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Author Topic: Another Tripp Lite UPS Bites The Dust Mark Gulbrandsen Resident Trollmaster Posts: 16657 From: Music City Registered: Jun 99 posted 09-03-2015 12:16 PM                     Nearby customer just called. His 2 1/2 year old Trip Lite UPS is showing a low battery and error. Another customer that had this issue tried a new set of batteries at Tripp Lite's suggestion however, that did not fix the problem. He had to replace the UPS as Tripp Lite also does not repair out of warranty units at all. I haven't looked at that UPS yet to see what failed but I'll be seeing this one today as the customer is bringing it to my shop for a look. Sadly, It's beginning to appear that Tripp Lite is no better any more then APC or any of the others. Mark  |  IP: Logged Scott Norwood Film God Posts: 8146 From: Boston, MA. USA (1774.21 miles northeast of Dallas) Registered: Jun 99 posted 09-03-2015 12:28 PM                        Do they have power issues at that location? If the UPS is constantly compensating for high or low incoming voltage, that could cause premature death. If not, then the UPS should have lasted far longer. I have an APC SU1400RM2U at home that dates from 2001 or thereabouts and works great. The smallish APC UPSes that I have used in an IT context generally have battery lives of about three years, plus or minus one year, so the dead battery issue is not surprising. APC sells a network card that will do nifty things like send email notifications and SNMP traps when something goes wrong with the battery, UPS, room, temperature, etc. APC is pretty much standard for small/medium IT installations. The only time when I have seen Tripp-Lite units has been in D-cinema installs, actually. APC has had a few duds, but the Smart-UPS and Symmetra lines have generally been good to me (again, in an IT context, not cinema). Their telephone support is also surprisingly good.  |  IP: Logged Mike Blakesley Film God Posts: 12767 From: Forsyth, Montana Registered: Jun 99 posted 09-03-2015 02:05 PM                        I've always used APC UPS's here. I probably have at least a half dozen of them in various places. I've replaced a battery here and there but never a problem otherwise. We definitely have "power issues" here. If there's any lighting in the area we'll get little two-second power failures. Sometimes it'll come back on for a half minute then drop for another two seconds. There's no rhyme or reason to it; sometimes it happens, sometimes it doesn't. Whatever's causing the problem, it's not here in town; it's east of here, because it always happens after a storm passes, almost never during a storm. And it never happens during the winter, since there's no lightning then. The only thing that causes problems in the winter for us is a huge heavy wet snow.  |  IP: Logged Steve Guttag We forgot the crackers Gromit!!! Posts: 12814 From: Annapolis, MD Registered: Dec 1999 posted 09-03-2015 02:32 PM                     Tripplite rates their batteries in the 3-5 year range. They also have an expensive SNMPWEB card that will allow the ups to email and such. We generally only that card on the TMS server (since it can also issue a graceful shutdown if the batteries are getting low. We've found that the SMART line of Tripplites have far fewer problems than the Smart Online versions (double conversions). The Smart Onlines are great but they can suddenly just die. We now have a transfer switch in our systems in the event a UPS dies.  |  IP: Logged Steve Kraus Film God Posts: 4094 From: Chicago, IL, USA Registered: May 2000 posted 09-05-2015 09:31 AM                    Mike, the two-second power drops are a recloser operating. Many faults (short circuits) are transients that will clear if power is turned off. Like if a tree branch momentarily brushes a wire and creates an ongoing arc. Turn off the power and turn it back on and it's gone. A recloser is a circuit breaker that will attempt to reset a specified number of times. If the fault is still there after several attempts to clear it by turning the power off a couple of seconds, then it locks out. This saves many nuisance trips and people left in the dark unnecessarily.  |  IP: Logged Mark Gulbrandsen Resident Trollmaster Posts: 16657 From: Music City Registered: Jun 99 posted 09-05-2015 12:02 PM                     This is a Smart On Line unit (220 volt), it's all I use except on TMS's. Luckily in this case it WAS just the batteries but a warning about these... The dam fault light is a joke, basically meaningless. The first one of these that had the exact same symptoms is toast. There IS also Bad or Replace Battery light in the lower left corner of the operating panel that never came on. So I go and pull the batteries out and found that they were nearly TWO YEARS older then the actual unit was. Way to go Tripp Lite! I lucked out on batteries too. A local battery supplier had a big batch of the exact same battery made in a special color for a customer only to find out the color was trademarked (or part of one) and they could not use them. So at $12.00 each that was a bargain. I bought 8 cases of them. This is a 48 volt battery pack and if it drops below 30 volts you have a dead in the water UPS that won't even charge it's own batteries! If that happens you may be able to revive them using a 2 amp trickle charger, but don't hold your breath. I am also recommending to everyone with these (SUINT1500RTXL2UA) to keep an inexpensive Tripp- lite bypass panel at each location in case the batteries or the UPS fails (one at each projector may be a little ridiculous since it takes all of 5 min to hook up.) and to replace batteries every 4 years irregardless of weather they seem to work fine or not. The panel is well under $200 bucks and could save your weekend from disaster. You open that sucker up and you'll see the factory date on the battery pack! So I do DO NOT recommend purchasing the packs from Tripp Lite. Get them locally from a reputable battery supplier like I did and rebuild the pack your self. That takes about 15 min. to do. My batteries have a factory date on them of within the last 90 days... Tripp Lite Bypass Panel I also have had zero issues with the Tripplite Smart Pro UPS's, I have close to 40 of those working in TMS's. If one of those dies it's not mission critical to the theater generally. And unlike a downed booth, one has some time to get those going again.. Mark  |  IP: Logged Steve Guttag We forgot the crackers Gromit!!! Posts: 12814 From: Annapolis, MD Registered: Dec 1999 posted 09-05-2015 01:35 PM                     What we originally did was to use an internal power strip to plug everything that will plug into the UPS...plug the power strip into the UPS. In the event of a UPS failure, you are just one plug away from plugging everything back into city power (plug the power strip into the outlet that the UPS was plugged into). We have since incorporated a transfer switch into our systems so if the UPS dies, the system immediately is on city power. As for battery changing...yes Tripplite is SUPER easy. Nothing has to be removed from the rack/pedestal...just take the front over off and change the battery pack. They slide out pretty easy from the front. Again, batteries are only good for 3-5 years and then they start to swell up too and you'll never get them out. The current SMART versions also have a better front panel display than the Smart Online versions...give you incoming/outgoing voltage, current...etc. The only place we use the "SU" series anymore are on NECs. I tend to use 120V versions for everything and step up for those things that NEED 220 (e.g. Barco electronics).  |  IP: Logged Mike Blakesley Film God Posts: 12767 From: Forsyth, Montana Registered: Jun 99 posted 09-05-2015 04:49 PM                        quote: Steve Kraus Mike, the two-second power drops are a recloser operating. That's good to know -- but it sure is irritating. I kept track of power outages for several years. The worst year I documented was 2012, we had 33 outages that year. Last year we did better; we only had around 20. All ranging from a couple of seconds to about four hours. And almost all during (or just after) lightning events. My wife lived in Billings for 17 years before we met and she says we have more power failures here in one year than she experienced the whole time she lived in Billings.  |  IP: Logged Jack Ondracek Film God Posts: 2348 From: Port Orchard, WA, USA Registered: Oct 2002 posted 09-05-2015 09:37 PM                        Years ago, we bought a generator for our drive-in. You haven't seen dark until you lose power in one of these places. We haven't needed the generator a lot, but it paid for itself the first time we did. quote: Mike Blakesley was the last to post  |  IP: Logged Mark Gulbrandsen Resident Trollmaster Posts: 16657 From: Music City Registered: Jun 99 posted 09-06-2015 09:11 AM                     Considering I have over 300 of these out there I probably shouldn't complain too much. I just wish these UPS's had better battery monitoring circuitry in them. I have had zero failures of the Smart units so far. But their load is a lot less at about 400 watts total. And the fact that Tripp Lite refuses to repair their product is really the pits too! Mark  |  IP: Logged Steve Guttag We forgot the crackers Gromit!!! Posts: 12814 From: Annapolis, MD Registered: Dec 1999 posted 09-06-2015 02:07 PM                     I'll tell you...that is the "new world" we live in. NOBODY wants to fix ANYTHING out of warranty. If out of warranty, everyone tells you to just throw it away. USL, in our industry is a notable exception and Christie will also attempt repairs. But as for most other industries...not a chance. Same is true with TVs and most any other consumer electronics. I'm sure that part of the problem is the high density (many layer) boards and SMT