Power failure, programs not working from switches

[kevincol]

I have had ISY running programs that haven't been touched for close to 10 yrs. now.  We had a power failure (days) and supplemented part of the house with a generator.  When the grid came back up, my programs that check the status of an Insteon light switch stopped working.  If I run the program from the "IF" part in the ISY Admin Console, the program works.  In this instance I turn the switch on from the ISY Admin Console.  If I turn the Insteon switch on / off at the switch, the program will not execute.  The program's are very simple.  Check the status of the switch.  If it is on, then wait N minutes and turn the switch off.  I did a screen grab of the program below.

All of this was somehow induced from the power going out.  The ISY994i seems to be working fine as I can get into from the ISY Admin console.  Programs that are based off of time of day work fine.  

Anyone have any ideas on troubleshooting this?

 

 

 

[oberkc]

Have you confirmed that the programs have not been disabled, for some reason?  

[MrBill]

Since you're using status, try this for troubleshooting: Check the status of the switches from the Main tab of the admin console, then go change one of them, and come back to the admin console and check the status again.  Now repeat with the other switch.   Is the status of the switch changing in the ISY?   

There's too many options depending on the results of that test to keep typing what I'd try next.   Possible problems could be a one way communication problem or bad switch.  it's possible that surges etc broke something.  It may more may not be an Insteon device actually causing the problem something else may have gotten damaged and is  now emitting noise blocking insteon signal, but it does seem to be working at least in one direction which makes me wonder if it's not an Insteon device itself.   (I once had an Insteon on/off switch for my attic fan get taken out by a surge, it impaired the entire system until the switch was disconnected then everything else was fine.)

[kevincol]

thanks.  the programs are enabled @oberkc  @MrBillI will test this out by changing the programs on the switches that turn on successfully by Time of Day and see if the status command works on them.  @MrBill when I do manually turn the switch on, the admin panel tells me they are on, though sometimes I have to query the system to see that it turned on, so maybe they did get partially taken out.  I have gone through more Insteon switches bighting the dust from a damn power failure than seems reasonable.  

Edited February 2, 2021 by kevincol

[oberkc]

3 hours ago, kevincol said:

the admin panel tells me they are on, though sometimes I have to query the system to see that it turned on,

Assuming that the switches are still working, if the status is not consistently updated in the admin panel, I would be looking at communication problems.  Obviously, if the ISY cannot see the status changes, it will not trigger programs.  Perhaps other electronics were affected by the power failure and are affecting insteon communications?

[MrBill]

@kevincol Don't assume it's the switches.  Noise can come from anywhere, even things you don't think about like LED lightbulbs.   There does seem to be a communication problem however.    When i start troubleshooting things like this, I usually start by unplugging or turning off everything on the same circuit.  If there are other insteon switches I pull the air-gap lever.   If there's still noise I turn off big batches of breakers.   Leavings on the modem and router, the PLM, the circuit in question. if those are on opposite phases then i usually turn on a nearby circuit on the opposite phase of the circuit in question.   If it works under those conditions then start turning on more circuits until it doesn't.  It's a little maddening to find noise or signal suckers, but with a good method it doesn't take long usually.  I've gotten so anything new gets plugged in (or now even new light bulbs) I automatically test if its a problem with Insteon.