School me on motion detector lights

drkelly

drkelly

Dipstick who put two vehicles on jack stands
Joined
Mar 21, 2005
Location
Oak Ridge/Stokesdale, NC
I have lived in my house for 4 years and feel like an idiot. I have still not figured out how to work the motion detector lights. There is one light on each corner of the front of the house. There is a switch near the front door, and another switch at the door that goes from the house to the garage. There seems to be some sort of method to the madness of how you turn the switches on and off. Each switch seems to operate both lights. It seems like if I turn the switch on and off real fast, certain things happen, and if I turn if off and wait several seconds and turn them back on different things happen. I can't even determine what exactly happens as it seems different every time! Sometimes the fawking lights stay on all night. Other times, they cut on and off while I am out there walking around right underneath them in the detector zone which is very annoying. I have not been able to figure it out. Anyone?
 
most work as.

if you turn one on and leave it the lights are in a state waiting for motion.

if you turn the switch on, off, and then on again quickly that will turn the lights on and leave them on.

if you want to put them back to motion.. you need to turn them off for a set of time and then turn just one on and leave it on and that should put them back into wait state for motion.
 
yeah, in my experience, the quick ON-OFF-ON is what makes them stay on. I have also had screwy ones that would sometimes cooperate, sometimes have a mind of their own.
 
yup the on-off-on = manual on
off for few seconds then on = auto

there should be a small knob type thing near the sensor eye that you can adjust to set how sensitive it is and how long the light stays on.
 
Also, you should be able to leave the switches on 24/7, as all the ones I've owned had light sensors that disabled the lights during the day.

IN addition to the sensitivity setting that Yager mentioned, the lights should also have an adjustable time setting, like TEST-1-5. The test setting allows you to walk around and see where the sensor picks you up by turning on the light for ~5 seconds, then shutting it off. The 1 & 5 should turn the light on for that many minutes once it detects someone or something.

Then there's also the possibility that they are indeed just being screwy.
 
Thanks for the replies guys. I am going to experiment tonight.
 
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