Intellicenter with pool, spa, valve delay not turning pump back on

[jdramm]

Hi,

I have a pool and spa, separate bodies of water, using shared equipment.

It's all controlled by Intellicenter with the i8PS personality module. The pump is a Pentair VSF, with RS485 control. The pump is always powered, and speed is controlled by the Intellicenter.

The Intellicenter doesn't seem to handle switching bodies correctly.

Here's what I've tested / observed.

WITH valve delay
Moving from pool to spa works, but the pump runs during the 'valve delay' period.
Moving from spa to pool does NOT work. The pump is set to 0 speed immediately after the move from spa (which I think is correct) but does not get started once the valve delay completes.
In this 'stopped' state, the app shows the pump is meant to be on and running the pool.
If I turn the pool off and back on, the pump starts.

WITHOUT valve delay
Moving from spa to pool or from pool to spa works. Pump remains running.

The problem is that I need the valve delay to stop my spa overflowing. Each transition pushes a bit of pool water into the spa if the pump runs during that period.

Anyone else seen this, or know how to address it?

I have NOT tried powering the pump off the filter relay, as I'm trying to avoid all the 'lost communication' alarms (and it shouldn't be necessary).

Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

John

 

[ajw22]

Welcome to TFP.

What version of firmware in the IntelliCenter are you running?

Did your system ever work correctly? When was it installed?

 

[jdramm]

Welcome to TFP.

What version of firmware in the IntelliCenter are you running?

Did your system ever work correctly? When was it installed?

Hi, thank you for the welcome.

Running 2.006.

It's a new (fall 2022) install. I would say it's never worked correctly. The installer (who, for various reasons, we're no longer working with) didn't seem that familiar with the set-up. There were other schedules masking this. It's on a 'bare bones' schedule at the moment.

I haven't tried with no schedules and only changing it over manually. Currently there's a schedule to run the pool filter 23x7, and two schedules that run the spa for a couple of hours in the morning and evening. They seem to override the pool schedule.

Just for info, here's a screenshot with the pool pump 'running' but not actually running, and the same photo with it genuinely running.



And these are the schedules:

Thanks!

 

[ajw22]

2.006 has been bug ridden and Pentair pulled it from release.

2.017 came out last month. I would update your panel to 2.017 and see how things work.

Pentair was supposed to begin pushing OTA updates of 2.017 this month.

IntelliCenter® Control System Firmware Download

Stay up to date with the newest software. Download the latest versions of our software's here.

www.pentair.com

 

[jdramm]

Thanks! The OTA update isn't available to my system yet. Have downloaded from the link and I'll give it a try.

 

[jdramm]

That worked! Will monitor, but on a quick test it behaved exactly as I expected -- switching bodies, the pump goes to zero, the valves move and the 30s timer counts down, then the pump starts up again.

Can I ask a follow up question? My intellichlor and heater are currently tied to the 'filter' relay -- which means that I get 'comms' errors about them during the valve change-over. Is it OK to wire those two to be permanently 'on' (on the same breaker as the main pump)? Both are communicating using RS485 with the intellicenter.

 

[ajw22]

Heater can be permanently ON and wired to LINE side of the filter pump relay.

IntelliChlor needs to be powered OFF when the pump is not on and needs to be wired to the LOAD side of the relay.

 

[jdramm]

Thanks. Will try to ignore the 'lost comms' messages when the system has turned off the Intellichlor! (Maybe they'll address that in a future update...)