Problem #0164- Elements not heating up

tmcmaster007 · Joined: 11 Jan 2011 Posts: 48 Location: South Lyon, MI

Here we go again. If I wasnt' having so much fun learning about all this stuff I might find another problem frustrating Laughing

I got to the point in my build where the CP was starting to come together and decided to test out the heating elements that I have mounted in the kettles. The three way switch I was sent has the wrong contact block so I just plugged the elements in to the boil kettle receptacle one at a time. The boil part of the switch works. The light lights up and the mechanical relay clicks and engages. However, when testing each element, neither heated up. So here are my questions:

1. When the light turns on does that mean that the element is receiving power? or does it just mean that it SHOULD be receiving power?
2. How can I be sure that the SSR is functioning properly? The ones Auber sent me are not the same type Kal has, but are the same type listed from Asia Engineer on Ebay.
3. If the mechanical relay is engaging does that mean that the SSR is working?
4. Is their something I'm not doing properly when setting my PID. I just turn up the number on the bottom of the display.

Thanks.

**kal**

tmcmaster007 · Joined: 11 Jan 2011 Posts: 48 Location: South Lyon, MI

Thanks Kal. The light for the element is definetly on. I did wire as directed on your page. So if the light is on, the element is receiving power, so why no heat?

**kal** · Posted: Wed Mar 16, 2011 1:40 pm Post subject:

**kal** · Posted: Wed Mar 16, 2011 1:43 pm Post subject:

tmcmaster007 · Joined: 11 Jan 2011 Posts: 48 Location: South Lyon, MI

Ok, I'll check my receptacle when I get home. One more thing. The SSR's I received are different than on the site. You have the top (I assume this because of the writing on the SSR itself) as AC. The top contacts of my SSR say OUTPUT and the bottom contacts say CONTROL. I have the larger wires (10 gauge) going to the OUTPUT. Is that the same as AC?

**kal** · Posted: Wed Mar 16, 2011 2:10 pm Post subject:

**Spike Innovations** · Posted: Wed Mar 16, 2011 2:46 pm Post subject:

tmcmaster007 · Joined: 11 Jan 2011 Posts: 48 Location: South Lyon, MI

Thinking back to last night when I was troubleshooting myself I don't remember the LED's on the SSR coming on. Would that be on intermittently or constantly? I could have just not noticed it if it turned on and off. Seems that if the element wasn't heating it would need to be on constantly.

tmcmaster007 · Joined: 11 Jan 2011 Posts: 48 Location: South Lyon, MI

Went out last night and bought a multimeter (should've had one before) and tested the boil outlet to see what was causing the element to not heat up. At first I wasn't getting a reading even though the switch on the CP was turned to boil and the mechanical relay was engaged. At this time there was no red LED on the SSR. Did some thinking and decided to monkey around with the boil PID a bit. Turns out that the A-M setting was set to 0 as per instructions. Changed this to 2 and then back to 0 an magically the SSR light came on and got a 220 reading from the boil receptacle. Not sure if anyone else is having this problem, but might be worth it to try this very simple fix.

**kal** · Posted: Thu Mar 17, 2011 1:50 pm Post subject:

tmcmaster007 · Joined: 11 Jan 2011 Posts: 48 Location: South Lyon, MI

That's sort of what I was thinking, but it works now Drunk

I'll be sure to recheck the PID connections. I also learned that the GFI on the plug works...oops.