Ultra-1000AP UPS troubleshooting

[DrB0b]

Im looking for anyone knowledgeable in UPS. I have 2 UPS that will attempt to power on and then shut down within a second.

With Ultra, they say to hold the power button until the first long beep stops and let go, when I do that, it will make a "switching" sound inside the UPS and shut off. If I hold the power button until the first long beep stops and then there are 2 short beeps a second after, it will make the "switching" sound and immediately shut off after the 2nd short beep. Ive checked the 2 fuses inside it and they are fine, both batteries test ~12.8V and work fine in another functioning UPS. No capacitors are blown and all the ICs/resistors appear to be fine. Ive sent an email to Ultra tech support to see what they say and Ill post what they come back with.

Any thoughts or suggestions would be great.

"Silence is golden, duct tape is silver...

 

[FredWagner]

DrBob -
Are the UPS units set for your local line voltage ? 120 vs 240 ?
Is there some sort of monitor/control port - either DB9 or USB ? Any connections or shorting pins there ? If you can find the documentation, perhaps there needs to be a dummy plug on the control port if there isn't a live connection.


Fred Wagner

 

[DrB0b]

I believe they are set voltage wise correctly as it was working fine until a power outage of around 30 min killed it. I removed the batteries and they were still ~12V so it wasnt dead batteries.

Yes it has a USb port on the back but to get to use with the PC it has to be able to stay on.

Need to find the docs to see about your last comment.

Thanks for the reply

"Silence is golden, duct tape is silver...

 

[FredWagner]

Recent power outage - there may have been a voltage spike, either at the time of the failure, or when power was restored. Some of the protection compenents in the UPS may have failed doing their job, and the unit recognizes this and turns back off during its power-on checks.

Fred Wagner

 

[FredWagner]

Several jobs ago, I had a remote site at our showroom at a big furniture design center. There was a major blowout in the escalator system. Our FAX machine was toast, but the PC system was protected by a good quality Surge Protector, which turned to charcoal, but protected the PC and monitor. I replaced surge protector, and the PC worked. We had to buy a new FAX.

Fred Wagner

 

[DrB0b]

Guess there is no way to isolate which components have failed? The only 2 fuses I see are intact and all the other components appear fine. I suppose it did do its job in protecting the vital PC but was hoping to fix it if possible.

Thanks again

"Silence is golden, duct tape is silver...

 

[FredWagner]

If you can contact the manufacturer, they might swap boards with you via mail/Fedex. They might have some voltage/resistance checks you can do on the unit to isolate/verify the problem. I wound up replacing a power supply board on an engineering-size scanner this way a while back.

Fred Wagner

 

[edfair]

I generally associate almost instataneous shutdowns like this to protective circuits operating to protect something. The ones I am thinking about are called crowbars because they resemble what happens when you throw a crowbar across power busses.

Although the batteries show a good voltage it is possible that they are flat enough that they draw excess current attempting to charge. If there are 2 in parallel you could take one out of the circuit to test that possibility.

I assume that the normally connected load is removed.





Ed Fair
Give the wrong symptoms, get the wrong solutions.

 

[DrB0b]

No load other than what the internal circuitry is applying. They test fine together after hooked up by doubling their initial voltage. The batteries function fine in another Ultra UPS.

"Silence is golden, duct tape is silver...

 

[BadBigBen]

See if there is a way to reset the protection circuit, like some of the better PSU's, it may need to be removed from the mains and turned on by holding the power button...

if it does not have a reset function, then I would concur that the control board has a problem...

well, after skimming the manual (see page 14), it does state the problem as being the PCB... guess it's time to call in the service...

or you do not have a high enough load on the system (30W +)...


Ben
"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."
How to ask a question, when posting them to a professional forum.
Only ask questions with yes/no answers if you want "yes" or "no"

 

[goombawaho]

If you have to buy new ones and you want to (still can) get the same units, pull the batteries out of the new ones and use the old batteries - saving the new batteries for future use.

That is, if the UPSs will live long enough that their batteries die.

 

[RickOzone]

I have a similar problem with my Ultra Power 1000AP UPS, except it stays on when plugged in but frequently shuts down. If I pull the plug it shuts down after one second. If I try to start it, with the power plug out, then it beeps and relays click and then shuts down. I called the service department and they said to replace the battery or the whole unit. There are two 12 Vdc batteries in the unit. They need to be tested with some load on them to see if they can hold the charge. I used a 25 ohm 225 W resistor to load the battery and then check the voltage. One of the batteries dropped to 5 V. I then connected a DC power supply across the batteries while connected to the circuit. In this configuration, the UPS stayed on and the output voltage was 120 Vac. I found a local source for the batteries at a cost of $35 each. Therefore, if both batteries are replaced, then the repair cost is about half the cost of a new unit.

 

[RickOzone]

Also check the MOV's on the output are not shorted. They are about the size of a quarter and blue. The resistance across them should be high. They are labeled RV1, RV2 and RV3.