Apex/ electrical/GFI messed up.Help.

[reefwithareefer]

Originally Posted by mike31154

Probably best to get an electrician in then.

Troubleshooting what you're describing without circuit diagrams, proper test equipment & being able to physically see your equipment is a guessing game online. Sure there are a few things you can try, but you're talking spikes of 75 & 29.3 amps on house circuits that are rated for 15 amps max on a feeder circuit rated for 40 amps. That is scary! There should be some roasted wire by now if those readings are accurate. You mention GFI tripping but also talk about breakers tripping. Can you confirm both GFI & breakers tripping or only GFI?

As already mentioned, GFI devices monitor/compare current coming in on the hot lead (black) & return current via neutral (white). An imbalance of 4 to 6 milliamps will trip the GFI device. That's 0.004 to 0.006 amps, anything above which is considered capable of killing a person. A circuit breaker on the other hand, is designed to protect wiring from over current & prevent it from catching fire/burning down your house. It will not protect you from electrocution.

Folks mention that replacing a GFCI plug or outlet with a GFI circuit breaker has solved their problems & that may be so, but each of these devices is designed to trip at the same 4 to 6milliamps that protect you from electrocution. GFCI circuit breakers are expensive & typically use two spots in your breaker panel, they are large. Throw in a couple of AFCI breakers & things get tight real quick in your electrical panel. If you have the room in your panel & the $$$'s that's great. I have one GFCI breaker but use in wall outlets for a number of other locations where code calls for that type of protection. In my experience the GFCI wall outlets don't exhibit excessive nuisance trips & reset automatically in the event of a power outage when power comes back on. I've tripped the ones on my aquarium occasionally when unplugging equipment during a water change. Don't consider that abnormal, since unplugging running equipment often causes a spark at the plug & that could certainly cause a brief amperage imbalance that the GFCI sees.

High power ballasts that run MH & T5HO lights produce very high voltages at startup & there are plenty of examples of this type of lighting causing tank owners grief with GFCI devices. My guess is that the GFCIs are located a bit too close to the ballasts & there is some EMI happening, or that there is actually a problem with a ballast.

From the amperage numbers you're throwing around & several other symptoms you've described, my guess is that one or more of the relays in your controller power bars are cooked/fused, but that's a guess. Triacs were also mentioned, high current will cook them even faster than a mechanical relay. Get some professional help to check your gear.

Yes, it should be scary. The thing is, there are no burnt wires or smell of burnt wires, nothing that has caused great concern that way. It is why I am wondering if it is just the apex "twitching" with how many amps are running through it.
No, the breakers have not gone off, just the one GFI. Which makes it all the more strange as both breakers are run off the 40 amp breaker.

Lights, ballasts and eb8s are all about 6ft apart from one another.

I have apex support looking into it and if they can not find anything, I will probably call an Electrician to come look. Last time I called one for a similar issue, he made it sound like it would be impossible to locate the issue etc etc

[reefwithareefer]

I have unplugged the MH light to see if any spikes in amperage happen today.

[mike31154]

I looked up the specs on the EB8 energy bar & had a quick read. You probably know all this, but for the benefit of any further troubleshooting..... I see that it has a built in circuit breaker, 2 mechanical relay switched outlets rated to 10 amps maximum each & 6 solid state switched outlets rated to 5 amps maximum each. Each 250 watt Halide should draw about 2 amps & I would recommend using the mechanically switched outlets for those. I suspect they draw somewhat more than 2 amps when starting up to get the voltage needed to strike an arc in the lamp. You need to be careful not to overload the power bar. It does warn that maximum current for the whole bar is 15 amps & the built in breaker should trip if you exceed that, but even circuit breakers can mess up. It's easy to get carried away plugging stuff into something that conveniently switches so many components for you. If you were to use each individual outlet to its max allowable, you'd very quickly exceed 15 amps, in fact simply using 10 amps on each of the relay switched outlets already has you 5 amps over. Again, you likely already know all this & the breaker is there to help prevent overload, as is your feeder circuit breaker in the electrical panel.

Any one of the outlets on the power bar could fail individually since each is controlled by a separate component, either a solid state or mechanical relay. Then there's the controller software..... Normal power bars are straight electrical connections, so fewer components to fail. With the convenience of controllability, comes complexity & additional failure modes. It's a bit difficult to trust the current monitoring feature of a controller that shows a 75 amp spike and there is nothing burnt out. That's likely why the last electrician wasn't much help. Not all electricians are knowledgeable in electronics theory, many are great installers & know the electrical code to wire houses very well, but they don't need a lot of solid state/electronics theory to do that. Obviously there are industrial qualified electricians out there that deal with control circuitry, robotics etc., but that's generally not the guy that mostly does residential wiring. Different levels of training.

Is the GFI you're using one of the portable plug in types?

[mike31154]

Doing some additional reading, the Apex Comprehensive Reference Manual provides some troubleshooting procedures when your lights don't work, pages 73-74. Even gives some instructions using a multimeter. This will help you narrow down the issue by confirming serviceability of various components. Should give a better idea if it's something in your power bar or if you should suspect a ballast issue. Good luck, hope this helps.

https://www.neptunesystems.com/downl...nce_Manual.pdf

EDIT: Sorry, the procedure on page 73-74 is for dimmable light ballast, may not be appropriate to your issue, but the tests should still tell you if the relays/triacs on the power bar are functional. I need to read more carefully, or completely before I post stuff!

