IC40 SWG rebooting at regular intervals.

[Flying Tivo]

So short story loooong:
Today after my regular pool chores and adding a new valve to tie up my fresh water cistern(softened) to the pool equipment pad, i started to notice that the IC40 went into reboot and calibration sequence. Thought that it was the 12hr loop but then i recalled my schedule is from 8am-8pm, so technically there should not be a reboot cycle. So i took a seat and started a scientifically controlled observational study with a controlled subject (Me). I will tag a few guys for help @Dirk @Jimrahbe @ajw22 @mknauss @JamesW sorry if i missed someone.
This was the result:



In this time lapse it rebooted 7-8 times.

So went grab my trusty multimeter and started poking around. Opened up the ET and started measuring from the SWG transformer all the way up to the IC board. Got 47 volts the cell resting and 40.3 with cell generating. No fuse popped or connectors overheated. The green light on the IC remains on through out the reboots and no change in voltage either. My next best guess was the Coms, checked for loose wires on the IC board and Main board but nothing. Then took some reading of the voltages of the Coms which i dont recall right now but also no change in voltages during reboots and it did not affect the main pump either(which is connectoed to the Coms). The next logical step was to disconnect the Coms from the SWG IC board to the cell, and no luck either. Here is a video of the Life of cell menu which is throwing me off since no lights come on and the pool has been running for 4.3 years.

Is it that simple that the cell is starting to Fibrillate close to end of life?? Hope not!

 

[mknauss]

Mine started doing that earlier this year. 7 years old. So I bought a new one and keeping the old as back up. Check it for scale build up.

 

[Lake Placid]

I’ll share my non scientific anecdotal experience with the IC40 reboot purgatory in the event it may help narrow down what or why the problem may exist.

The first time my cell displayed the need to reboot in a constant endless loop I diagnosed down to a slight bit of corrosion on the connector from my IPH control board to the hot wire (red) that feeds power to the cell. When disconnected from the IPH and run stand-alone on the power center, the cell performed normally. Correcting the issue by bypassing that slightly corroded pin in the IPH connection solved the issue. (The known problem with the IPH connection and fix was documented/resolved by Dirk and ogento in other threads).

The second time the reboot purgatory cycle started, I noted that cell production was set at 19% output. This is the setting I’ve pretty much always used once the pool is settled in for the season. In tinkering with the cell and moving production up from 19% to various levels I noted the behavior would stop. In the end I set the cell to 20% and the issue completely disappeared. Why? I have no idea, but it’s given me no trouble since (been running 24-7 for 6 weeks at 20% with no reboot issues).

Cell was spotless with no scaling on visual inspection when the symptoms appeared in both instances. All that said, perhaps it was coincidence and the cell just got happy again.

 

[Flying Tivo]

Mine is set at 15-19 most of the time. I will raise to 24 tomorrow and reassess. Thanks

 

[Lake Placid]

I’ll cross my fingers for ya and hope it works

 

[Jimrahbe]

Felipe,

I had that issue on a new cell about a year after my pool was built.

Pentair came out and replaced the cell under warranty.

I guess my point is that it appears to be a cell issue and not a power supply or com issue.

Thanks,

Jim R.

 

[Dirk]

I would have guessed a cell issue, too, unfortunately. You could try replacing the flow switch. If that is faulty, if could be triggering the IC. It's supposed to light its Flow LED, of course, not reboot, but it's a relatively inexpensive troubleshooting step. If that doesn't help, at least you'd have a spare flow switch "in stock."

But before that, check and clean all contacts, male and female, especially the exterior one, where the IC plugs into the ET8. Corrosion on those contacts could cause intermittent power fluctuations. Not enough to darken the IC's LED, but just enough to cause a restart. Cleaning all eight of those contacts will not be fun, you gotta get in there and scrap everything.

Disconnect your IpH custom wiring to the power supply for a while and see if the problem occurs while all of your IpH wiring is not involved, just to eliminate that possibility as a troubleshooting step.

I've never measured my power supply's voltage, but 47 and 40.3 are above spec, which I believe maxes at 39V. Or were those voltages AC before the rectifier? If so, what is the DC voltage after the rectifier (surge board)? I thing that's supposed to be 22-39VDC. The IntellipH Controller faceplate reads "Output: 22-39VDC, 7.3 A Max. Load to Cell". I know your IpH Controller is not in your loop, but that's the spec. You should measure the amps to see what's going on there.

