Garage Door Interference

[Chief]

I was running 4 flourescent fixures in the garage. 2 T8's and 2 T5's. Each fixture has 2 bulbs. My Genie Pro Screw Drive opener worked fine. I added 1 more T5 Fixure with two bulbs and now my openers only work when the remote is directly beneath the opener. I made the sure the antena on the unit is facing down, but still it has no range. I heard that flourescent fixtures could lead to interference and diminished range.

With the lights off, the range is still horrible. However, when i turn off the breaker that controls the lights, the range of the remotes is back to normal.

Any suggestions for a fix? Is there anything I can insulate/shield? The things that confuses me, is i have read that flourescents can cause interference, if that is the case why does my garagage remote have such short range even when the lights are not on. It appears the current in the lines, not the flourecents are causing the problem.

Thanks

 

[Chief]

No one has any thoughts?

Very disappointing

 

[red98gt]

Have you tried disconnecting the new T5 and see if the remote works? Maybe something wrong with it?

 

[bward76]

I've never heard of that. You may want to try putting a ground from the ballast mounting screw to the circuit ground. Could be some inductance from the ballast. Please let us know if you find out what it is. good luck.

 

[pattenp]

I don't understand how turning off the lights with the light switch vs. using the breaker to cut the power would make a difference. There should be no power flowing either way. I think it's a fluke and you are having openner problems that aren't related to the lights.

 

[Gary S]

AC emits EMI (electromagnetic interference)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electromagnetic_interference

When you turn the breaker off, you don't have the AC voltage in the wires that are near your garage door receiver. Depending on how you wired the switch in for the lights, you can have AC voltage available on the wires with the switch off.

You can recheck your wiring to make sure that you ran your power first to the switch and not to the light. If you run the hot to the light first and then back to the switch, the switch can't remove the AC voltage from the light fixture even when it is off. Rewiring so the hot goes to the switch first and then to the lights could make a difference.

My guess is that the only sure way to get rid of the problem would be to move the AC wiring and the lights farther away from the opener receiver.

Anything wireless can be expected to mess up from interference, and wireless devices seldom will fail to live up to this expectation.

 

[pattenp]

AC emits EMI (electromagnetic interference)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electromagnetic_interference

When you turn the breaker off, you don't have the AC voltage in the wires that are near your garage door receiver. Depending on how you wired the switch in for the lights, you can have AC voltage available on the wires with the switch off.

You can recheck your wiring to make sure that you ran your power first to the switch and not to the light. If you run the hot to the light first and then back to the switch, the switch can't remove the AC voltage from the light fixture even when it is off. Rewiring so the hot goes to the switch first and then to the lights could make a difference.

My guess is that the only sure way to get rid of the problem would be to move the AC wiring and the lights farther away from the opener receiver.

Anything wireless can be expected to mess up from interference, and wireless devices seldom will fail to live up to this expectation.

I not sure about the availability of AC causing EMI... EMI is caused by the flow of electricity. With the switch or breaker off there is no flow so no EMI. Now that's providing there is no other continuous power consuming device on the same circuit with the lights that's only being disconnected by the breaker.

 

[Falcon67]

Well, there's still 60 cycle radiating from the hot lead to the switch. IMHO, it'd be a pretty poor wireless device to get swamped by the little bit of radiation. The implication from the OP is that there might still be something putting partial power into the fixtures. I'd run a polarity check on all outlets and/or unplug or disconnect each fixture to see if one is causing a problem.