I had a rude awakening last night about 4 am when my RE219 sensor set off my alarm. After quickly disarming, I looked at the history which stated “Basement Freeze Sensor Pending Alarm (Awaiting Panel’s Programmed Delay)”.
A few things about this:
There was no change in temperature in the basement. It is usually in the mid to upper 50’s and the sensor is designed to trigger below 40. In fact, I only bought the sensor to detect floods. The panel says the sensor is still open and I have to bypass it to set the alarm right now.
Why does this type of sensor trigger the full alarm in the middle of the night? Based on the response of my family, I think they’d rather have the flood than be woken to the alarm thinking there may have been an illegal entry. It also triggered cameras, etc. as if there had been a burglar situation. This does not seem to be logical.
Any ideas on what could be causing the problem with the sensor?
Each individual function of the RE219 is programmed independently, so you can remove the low temperature zone and keep the flood zone if desired.
The freeze zone is the one that uses Loop 3.
Flood uses Loop 2.
Looks like you are referencing on your system zones 13-14-15 (Flood Freeze Heat)
To halt the Freeze function you could mark that zone type for zone 14 as “unused”
Why does this type of sensor trigger the full alarm in the middle of the night? Based on the response of my family, I think they’d rather have the flood than be woken to the alarm thinking there may have been an illegal entry. It also triggered cameras, etc. as if there had been a burglar situation. This does not seem to be logical.
If you prefer to not generate alarms when tripped, instead of using the Aux-Alarm zone type, you can program the zones as Zone type (23) No Response Type, with the Equipment type of contact. This will allow you to set up Alarm.com notifications for the zones but never generate an actual alarm signal.
Any ideas on what could be causing the problem with the sensor?
While the ambient temperature of the room may be in the 50s, the surface the sensor is attached to may be very cold in winter, or drafts may affect its readings.
Thanks for your response. I’ve had this RE219 for over 6 years in the same location and have never had any type of issue from it. Just in case, I’m going to start by changing out the battery. I think I am going to keep both in the system but change both to type (23) unless you can tell me a good reason I shouldn’t.