RR501 receives the rf signal, but won't send to other units

[nee...@yahoo.com]

Hi,

Ihave a RR501 wieless transceiver and the palmpad combo. I plug the
RR501 in, set to my house code 'I', unit 1 *or* set to unit 9 and set
the palmpad to house code 'I', and when I press the appropriate on or
off button for unit 1 or 9, I hear a click from the RR501, but none of
the other X-10 units get their signal (i.e. if I want unit 1 on, I get
nothing).

What am I missing?

[Dave Houston]

The relay is triggered by the RF signal but the RR501 must send via the
powerline (PLC) to other units. It may be that you have PLC signal strength
issues which can be caused by several things. See...

http://www.mbx-usa.com/noise.htm
http://www.mbx-usa.com/coupling.htm

[nee...@yahoo.com]

Dave,

I am not sure I understand. My plug in X-10 controller works fine. Is
there a possibility that the RF receiver is not working properly? I had
one fail a couple of years ago and this is the replacement.

[Dave Houston]

It's unlikely that the RF receiver isn't working since it must be working
for the relay to respond.

The most likely causes are that the RR501 is plugged into a different phase
than the plug in X-10 controller and your modules or that there is an
appliance in the (electrical) vicinity of the RR501 that is eating X-10 PLC
signals.

Move the RR501 to the same outlet as the plug in X-10 controller and see if
it can control the other modules.

[nee...@yahoo.com]

That's what I did. After I concluded that the RR501 was receiving the
RF signal (as evidenced by the click when unit code 9 was sent), but
that the X-10 signal wasn't going anywhere (as evidenced by units
1,2,3,4 or 9 not responding) I unplugged the %%501 and plugged in the
table top transmitter to the same outlet. Viola! X-10 response.

Any further thoughts?

[Dave Houston]

Ahhh! Why didn't you say so in the first place? ;)

If the table top controller works in the same outlet, you've ruled out a
signal sucking appliance.

It appears that your RR501 has indeed gone bad. The RF receiver section is
probably OK since you can control the relay with it but the PLC transmitter
section (which sends to the powerline) is kaput.

Just out of curiosity, try controlling the relay by sending with the table
top controller.

[Anand]

I'm almost certain of whats happening, going by the symptoms and my
very similiar experience; there is a small transformer near the 120V
outlet that generates the outgoing 120 kHz, and also couples it to the
mains.

You could confirm this by checking your unit against the schematic
available at http://www.geocities.com/ido_bartana/

Regards,

Anand Dhuru

My bet is the winding in that transformer has opened up.