Four things that set off my Van Bitz alarm

[PaulW2]

1. Loud thunder
2. Loud fireworks near my house
3. Snow that settles, then melts and slides down the windscreen onto the bonnet
4. Flying insects that are caught inside when I arm it

Is this consistent with everyone else's experience? I don't recall my previous van in c. 10 years doing this, but this one is a PVC. Not sure if it's unusual or just par for the course.

 

[Badknee]

Perhaps a question for AshVanBitz ?

 

[PaulW2]

Thanks, yes. I'm not yet sure how common it is or whether it's a 'problem' so thought I'd get a sense of whether others experience it before checking in with Ash.

But AshVanBitz, now that you're in the loop, does this sound normal?

 

[DuxDeluxe]

Thanks, yes. I'm not yet sure how common it is or whether it's a 'problem' so thought I'd get a sense of whether others experience it before checking in with Ash.

But AshVanBitz, now that you're in the loop, does this sound normal?

I have turned off my internal sensor as despite taking every precaution it still goes off on occasions without any apparent reason. Our neighbour is on permanent night shifts so it is to avoid upsetting him. The perimeter is still alarmed so the van is OK (blocked in on the driveway as well)

 

[lorger]

My internal sensor went off a couple of times, thought it might have been rodents but turned out to be my dash cam falling off the windscreen and swinging . I now have it on shorter cable that’s wrapped round the mirror, if it falls off it won’t reach the sensor now.

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[Howard B]

Received an alarm activation notification the other morning, which i suspect was something to do with the high winds.
As we are away, i cant currently check which sensor activated. Nothing untoward showing on the cameras monitoring it.

 

[Brains]

In 5 years only had mine go off twice.
(Other than the multiple times when I open a door/locker and forget the alarm is on)
Once when the fridge door swung open after 2 weeks of being left on the latch.
Guess it was just the suspension settling.

Other time was the satnav unsticking from the windscreen

 

[PaulW2]

In 5 years only had mine go off twice.

The top 3 of mine (thunder, fireworks, snow) happened this month and the 4th (insects, I think - couldn't always identify them) happened a number of times last year.

Think I'll also turn off the internal sensor more. Don't want to upset the neighbours.

It's obviously good to have it sensitive enough to pick up on shock waves such as someone breaking a window, but guess it's then difficult in a tin can like a PVC not to have some 'false positives' when other unusual things happen.

 

[AshVanBitz]

None of these should set off your alarm. The internal hyper frequency module is triggered by electric currents. For example our bodies are full of them and would in turn trigger the system if we were walking around inside of the vehicle. If however a curtain blows, the temperature changed, a fly flutters around the vehicle or wind is blown through an open window, this should not cause the alarm to go off.

PaulW2 , please give me a call when you are by the vehicle and we can go through a few things to try and establish the cause of the issue. It will hopefully be something very simple to rectify and the system can start performing in the way it was designed

Kindest regards

Ash

 

[PaulW2]

Many thanks Ash - good to talk to you a minute ago!

As a public service announcement, it appears that the internal sensor usually works well as long as there is nothing in close proximity to potentially interfere with its operation. As I understand it this includes things that are metallic or that are capable of sending an electronic signal.

I had two gate remotes and several keys in the zone where interference could have been caused, so exactly the opposite of what the doctor ordered. Now removed. Here's hoping...

Thanks again
Paul

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[Wicketter]

1. Loud thunder
2. Loud fireworks near my house
3. Snow that settles, then melts and slides down the windscreen onto the bonnet
4. Flying insects that are caught inside when I arm it

Is this consistent with everyone else's experience? I don't recall my previous van in c. 10 years doing this, but this one is a PVC. Not sure if it's unusual or just par for the course.

Ours does not do any of that

 

[carolyn]

Gosh no, that would have driven me mad. We had a few false alarms on our latest PVC. Initially we blamed ourselves until we realised the error flash was only one which wasn’t in the Vanbitz manual. Thought I might not be believed so took a few videos!

Phoned and spoke to NickVanBitz and ended up visiting. He admitted he didn’t initially believe me but I did show him one of my videos! They checked it out and reduced the sensitivity of sensors. Many other fancy words were used , something to do with a circuit that shouldn’t be active. Anyhow , hasn’t gone off now in 4 months unless stupidity is involved. Before it was 2 or 3 times a week but we couldn’t do anything before as we were away.

 

[dash300]

Dangling phone leads from the dash set mine off if there is a bit of wind rocking the van.

 

[TinaLes]

Having learned the "House Cleaning Lessons" a few years back from Ash at Vanbitz, we no longer leave Phones charging on or near the dash in the van, no longer have USB leads dangling from dash sockets when we leave the van and set the alarm, no problems since the with false alarms.
That said it did go off on the drive last week as the snow was melting off the roof, I assumed it was moisture on a detector/door switch problem.
I re-set the alarm, no problems since, but I maybe should have listened to the bleeps when re setting the alarm as that would have informed me of which detector had been activated. My excuse was...It was bleedin Freezing out there at the time.
LES

 

[Howard B]

Received an alarm activation notification the other morning, which i suspect was something to do with the high winds.
As we are away, i cant currently check which sensor activated. Nothing untoward showing on the cameras monitoring it.

Just back off holiday and checked the LEDs. I have 5 flashes so looks like the internal sensor. Nothing obvious that I can see, but we have a few phone charging leads hanging from the dash and all my internal doors were left open, so probably one of those things moving due to high winds activated it. .

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[buntyb]

Not Van Bitz but we do have a CarLock motion sensor which issues an alert on our mobiles. However, it kept going off on same day, approx same time. We worked out from house camera that it was the ice cream van passing by and more so its chimes . The bin lorries never set it off so can’t be motion related.

 

[heliart]

Had a fair few false alarms when parked on my drive, but never when away. I put it down to the cables that run over my front drive, as I've had some issue with another alarm system's anti jamming feature also failing on my drive only. Just learnt to live with it, and still believe the VanBitz system is the best for the price.

 

[Manic]

Just back off holiday and checked the LEDs. I have 5 flashes so looks like the internal sensor. Nothing obvious that I can see, but we have a few phone charging leads hanging from the dash and all my internal doors were left open, so probably one of those things moving due to high winds activated it. .

If you speak to Vanbitz you can reduce the sensitivity of the internal sensor

 

[Howard B]

If you speak to Vanbitz you can reduce the sensitivity of the internal sensor

Ill just be more mindful about leaving cables hanging round the dash area.

 

[Mleabon]

Mine is pretty reliable but I have definitely had thunder set it off and a steam roller trundling by set it off once. I did have to reduce the sensitivity when I first had it as instructed by Vanbitz.

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[Diggerdi]

The only thing(s) that have ever set ours off, other than user error, have been when we had mice apparently coming in under the dashboard from the engine compartment. In that instance the alarm went off 49 times in a month (every day, sometimes multiple times). Eventually stopped after we had caught 9 mice in traditional snap traps.