Wiring powered leak detectors?

[Quixote_1]

Hi,
I bought a bunch of these the other day:
http://www.aartech.ca/vip1000-h2o-flair-waterguard-water-detector-5-24vdc-white.html
and I was wondering how to wire them correctly to the Elk. When I saw them I thought that there were two terminals for power and two to wire to a zone, but there are only two terminals.
Can I wire a circuit that has the power source, the leak detector and then to a zone on the elk and just look for the zone to close, or would I need to go about it in a more roundabout way?
Thanks in advance.

 

[mustangcoupe]

I have not used them yet, but I had looked at some like them. MY impression was they'd connect directly to the elk zone as that is 13 VDC I believe. but lets wait for someone who has used them tell us.

 

[video321]

Maybe the contacts you got are designed to be part of a system where there is a master that has the 4 terminals and these link to that for a single zone with multiple "probes". The GRI contacts I'm looking at have that type and the regular 4-wire ones (which I already have) available.

 

[Digger]

Hi,
I bought a bunch of these the other day:
http://www.aartech.ca/vip1000-h2o-flair-waterguard-water-detector-5-24vdc-white.html
and I was wondering how to wire them correctly to the Elk. When I saw them I thought that there were two terminals for power and two to wire to a zone, but there are only two terminals.
Can I wire a circuit that has the power source, the leak detector and then to a zone on the elk and just look for the zone to close, or would I need to go about it in a more roundabout way?
Thanks in advance.

These are probably similar to the GRI-2800 water sensors I use. Wire to a zone and put an EOL resistor in parallel with the sensor (at the sensor) and they should work fine (but test to make sure). When water bridges the contact it will trip the zone.

You may want to turn your siren cutoff for a water alarm to 5 seconds or zero and just let the tripped zone beep the keypads and report etc.

 

[video321]

If these could be powered right off the zone then what is the difference of using a 12V 4-wire sensor (such as the GRI-2600) vs. the GRI-2800(5-24V) that Digger mentioned?

I did just see this in the PDF for the 2800(5V):
For Maximum Protection We Recommend
Using the 2600 4-Wire Sensor

Can someone clarify?

 

[apostolakisl]

I have a two wire water detector on my Elk. It is a normally open circuit and water acts as a conductor to close the contacts. I believe mine are made by GRI. Anyway, they work fine just off of the power supplied by the zone voltage. It appears that the ones you bought are of the same design.

An important note, if you are putting multiple water detectors on the same zone, they must be run in parrelel, NOT series as you would with door and window contactors. You must then setup your panel to alarm when the zone closes. I would not put an EOL resistor on this. It really serves no useful purpose and may decrease the voltage at the detector such that water no longer is a good enough conductor for current to flow.

 

[Quixote_1]

Thanks for all of your input, guys.
Can someone please enlighten me on the voltage that a zone will provide in the different monitoring modes? I know that I had this info a while back, but I can't remember anymore. I'm reading around 14v on a non-alarm, normally closed zone. I'm a bit too lazy to test each and every zone mode, but maybe someone here has easy access to that info?
Thanks again.

 

[video321]

Can someone please enlighten me on the voltage that a zone will provide in the different monitoring modes?

Zone Open: 12 to 13.8 volts DC, must be greater than 9 volts DC.
Zone Shorted: 0 volts DC, must be less than 4 volts DC.
EOL Resistor in place: 4 to 9 volts DC, normally about 7 volts.

 

[Quixote_1]

Cool. Good to know.

The sensors that I bought work great wired directly to a zone as a non-alarm, normally closed zone (or normally open, I would guess). This weekend I'll experiment with wiring up multiple sensors in parallel, as well as try to get a better idea of the response time. They seem very quick with my initial tests.

 

[apostolakisl]

The alarm panel is always producing the 13 or so volts. The reduced readeings of 0 (shorted) or 7 (eol resistor) is becuase the potential is being shunted across the resistor or the short.