Home Forums General Discussion Technical Questions MCE Duplex Dispatching Problem

We have a new duplex using MCE motion 4000 controllers. When Car A is dispatcher the dispatching works fine. If Car A is put on inspection or shut off. Hall calls will not be answered. If Car B is dispatching, hall calls will not be answered. Only if Car A is the dispatcher and Car B is the slave will it work properly. We have checked to make sure the car identifiers are set properly for each car. The can bus is communicating. The power phases to each car match. Jumpers J3 on the MPU boards are in place. Floor assignments are set in the F1 Basic Features menu. Any ideas?

Forgot to mention that the hall calls are serial node boards on the Can Bus. All hall calls are handled through the Can Bus and are not discrete wired.

I would call MCE

I'm sorry no one has chimed in on this one. My company has also had this problem on a few mod jobs, and I was interested to find the solution.

The jobs we have had this problem with have had discrete hall calls, though, not serial link. Also, I don't think the A car being on inspection affected the hall calls, it would only happen if the A car was the slave and the B car was the dispatcher. We only noticed it after emergency power testing when building normal power came back on and the dispatching was swapped.

I know that it is important that the 2 busses are in phase between the two cars- with the meter on AC Volts 2 to ST2 should have no potential between them. But you mentioned that this is the case already, and in the cases I have seen the 2 busses are in phase.

Everyone is so busy here that no one has had the time or patience to call MCE tech support and wait the two to four hours on hold with a meter and print at the ready in the machine room! But that is probably what needs to be done, and then hope you get someone who knows what they are doing.

Good luck, if you figure it out report back here please, if I do I will as well.

When your Car A is taken offline intentionally or on a fault, and Car B tells you it's on "normal" but it won't take hall calls, check these;

1) Will the Car B take car calls?
2) On Car B, in the Spare Outputs Menu Options, look for these inputs to be high:
ISRT, ISV, ISVF (Each of these represents an "in service and ready" state).
If these are not active, your car won't respond to dispatching.
If this is the case, it could be software. It can occur on either car, rendering the supposed "active" car to be really not active at all, but everything will look absolutely normal from first glances. The suggestion to call MCE is a good one.

I've had a dispatching issues with a mod we did and it ended up being induced voltage on the canbus system. The mechanic ran the wires in the trough with the canbus wires.

So,
With an original post of June 13, I wonder what the outcome was for the OP. Maybe he's still analyzing the problem, maybe he called MCE and got it remedied. We'll never know, unless of course he reports back.
What might the chances be now?
I know I know, there will be some who come here begging advice and do return with updates and resolution and that's great! But I get slightly miffed at those who do call for help, the members take the time to respond, and you never hear a word back.

Always a good idea to review ALL F1 parameters on both cars.

The issue is most likely that your floor eligibility isn’t the same in both cars . It’s an option on your basic features menu. It’ll say this car serves floor 1,2 etc and it will also say other car floor 1,2 etc. Sounds like the B car is wrong . If the B car doesn’t have any eligible floors for the A car correct it won’t allow the A car to answer those calls. Make sure all floors and front and rear match .

We still haven't had any luck with this issue and now have another job with the same issue. MCE has not been able to help so far. As per MCE advice, we have changed boards, defaulted parameters, checked the eligibility, ensured that the cables are properly shielded, etc. We are currently working with MCE software engineer to determine the cause.