door control. Part of the zwave device is a “barrier control” (door open/closed) which I use to trigger a virtual zone. I set up the virtual zone on the vista20p using the alarm decoder keypad on a laptop. It is setup as zone 16, entry/exit delay zone. I added a virtual zone 16 in the plugin and checked the virtual zone box. The event trigger was programmed for if first floor barrier control becomes open then fault virtual zone 16. There is also a zwave tamper on the go control. I have that programmed to fault virtual zone 16 as well. Everything was fine (for about 9 months) until I turned my garage circuit breaker off to add zwave switches in the garage. When I switched it back on the go control died. I guess this is a common issue with the go control. There are a lot of complaints about it. Once that device died, Hs no longer communicated with it and I guess since it was programmed to a virtual zone Hs got confused and locked up the plugin or ad2usb. Everything else in Hs worked fine. Now that I got my replacement go control. I deleted the old device from Hs and added the new one. When I go to events under security, garage door, and enter the trigger if the first floor garage barrier control becomes open then fault virtual zone.....it says select virtual zone, and that’s it. I can’t scroll and no virtual zones exist. When I go to the plugin and select add zone, zone 16 is missing from the drop down menu. Zone 16 was the virtual zone I was using previously. So, I could program another virtual zone into the vista20p using the alarm decoder keypad and then add that zone number into the plugin and be done, but I was hoping there was an easy way to see/modify the existing zones in the plugin so that I could just use the previous zone again.

thanks for you help

[Dillon]

Mark,

thank you for your help. I was able to delete zone 16 from the device list. I then was able to add zone 16 back into the plugin and all is good now. Somehow, when the go control died it corrupted the system. All is well now. Thanks again

[mnsandler]

do you still have the virtual device programmed in the ad2usb? is the correct expander module enabled? it should not overlap any existing zones that the panel already has (whether you use them or not)

have you tried deleting the hs device for zone 16 and recreating it from the plugin config pages

[mnsandler]

Mark,

thank you for your help. I was able to delete zone 16 from the device list. I then was able to add zone 16 back into the plugin and all is good now. Somehow, when the go control died it corrupted the system. All is well now. Thanks again

glad you got it working.

[rsturner]

Mark,

I had this same problem and did the same thing (deleted zone and re-added it). I have two homes and just brought up a new house with a Vista 20P and a Homeseer Zee S2 (HS3 Obviously). I have been running the same configuration on the same setup in my home in Ohio for 3+ years. Never seen this stuck "faulted" zone before.

Does it make sense to have a button on the system status device to have the plug-in check all the zone devices and make sure they are set correctly? It would be easier than deleting and re-adding the device. Especially if you had a lot of events tied to it.

Just and idea....

Bob

[mnsandler]

Mark,

I had this same problem and did the same thing (deleted zone and re-added it). I have two homes and just brought up a new house with a Vista 20P and a Homeseer Zee S2 (HS3 Obviously). I have been running the same configuration on the same setup in my home in Ohio for 3+ years. Never seen this stuck "faulted" zone before.

Does it make sense to have a button on the system status device to have the plug-in check all the zone devices and make sure they are set correctly? It would be easier than deleting and re-adding the device. Especially if you had a lot of events tied to it.

Just and idea....

Bob

not a bad idea, but sort of a workaround.

something about these zone devices is getting broken. the plugin should automatically clear all faulted zones when it sees a disarm-ready message. It does not read or get a unique message about each zone; this doesn't exist.

if the plugin isn't clearing the zone, then the status value or interface value, or other hs device setting is getting corrupt; hence the delete and readd must be fixing something

a before and after would be helpful

[rsturner]

I agree it is a workaround. Ultimately we want our software to work perfectly. However I learned after many years in software development, the effort to track down an infrequent boundary condition usually makes a workaround tolerable, though distasteful.

If I can recreate it, I will. I think it is a race condition. The worst bugs always seem to be race conditions.

Observation: It seems to me the the owner of "state" in this case is the alarm panel. The plug-in is a display of status for faults.

Alternative idea: I assume you have code that looks for the fault indicator coming in the keybus message. If the fault indicator clears, then you scan the devices in the partition looking for faults and clearing them. Not sure if that is possible in your code, but its another thought.

Bob

[mnsandler]

Alternative idea: I assume you have code that looks for the fault indicator coming in the keybus message. If the fault indicator clears, then you scan the devices in the partition looking for faults and clearing them. Not sure if that is possible in your code, but its another thought.

Bob

this is basically what the plugin does. Most of the vista alarms do no output the state of each zone; they just broadcast faults, low battery, and checks per zone. so the assumption is, if its not reporting one of these states via a message, then it must be normal. so the plugin clears any zone where it hasn't received a fault message for some time (the message timeout setting).

here is one thing to try next time a zone won't clear. run the following from the control panel immediate window:

(1) hs.setdevicevaluebyref([hs device reference ID], 1, false)

or

(2) you could also try the Bypass button on the device; click it once to bypass, wait for the panel and plugin to respond, and then click it again to clear

[rsturner]

Mark,

An update on the fault problem.

1. the setdevicevaluebyref worked and moved it back to normal

2. Prior to #1, I tried to bypass. The Vista saw no problem and knew that zone 4 was not faulted. I pressed Bypass three times.

I got the following in the logs:

May-19 8:42:59 PM

System

Control Panel Immediate Script: &hs.setdevicevaluebyref(34, 1, false)

May-19 8:40:21 PM

Device Control

Device: Alarm Front Door Front Door to Bypass (103) by/from: CAPI Control Handler

May-19 8:40:20 PM

Device Control

Device: Alarm Front Door Front Door to Bypass (103) by/from: CAPI Control Handler

May-19 8:40:07 PM

Device Control

Device: Alarm Front Door Front Door to Bypass (103) by/from: CAPI Control Handler

It doesn't appear than any keypresses were output to the panel.

Bob

[mnsandler]

Bob,
was Debug mode enabled when you tested the Bypass button? if not can you enable and retest

[rsturner]

Duh! No. Ok I will try with debug on next time I see it.

However a warning: it maybe a few months. We are leaving AZ where this system and heading back to the Midwest next week.

Bob