[reefwithareefer]

Originally Posted by mike31154

I looked up the specs on the EB8 energy bar & had a quick read. You probably know all this, but for the benefit of any further troubleshooting..... I see that it has a built in circuit breaker, 2 mechanical relay switched outlets rated to 10 amps maximum each & 6 solid state switched outlets rated to 5 amps maximum each. Each 250 watt Halide should draw about 2 amps & I would recommend using the mechanically switched outlets for those. I suspect they draw somewhat more than 2 amps when starting up to get the voltage needed to strike an arc in the lamp. You need to be careful not to overload the power bar. It does warn that maximum current for the whole bar is 15 amps & the built in breaker should trip if you exceed that, but even circuit breakers can mess up. It's easy to get carried away plugging stuff into something that conveniently switches so many components for you. If you were to use each individual outlet to its max allowable, you'd very quickly exceed 15 amps, in fact simply using 10 amps on each of the relay switched outlets already has you 5 amps over. Again, you likely already know all this & the breaker is there to help prevent overload, as is your feeder circuit breaker in the electrical panel.

Any one of the outlets on the power bar could fail individually since each is controlled by a separate component, either a solid state or mechanical relay. Then there's the controller software..... Normal power bars are straight electrical connections, so fewer components to fail. With the convenience of controllability, comes complexity & additional failure modes. It's a bit difficult to trust the current monitoring feature of a controller that shows a 75 amp spike and there is nothing burnt out. That's likely why the last electrician wasn't much help. Not all electricians are knowledgeable in electronics theory, many are great installers & know the electrical code to wire houses very well, but they don't need a lot of solid state/electronics theory to do that. Obviously there are industrial qualified electricians out there that deal with control circuitry, robotics etc., but that's generally not the guy that mostly does residential wiring. Different levels of training.

Is the GFI you're using one of the portable plug in types?

I did know that, but had forgotten about the types of plugs etc over time, as it never caused an issue before. At one time I had figured out how to calculate how many amps each item pulled etc, so that I could plug all my stuff into each EB8 and not be over the max, but have forgotten that as well. .
Each

The eb4 rarely goes above 1 amp as the dosers pull a fraction of that.
The one eb8 pulls an avg of 9.6 amps and the one that is causing issues is around 12 is

With everyone helping out with ideas, it has lead me to wonder if my chiller is not being part of the issue. If it is going on and off, it will pull a lot of amps.
Do different ballasts pull different amps? I wonder if it is because I changed ballasts, the new ballast pulls more amps and when the chiller goes on, it exceeds the max for that EB8? Which makes the graph show unrealistic spikes....

The GFI I am using is a permanent wall mounted one. Paid 30 a pop for them.

The 3:00 time may just be coincidence or the chiller just needs to go on at that time. Nothing has been changed on that EB8 all hardware is the same and in the same outlets. The only thing differenth is the new ballast.. then again, did the apex cause my galaxy ballast to fry? Is it possible?
I like puzzles, but I may have to look at getting someone in...

[reefwithareefer]

I had a very similar issue about 6 months ago. Could not figure out what it was. But I do remember it broke the GFI in the same time and fashion. I swapped out the GFI for a regular duplex. No harm came of it, but I did not like the idea of not having a GFI installed when walking get on a wet floor, so I installed a new one a month or so later. All was goodoing for about 4 months or so until Sunday....

[mike31154]

You might be on to something with the chiller and if you know one of the bars is at 12 amps, that's getting a bit tight. It's generally recommended to keep draw to 80% of maximum on any given 15 amp circuit for your own safety. Wall mounted GFCIs have improved & the newer ones shouldn't be as prone to nuisance trips, but nothing is foolproof!

Have a look at my earlier post, #17, you may have missed that in the process of writing your most recent reply. The reference manual is very comprehensive, an amazing little piece of kit this Apex. You almost need to hire someone to set it up if you wish to use all of it's capabilities!

[mike31154]

The Apex Reference Manual is full of little gems! Remember my questioning of a logged current spike of 75 amps?

https://www.neptunesystems.com/downl...nce_Manual.pdf

Page 139

"EB8 or EB4 shows incorrect amperage Similar to the previous issue, the EBx may need recalibration. The process is simple but you must be comfortable knowing how to telnet into your controller. If so, then read on. 1. Identify the Aquabus number of the EB8 or EB4 that you want to calibrate. If your EBx is numbered EB8_3 then the Aquabus number is 3. 2. Unplug everything from the EBx or at least make 100% certain it’s all turned off. This is critical. Whatever amperage the EBx is pulling when the calibration is run becomes the new zero point. You want to make sure it’s pulling 0. 3. Telnet into the controller and login with your userid and password. 4. Issue the following command: eb8zero n where ‘n’ is the Aquabus number of the EBx you want to calibrate. If you’re calibrating an EB4, the command is still ‘eb8zero’. So using the above example of an EB that is known as ‘EB8_3’ the command would be ‘eb8zero 3’. This command is case sensitive and should be entered in lower case as is shown. It executes immediately and there’s no confirmation or message when finished, just a new telnet prompt. 5. Quit telnet. That’s it. Your EBx should now read the proper amperage load when devices are active."

[reefwithareefer]

Originally Posted by mike31154

You might be on to something with the chiller and if you know one of the bars is at 12 amps, that's getting a bit tight. It's generally recommended to keep draw to 80% of maximum on any given 15 amp circuit for your own safety. Wall mounted GFCIs have improved & the newer ones shouldn't be as prone to nuisance trips, but nothing is foolproof!

Have a look at my earlier post, #17, you may have missed that in the process of writing your most recent reply. The reference manual is very comprehensive, an amazing little piece of kit this Apex. You almost need to hire someone to set it up if you wish to use all of it's capabilities!

Yes it is quite the kit. I have read the comprehensive manual enough times that I should have memorized by now, but dirt biking and concussions have taken their toll. I will re-read

Thanks for the ideas and helping working it down to possible issues and solutions