The ultimate troubleshooting step is a new cell. If that fixes the issue, then you'll know it was the old cell. If it doesn't, you'll have a backup cell, so you're not really losing any money if that's not the problem. You'd use the new cell until the warranty expires, then use the old one after that, to get your money's worth out of it, then back to the new one after that. That's assuming you find what is causing the restart issue. If it was the old cell, you could still use that as a temporary backup in a pinch, I suppose (like Marty suggested).

You could replace the surge card, but your voltage testing suggests it's not that. There was another, here, just a day or two ago, that replaced just the rectifier part on his surge card and brought it back to life. Cheap part. That might be something to try, too. He mentions it here, but not how he fixed it. You might have to search his threads.

Breaker tripping

Sorry, I didn't answer that part. No, that's not what that means. If the breaker was bad, or just weak, and was tripping under load, it would very likely do nothing while not under load, so that's not a legit troubleshooting conclusion. Jim has suggested to another here that you could go about...

www.troublefreepool.com

That's all I got, just basic troubleshooting stuff. I haven't had this issue, so have never had to resolve it.

 

[ajw22]

There was another, here, just a day or two ago, that replaced just the rectifier part on his surge card and brought it back to life. Cheap part. That might be something to try, too. He mentions it here, but not how he fixed it. You might have to search his threads.

Here it is...

EasyTouch Surge board repair - IC40

I had the 12A breaker pop on my EasyTouch that uses an IC40. The pool maintenance guys said it was a bad breaker, so I dutifully replaced it only to have the same problem. I tracked down the problem to the Surge board (521593). It turns out that there are two functions for this board: 1...

www.troublefreepool.com

 

[Flying Tivo]

I’ll cross my fingers for ya and hope it works

Thanks for crossing your fingers, apparently its working at 30%. It did not work at 20,25%. I had to change the schedule to 8 hrs instead of 12. What i did notice is that at 30% the second green led of output sanitizer lights up, below that its just one green led. Just a wild assumption if it has something to do. The cell did have some scale buildup, but was just on the center plate touching the adjacent plates on both ends. This washed up really easy with a water jet. Did a light 1 min vinegar bath, no mayor bubbling.

I guess my point is that it appears to be a cell issue and not a power supply or com issue.

Yes that is where it seams to all point out.

You could try replacing the flow switch.

The salinity reading from the cell did go up from before the scale wash 2800 to 3150. I have the external temp sensor rewired as suggested by Allen and Davis.

Disconnect your IpH custom wiring

Thought about that but did not make sense to me since the rebooting was not during the iph dosing.

Or were those voltages AC before the rectifier?

After the rectifier.

You should measure the amps to see what's going on there.

Dont have an amp meter

The ultimate troubleshooting step is a new cell

Since the new output setting is working i will wait on this. The cell was built in 2014 but started use in 2018.

There was another, here, just a day or two ago, that replaced just the rectifier part

Can a about to go bad rectifier have increased voltage? I tought diodes either are on/off.
What could be increasing the voltage? The SWG transformer? Even if its higher at the transformer the IC board still would regulate it down the regular swg range or not? I can easily do the rectifier soldering.
I will tag @RSView for his electrical engineering knowledge.

Thanks Everybody

 

[Dirk]

Can a about to go bad rectifier have increased voltage?

Not sure, probably, depending on the type of rectifier.

What could be increasing the voltage?

Maybe the transformer, maybe a faulty part on the surge board. I don't have the same board or transformer as you, so even if I measured either it would not be definitive. You'd need a volunteer that has the transformer and board that came with their ET.

Even if its higher at the transformer the IC board still would regulate it down the regular swg range or not?

Again, depends on the rectifier circuitry. There are circuits that can do that, including power supplies that can do that, but I wouldn't know if Pentair's surge board has that circuitry or not. Perhaps @RSView would know, because it sounds to me like he knows exactly what his surge board is doing or not doing.

 

[Dirk]

Even if its higher at the transformer the IC board still would regulate it down the regular swg range or not?

