Sensor Light driving me nuts

[Jsf721]

I have a two units each 2 bulb sensor light one over my garage that works great when it works. And another at the rear of the house.
They have been up a few years and a few times a year the one over the garage gets wonky. The rear unit has been rock solid but perhaps it gets triggered less often. I actually purchased 2 newer units to replace these but as luck would have it the power went out and when it came back the unit came back to life. So I put the new fixtures on the shelf in the garage and their they sit.

The only reason I know the power went out is that the cable box say turn on and that only happens after a power failure.

Power outages has fixed / reset them before. I’ve tried cycling the switch or breaker to simulate a power outage to trick them into resetting but it Never worked. Any ideas other than replace them.

These are pretty high up and I’d need to call someone in to replace them.

Thanks

 

[couch67]

Other than some units having adjustable sensitivity and 'on' time settings, there isnt much that can be serviced in these things. From your post I interpreted 'wonky' to be that the unit does not trigger when it should. And that at times you have seen that cycling power (ie outage), the unit started to behave as expected .

You could try adjusting the sensitivity if there is one, but if you already have replacement units, replacing would likely be the best move.
couch

 

[BillK]

one over the garage gets wonky.

Define "wonky" ???? I have one on the side of the house that acts up every time we have a power outage which is not that often. It usually ends up coming on solid. It is the type that has the function to turn it on continuous with a double click of the light switch. Maybe that is what is happening to yours ?

 

[Sevenhills1952]

Last thought I have is to turn breaker power off to them for maybe an hour or so, then on. If that doesn't work as others say try adjustment, however, if they're hard to get to you may as well replace them.
Whoever you get to to it could try adjustment first of course.

 

[Jsf721]

Wonky like the sensor light (red) lights but the lights don’t illuminate.

The after the power failure it works perfectly for months with our issue and then one day it’s back to the red indicator light illuminating but no lights.

I have tried powering off the breaker and flipping the switch 2x but nothing fixes it.

I will replace it but since it works for months I want to be sure there isn’t something simple I’m missing.

Define "wonky" ???? I have one on the side of the house that acts up every time we have a power outage which is not that often. It usually ends up coming on solid. It is the type that has the function to turn it on continuous with a double click of the light switch. Maybe that is what is happening to yours ?

 

[Sevenhills1952]

Maybe a picture, picture of replacement is fine if it's the same. Is it incandescent, the two floodlight kind, or LED? Incandescent if bulbs are loose it could act weird.

 

[Jsf721]

I replaced the in Regular bulbs for LEDs.
I had the same issue with regular and led bulbs.

Maybe a picture, picture of replacement is fine if it's the same. Is it incandescent, the two floodlight kind, or LED? Incandescent if bulbs are loose it could act weird.

 

[Sevenhills1952]

Replacement sounds like only option.

 

[Jsf721]

Well it’s out again tonight. Will be getting electrician set up for 2 new installs.

 

[CJ7VFR]

Well it’s out again tonight. Will be getting electrician set up for 2 new installs.

Does the light come on when you set the time switch to "Test"? Try that to determine if the motion part of the light and the lights themselves, are still working.

I also have two motion sensor flood lights on my garage. One on the front between the two garage doors, and one on the side.

I installed both of them when I moved into this house 8 years ago. For all that time they worked great. Then, all of the sudden, about a month ago, both of them started to act "wonky" like you mentioned.

Both of them had power. The small red light on both of them would go on to indicate they detected motion. Both of them would not light up at night when motion was detected, but both would light up if the time switch was set to "Test" and they detected motion.

I had read somewhere that the motion sensitivity switch could get sort of "stuck" in one place, and that over time the setting it was at would no long allow the light to detect motion at night. The "fix" for this was to move the sensitivity switch to the lowest setting, then turn the power off to the light, and wait a few hours, then turn the power back on to the lights, and this would reset them to work again. Hokey I know, but I tried it.

And it worked! Both of them started working again, so I turned the "sensitivity" switch on each light to a point just shy of where I had them before, and so far, knock on wood, they are working.

Jim

 

[klassenl]

I have had these sensor lights over the years with good success. My own opinion at this point is if you want coverage all night why not put in a dusk to dawn type of fixture. An 8 watt led runs very cheap and then you don't have to worry about the motion sensor.