stuff where potential repairs are going to be troublesome. Also, it is likely that service was not considered in design. If there aren't good test points, it may be near impossible to find bad stuff. Mind you, I'm not defending the practice...I HATE it but I keep coming across it from everyone! The first time I came across it in the cinema industry was Barco...board out of warranty (like an Enigma that has bricked)...sorry nothing we will do! Having a software related failure cause something to be discarded is just plain silly but that is what happens. Fortunately, we did keep those powered until the cure was found. Then again, I have one or two Enigmas who's power has been off in excess for a year...why can't there be a fee to recommission them? That is a TI thing if not something that any of the OEMs could do. Mind you, I have a Christie as well as a Barco in that state. I bet ya that APC has the same policy for out-of-warranty devices.  |  IP: Logged Rex Oliver Film Handler Posts: 65 From: Greenville, NC. USA Registered: Apr 2013 posted 09-07-2015 12:13 AM                     Recloser-From the breif but very good training we obtained from Powell Industries(Makers of utility and industrial switchgear)A Recloser will give three tries and then isolate the circuit affected from the distribution system then acting as a sectionalizer.so if your power "Blinks" three times in succesion(like sec between tries)-get out the flashlights and fire up your genset if you have one.A power company lineman has to manually reset the Recloser-sectionalizer after the fault has been corrected.Powell Industries replaced our 4160V switchgear at the transmitter plant.Their training was breaif but very good and interesting.The breakers they installed at our plant can be programmed for 3 shots-but for equipment breaker useage-they are for 1 shot.These devices can be pole mounted or mounted in enclosed "metalclad" switchgear cabinets for indoor use.  |  IP: Logged Steve Kraus Film God Posts: 4094 From: Chicago, IL, USA Registered: May 2000 posted 09-07-2015 03:05 PM                    My understanding is that a sectionalizer (which may not be that common) is like a recloser in that it has a breaker, overcurrent detection, and a counter but the breaker is not designed to open while carrying fault level current. It can carry it okay, just not open during it. That makes it cheaper and in theory can be placed more numerously covering smaller branches. A regular recloser goes above that covering a wider area. The counter on the sectionalizer is set to a lower number than on the recloser above it. The idea is that when there is a fault, the sectionalizer senses the fault-level current passing through it. The recloser higher up in the system opens and recloses in attempt(s) to clear it. If after several interruptions, the fault is still there, the sectionalizer waits for the recloser to open again and this time the sectionlizer on the branch with the fault opens. When the recloser recloses the power is then back on and only the one small branch stays out. The recloser doesn't know or care if the fault cleared because of the power being cycled or because a sectionalizer took the bad branch offline. All that matters is that it reclosed and the fault was finally gone. Naturally you can do the same thing with reclosers on each branch; the sectionalizer was supposed to be cheaper so smaller segments could be isolated.  |  IP: Logged Rick Raskin Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1100 From: Manassas Virginia Registered: Jan 2003 posted 09-07-2015 05:43 PM                     Not to derail this thread any more but my thoughts on reclosers. Where I live the recloser is higher up the distribution tree. Typically branches are fused. A hard fault will blow the fuse but a temporary one will cause the recloser to attempt to restore power 3 times before going open. The power company does a pretty good job of keeping the trees trimmed back but has to get landowner permission in some cases. A family at the end of my road steadfastly refused permission so the power company installed a fuse at the entry to their property. Now they can sit in the dark when the rest of us have power. I have a generator, as do most of my neighbors.  |  IP: Logged Scott Norwood Film God Posts: 8146 From: Boston, MA. USA (1774.21 miles northeast of Dallas) Registered: Jun 99 posted 09-07-2015 06:14 PM                        Is the US power distribution system really that bad that significant numbers of people experience power failures on a regular basis? Power failures are something that I would normally associate with stormy weather (leading to ice forming on power lines and/or trees falling on them), maintenance activity, or catastrophic equipment failure (mostly transformer explosions and the like, but also includes cars driving into poles and similar issues).  |  IP: Logged

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