Got another theory. In my IpH "Winter Switch" rewire, I used a buck converter to regulate the voltage applied to the IpH pump. No matter what the voltage coming out of my IC power supply, the buck converter puts out 24VDC. That's an example of the kind of circuitry you're asking about.

But my Power Center (IC Power Supply) case, and my IpH case, both state an output voltage of 22-39VDC. That's a pretty crummy power supply, and makes me think the IC power supplies don't have any circuitry that regulates the output voltage, or at least not accurately. Otherwise, the spec would just read "24VDC" or something like that, not such a wide range. So if your transformer is running too high, maybe there's nothing on your surge card that would keep its output voltage from also running high.

Now whether or not a too-high voltage on the IC would cause it to restart intermittently, I wouldn't know... And how any of that fits with why increasing the IC output a few notches solves the reboot issue is also a mystery to me.

If you chat with @RSView, ask him if he ever measured the output voltage of his surge card. I think his is like yours. Mine came out of a Power Center, it's not the one included with an ET bundle, same for my big IC transformer, so I don't have the same parts powering my IC like you and RS do.

 

[RSView]

Not sure, probably, depending on the type of rectifier.


Maybe the transformer, maybe a faulty part on the surge board. I don't have the same board or transformer as you, so even if I measured either it would not be definitive. You'd need a volunteer that has the transformer and board that came with their ET.


Again, depends on the rectifier circuitry. There are circuits that can do that, including power supplies that can do that, but I wouldn't know if Pentair's surge board has that circuitry or not. Perhaps @RSView would know, because it sounds to me like he knows exactly what his surge board is doing or not doing.

Sorry for the delay on responding to this.

The Surge Board is likely the same as the Power Center board and consists of a full wave rectifier from a 24VAC input. If you look at this voltage output with a multimeter set to measure DC voltage (or AC voltage) then you'll get a different value based on what meter you use. You have to realize that this is a completely unfiltered and unregulated signal, but it is DC (direct current). Labels on the board show an expected max of 39V which is the maximum PEAK DC voltage after rectification ( 24VAC is the RMS voltage). The spec of 22-39VDC spec is for the unregulated DC voltage and depends entirely on how much current the chlorinator is pulling. It is being regulating within the chlorinator down to something like 12V and the variation on the input does not matter since the output is controlled internally to the chlorinator.

Pictures of the power center board that I've seen have two locations for filter capacitors (probably) but they are unpopulated (not actually on the board). This means that the IC-40 itself is doing the filtering and regulation of the supply voltage, which makes sense as it is done much closer to the circuitry for fewer power drop issues, etc. Putting the rectifier in the control box also makes sense because it dissipates a reasonable amount of heat due and you don't need to deal with that in the chlorinator.

So, to be clear, if you've got an oscilloscope you'll see these two waveforms in the attached picture.

On my board the bridge rectifier had two failed diodes (probably due to heat failure). If one diode fails then you could get strange waveforms which could result in strange readings with a meter. You can check the diodes by turning off the breaker (removing the fuse) and using your multimeter to check each diode individually. Happy to help if you need to dig into this.

 

[Flying Tivo]

I dont have an oscilloscope but i have checked diodes before, i just dont remember which side should measure and which side blocked. If you can point me on IC board i know the 4 points but not where i should put the +/-(direction of diode)
thanks

 

[RSView]

I dont have an oscilloscope but i have checked diodes before, i just dont remember which side should measure and which side blocked. If you can point me on IC board i know the 4 points but not where i should put the +/-(direction of diode)
thanks

I'm attaching a picture of my Surge Board and where I found the short. You can identify the 4 points as 2 of them have the AC power to them (one through the breaker) and the other two are labeled +/-. You don't need to know the direction, just set your meter the diode setting and test each diode connection in both directions. You should see one direction conducting and the other not. If neither shows a conduction path or both show a conduction path you've got a bad diode in the array.

 

[Flying Tivo]

im almost sure i should check horizontally and not vertically, right?

 

[Flying Tivo]

Like from 1-2 and 3-4??

 

[RSView]

Measure the diodes from the AC pins to the + and - terminals. Attached is the diode arrangement. If you measure both ways between the AC pins you should show no connection. If you measure both ways between the +/- pins you should see two diode drops (about .4v each).

FWIW, this is the component I ordered from Mouser to repair my board: https://www.mouser.com/ProductDetail/821-GBPC3502WT0