I have outdoor floods controlled by an Aeon Micro Switch located in a J-box in the attic. It can only be controlled by the iOS app or an Aeon Minimote button, there is no other physical switch.
Last night, at 3:00 AM, the floodlights came on. We were sleeping and no one physically triggered the device.
I checked the hub management website (http://graph.api.smartthings.com) and the event was listed as follows:
SOURCE - DEVICE/PHYSICAL - Switch On
Any ideas how this was triggered?
If it says physical, that means it was the relay itself that turned on. A power outage might do that when power returned, but even so, as @Navat604 points out below, for this particular device it would likely mean some other problem as well. Did anything else show signs of a power fluctuation?
There were no other signs of power fluctuation.
However, you got me thinking about something else strange that sometimes happens: we have a vent hood (Island mounted) in our Kitchen, and every so often, it will come on in the middle of the night. The vent is also hard-wired in the attic. It seems like this only happens on very cold nights (although it doesn’t happen “every” cold night).
Last night, the low was around 44 degrees (F). Could temperature have any effect on the micro switch?
It’s always possible, but more typically a very cool night means other things come on which change the current fluctuation pattern on the circuit, like heaters kicking in. You sometime see this on a nonnetwork circuit when a room heater kicks on and the lights flicker.
I personally tend to be cautious about electrical issues so I would probably bring in an electrician to check the attic circuits, but that’s just me.
@Navat604 might have more to add.
Good advice. I’ll look into it. Thanks.
I have Aeon micro switches everywhere in both of my houses and never have this problem. Is the vent hood also hooks in the same circuit as the Aeon micro? If so then it’s possible there is an impending short caused by faulty wiring somewhere up the arttic. I would go up the attic and check the wiring and junction boxes. If they are not on the same circuit then I would look at the wire runs and boxes in the attic to be sure they don’t short to each other.
I have a couple of power surge before and the Aeon did not come on unless it’s a faulty switch as @JDRoberts mentioned.
Thanks for this helpful advice. I have a call in to my electrician and I’ll post any relevant information shortly.
The attic has not been inspected yet, but I have confirmed the following:
The Kitchen vent and Aeon controller are not on the same circuit, do not share a Neutral, and are fed through separate panels.
There is one more interesting event that I had previously forgotten: we have a hardwired smoke detector system with 4 devices wired in series. Last week, at approximately 3:00AM one of the devices started chirping with a low battery signal. In fact, the battery was rather new, I tested it and it was at full strength. (I did clean the device with compressed air just to be sure.) The device was reset and it has worked fine ever since.
The point is, I now have three different electrical devices which have experienced anomalies at approximately the same time of the night.
I’m wondering if we are experiencing some type of voltage drop/surge in the middle of the night that is affecting these devices. I suppose it could all just be coincidental, but it is strange, indeed.
Interesting, i also have a GE Zwave Dimmer that used to work really good until last week when it turns on and off itself physically. But in my case it happens during the day while i am not there. At some point also it did dim itself too lol.
I will try to replace it and see if it was just a bad switch or something else.
The weird thing is that it happens while we are not there, and there is no heat/AC on , hardly any power fluctuation and it happens to tunrs off itself after a few seconds. Also, i have not changed the hub or any other electrical changes at my house…