On Monday, we had a tech out to replace the temperature sensor on the fridge side because the fridge was freezing. We unplugged the fridge from roughly 10-3 (probably the gap between the 2 spikes that day on the graph).
This is the start of the current stretch of being on:
When I noticed it has been “on” for so long, I inspected the ice maker to see if I could see a problem. I don’t know how/if it explains the device being on for so long in Sense, but I did find that being unplugged for so long allowed the ice to defrost enough that a dam of ice cubes had formed around and out of reach of the blades that spin the ice into the chute. I used a fork to break these up so hopefully that corrects that problem. Even so, the device I have labeled ice maker in Sense remains on for now.
Any ideas how I can confirm what this device is? Does this look like other ice makers the community has seen? (I have a Samsung side by side, but I’m guessing the signatures are similar enough).
This is the “normal” run before this long stretch of being on:
The only way I would know to confirm that the detection is in fact the ice maker is to catch it in the act. This would be difficult to do because not all of them are loud enough to hear. Another problem is there are several components to the ice maker. I believe most have a heater that first comes on to loosen the ice, then a motor to turn the blades to dislodge the cubes and finally avalve to allow the tray to fill again.
Looking at the waveform you have, it appears like a small heating element. I haven’t seen a confirmed detection of an ice maker or any of the components yet so not sure what the wattages of ice tray defroster trays are. My defroster for the entire fridge is 450 watts so it makes sense to me that 150-160 watts would be about the right size for the tray and the approximate 15 minute run time of your device seems to make sense too. It’s just speculation on my part on what I think makes sense.
This 6 hour run you’ve had could be something that many of us have encountered with other devices. Sense will sometimes pick up the “on” signature just fine but for whatever reason, completely miss the “off” signature. I don’t remember the exact reason this happens but I’ve had it happen several times when there has been high electric use in my home on a given day.
If I were trying to confirm the ice maker, this is what I think I would try;
Most ice makers are timed with compressor cycles, mine appears to make ice at 5-6 cycles.
Set a notification for this device when it turns “on”.
When you get the notification that it turned on, stand in front of the freezer door and patiently listen. This could be a long wait as I’m not sure at what point in the heater cycle that the blades begin to turn to dislodge the ice.
At some point you should be able to correlate the sound of the ice dropping into the storage bucket with the “off” signature of the device if it is the ice maker defrost or another component of the ice maker.
Unfortunately this could take quite awhile to do and maybe several trips of observation to confirm or rul out.
I’m sorry I don’t have better advice, some of these are just tough to track down. I do hope that you will submit this device to the library when you find out what it is. I feel your on the right track with what you think It is.
Good luck @jamesroxford
Sense has detected five of my three fridges (counting a mini-fridge). I still have no idea what the other two are. And the only way I could figure out one of them was by unplugging it for a day (after moving any spoilable food out) and seeing which fridge didn’t show up that day.
I had to read the first sentence a few times, thanks for the early morning laugh.
Playing detective can be challenging, that’s for sure. I admit to to deleting more than one after I couldn’t figure it out and not having much history anyway.
If you feel like help from the community, post some cycles and individual waveforms and what you know so far.
The library would also be of help for making comparisons or viewing the different waveform types. https://community.sense.com/c/device-detection/device-library
I didn’t know this existed yet! When you mentioned it the other day I thought you were referring to the community name suggestions found in the app for unnamed devices. Thanks for pointing this out!
