Home Forums General Discussion Technical Questions Ascension 2000 Stuck going down

I have an ascension 2000 hydraulic that goes down about once a week. I find it at the bottom floor with DN and DNX energized on the motion board. It will be below the door zone and on the down direction limit, which de-energizes the coils on the valve but for some reason it still wants to continue going down. Shows the correct floor on the hall P.I.

When I plug in the freedomware, the mode display shows “test request”, the phase display shows “lost” and it says it’s in level 1. Shows the T1D bit for the slowdown low.

The only way to get it running is to put in on inspection on the car top and run it back into the door zone enough the the selector sees the door zone magnet. Then it will run fine.

I swapped the motion board and all its relays and the function board, but it came back in with the same fault. Traced the wiring to all the limits, found it all to be good. Checked the selector tape magnets and selector, couldn’t find any issues.

I tried swapping the processor board but after setting up the personality settings again I could not get it to learn the hoistway by setting the learn bit high on display 9. When I tried running it on auto, I kept getting faults. Swapped back the old processor board and let it run.

This is in a building with three other identical ascension 2000’s. I always clear the C display monthly in the freedomware and they have been excellent runners for years up to now.

Hmmm... I adjusted some of the first Ascension's, both 1k and 2k, but that was a loooong time ago. First, I don't know about this "learning the hoistway" that you're describing. Forget about that and move on. I don't recall the down direction limit affecting DN and DNX.

The U.S. micros of that period would continue to level down if they got below the LU. The most probable cause of your problem is that the elevator is blowing past the floor. I'd first make sure that the tape reader is seeing the STD, and the step down circuit is functioning properly. Also make sure that the valve is adjusted with 3-6 inches of leveling into the floor. Don't try to bring it in hot. Also, it's possible that the LU circuit is not functioning properly. As the car sinks below the floor, if it doesn't get the LU, it will just keep sinking until it's out of DZ, then start recovering down. That's all I can think of right now.

I’d be looking at the selector guides. You don’t mention them, so I’ll comment.
Those nylon guides allow for about 1/8”total lateral movement with no real trouble. But, the wear front to back up to an 1/8” will cause the selector reader card not to see the magnetic inputs correctly, which is supoposed to match your learn profile/hole count. I’d check those on your next visit.

IIRC, once it slips past DZ, and the hole count didn’t match, your SOL, regardless of LU input and DSD being open.
Have you looked at the faults located at DISP F? This Ascension 2000 is a different bird than U.S.’s previous mp’s (1230, 1000).
Mode 5 or “Test” is default when the car craps out except for Fault F I believe.
Test request implies the same, but there are car calls yet registered, although the unit maybe out of service (door lock open for example).

There is an easier way to run the car up than gaining access to the car top, but I’ll pm that info.
Changing the nylon guides can be a pain. Looks simple enough, but poor design. If you’re going to replace them, be sure main line power is off and locked out. Phillips screwdriver is all you need and maybe a 2” paint brush to clean off all the nylon dust...oh...and good lighting over your head.

Rustyiron and elmcannic, those were some great suggestions, I will be back at the building next week and will update what I find.
Also, thank you for the pm elmcannic that is very helpful.

So, after posting here I have been waiting to get a callback to this elevator but nothing happened. I went to the building two days ago for the monthly maintenance visit and it is running fine. The superintendent confirmed that it’s been running fine this whole time.

I am wondering if maybe removing the processor board and the EPROM and then re-seating the EPROM and re-installing the processor board was the trick. Maybe a bad connection somewhere. Just have to wait and see.

I checked the selector, shoes are in good shape, and the car does have around four inches of levelling into the floor.

Thanks very much for the replies and advice, I’ll update this thread if any problems come back.

Ha!
When I first saw your post (today), I thought, “oh no, more trouble”. Thanks for the update.