Re: I think they've done it again.

["bruceR" <nospam@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Well, here is one guy who has the problem. Before the coversion was complete
Insteon devices were making certain Leviton X10 switches flicker and now
that I'm 98% Insteon I still get some flickering. I will changeout the
offenders when a fix is availble.


"Marc F Hult" <MFHult@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:aakv921aot72gv63ubsp3ec8niucgt4vd5@xxxxxxxxxx
> On Sun, 25 Jun 2006 17:30:15 -0400, Marc F Hult
> <MFHult@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
> <g2ut92do7d99l555jouk9fmttc15jefbv6@xxxxxxx>:
>
>>
>>I'll look at the reports some more so as to be able to respond more
>>usefully. I think that i understand your timing question and add the
> comment
>>that when I looked at line noise created by generic and X-10 WS467 dimmers
>>several years ago, I found that the highest peak voltages were measured at
>>about the 1/4 the RMS output IIRC.
>>
>>Recall that an inductor 'stretches' the duration of a pulse, so the delay
>>caused by the L1 choke  might be long enough to trigger gate triggering in
> a
>>second TRIAC in a second dimmer when the delayed/stretched INSTEON PLC
>>signal is _added_ to the TRIAC noise from the INSTEON TRIAC at some time
>>significantly after zero crossing and that signal is not sufficiently
>>attenuated (there are two issues here; timing and noise/signal strength.)
>>
>>Later ... Marc
>>Marc_F_Hult
>>www.ECOntrol.org
>
>
> I conclude that as a an actual performance problem, this is a tempest in a
> teapot: a problem nobody here has actually experienced (not surprising
> since
> it seems most folks participating in this thread may not even have an
> INSTEON installation ;-)
>
> An INSTEON rep wrote in the thread I cited previously that: "We saw this
> problem during the beta testing of the SwitchLinc dimmer in two units out
> of
> 800 beta samples." and goes on to give contact info for a person with a
> flickering dimmer to be able to contact Smarthome on a Sunday to arrange
> for
> a replacement dimmer. The same rep reports that INSTEON spent $40,000
> troubleshooting and replacing possible off-spec components before shipping
> but apparently a few slipped through (or at least that is one explanation
> offered).
>
> According to INSTEON, the dimmers with revised/QA'd TRIAsC/chokes  will be
> shipping 4th Qtr which will presumably reduce problem frequency closer
> even
> to zero. I haven't experienced any problems myself nor apparently have the
> vast majority of other INSTEON users. So the solution to this apparently
> infrequent problem is at hand.
>
> As to the challenge of trying to divine the cause, first step is problem
> definition which is problematic because reports are not consistent. I'd be
> more interested if there was a way of testing the various hypotheses
> posed.
> Absent an actual case of flickering on which to test causes and remedies,
> another way would be (eg Spice) modeling but that's more work than I'm
> inclined to put into this particular academic exercise.
>
> ... Marc
> Marc_F_Hult
> www.ECOntrol.org