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Fault 8
Pro

Fault 8 — Relay Contact Card Swap (Alarm Stuck ON)

What you'll learn

**Symptom:** the night-shift operator phoned: the panel's alarm beacon and X0 input have been ON since power-up, and there's no actual alarm condition — the safety chain is healthy, the door switches are closed, nothing has tripped. You walk to the panel. PSU LED on. Relay KA1 coil de-energised (correct — there's no alarm condition to drive it). PLC input X0 LED **lit** when it should be dark.

Lab time: ~10 minutes.

Lesson briefing

Relay Contact Card Swap — Alarm Stuck ON

Symptom: the night-shift operator phoned: the panel's alarm beacon and X0 input have been ON since power-up, and there's no actual alarm condition — the safety chain is healthy, the door switches are closed, nothing has tripped. You walk to the panel. PSU LED on. Relay KA1 coil de-energised (correct — there's no alarm condition to drive it). PLC input X0 LED lit when it should be dark.

The schematic on the door says X0 is sourced from KA1's NO contact: alarm signal goes high (+24 V at X0) ONLY when the relay coil energises. At rest, with the coil dropped, the NO contact is OPEN and X0 should sit floating — the PLC reads it as OFF. So why is the alarm ON when it should be OFF?

On a relay marked per IEC contact numbering, terminal 11 is the contact common, 12 is the NC contact, and 14 is the NO contact. Two physically distinct screws on the side of the relay body — easy to land a wire on the wrong one if the contact card was specified wrong on the BOM.

Reach for the multimeter on the toolbar and probe the panel.

Hints

Hint 1

Start at the PLC input. Probe X0 against the panel 0 V — what do you read, and what should you read at rest if the input is sourced from the relay's NO contact (open at rest)?

Hint 2

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Hint 3

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This lesson uses 6 placed components on the lab canvas. Components are vendor-neutral (no proprietary trademarks); the wiring rules apply to any equivalent industrial part.

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Competency and practice field guide

Relay-alarm stuck-on fault lesson: practice plan

Direct answer

The learner can separate logic request, physical output, relay contact, unintended feed, load return and actual alarm state without random replacement.

Written for maintenance learners diagnosing an alarm that remains energized despite an apparent off command.

a supervised low-energy motor-starter and control-transformer bench with protective devices, terminal points and measurement access while studying relay output, alarm circuit and stuck-on fault isolation
System map / 02

NODE 01observable

Scope

Alarm requirement, controller output state, module indication, relay coil, contact type, alternate feed, wiring, load and return path.

NODE 02observable

Signal path

Logic decision through output channel, interface relay coil, contact, alarm load, return and independently observed energized state.

NODE 03observable

Baseline practice

Alarm energizes for the declared condition and de-energizes when the request clears with no parallel unintended feed.

NODE 04observable

Edge cases

Welded contact, wrong normally-open or normally-closed terminal, backfeed, shorted output, shared common, forced tag, delayed release and restart.

NODE 05observable

Fault practice

A program, force, output, relay coil, mechanical contact, conductor, alternate supply, load or return mismatch.

NODE 06observable

Transfer to the job

The cause removed, temporary measures cleared and circuit proven under current drawings and energy-control procedure.

Answer surface / 07

What causes an alarm relay to stay on?

Possible causes include a maintained software request, forced output, shorted module, energized coil, welded or miswired contact, parallel feed or load-side wiring fault.

Can an output LED prove the alarm circuit is off?

No. It reports one output boundary. Measure or inspect the relay and load circuit through approved methods to locate the first disagreeing state.