Contact sensor problems

I’ve got two contact sensors acting up on my Ring alarm.

  1. A little while back one started chiming constantly when the door is open (the “bing bing” sound when you open the door… it just does it every few seconds). To be more specific, it only happens intermittently AND the time between chimes varies. I’ve tried removing it from the base station via the app and re-adding it, and it still does it.
  2. The other sensor keeps going offline. I couldn’t get it to reconnect, or re-add (after removing), so I replaced the battery. At that point it said “tampered”, and wouldn’t clear that message, but it did reconnect. But then it still woke me at 2:00 AM saying it was “offline” again.

I’ve tried to go to the “chat with us” option in the Support page and it only redirects me here, to Community.

Hey @Seriously. I’m here to help and have some ideas on what may be happening for the sensors!

For the first sensor, could you reply with a picture of how you have the sensor mounted? If it’s constantly chirping at you like the door is opened, and it may even randomly says it’s opened and tripped in the app, you may have the placement off. If you could reply with the picture of how you have that sensor and magnet mounted, I can help from there to see if this is the case!

For the second sensor, is it still offline in the app? If it is, please remove the device from your system (may have to do Remove Failed Device in its advanced options section), factory reset the device and then set it up again. Once the device is set up on your app again, ensure the cover is on the device fully. When the device is showing tampered it means that the cover is not fully on. If you have found that you have the cover fully on and the device still shows “tampered,” please press down slightly on the top of the sensor while looking at your app. If the app shows that it’s not longer tampered or online whilst applying pressure, it’s a sign that the cover is damaged and not pressing down enough when there is no pressure to show the cover on and closed. You will need to contact our support team at that point via phone to get the device possibly replaced or looked into further.

If you get to the event of needing to contact support at any time, please give our support team a call at one of the numbers available here. We’re taking additional steps to protect our team and help reduce the spread of COVID-19. This has resulted in longer than normal wait times. If you are outside of the US, please read our response to COVID-19 here to see how to contact support.

1 Like

To be clear, the first sensor only chimes repeatedly when the door is open… not all the time. If I prop the door open (to let in air, or to move in and out) it chimes repeatedly as if I’m opening and closing the door over and over again… so it’s not the sensor placement. Any idea what could be going on here?

I tried resetting the second sensor and will let you know if that doesn’t work.

Thanks!

1 Like

@Seriously Ahh, sorry for my confusion! When you prop the door open to let air in, is there any metal on the door itself, or around where the door is popped open to? The internal reed switch inside the contact sensor will pull closed when there is a magnet there to show that it is closed, which is what happens when the door is closed. When your door is opened and repeating that it is being opened when it was just opened once, there could be a source that is pulling at the internal reed switch. Additionally, you may not have the door opened enough, and therefore the magnet nearby is trying to “pull” at the reed switch, and popping back and forth between open/closed. Does that sound right in your situation?

Thanks for doing that on the second sensor, keep me posted of course! :slight_smile:

Same issue. Sensor triggers repeatedly WHEN OPEN. i even took the sensor off of the door and held it in my hand. Same result, so it’s not related to metal or anything. It’s the sensor.

No, no metal and it’s not almost closed… now two sensors are doing it, so I’m wondering if it’s the base station instead.

@Seriously Thanks for clearing that up! @Bobsrbfj Thank you for describing your experience as well. :slight_smile:

For both of you neighbors, if you could, please give our support team a call directly on your concern. They can diagnose your system further with your specific devices to see what could be causing the concern you are running into. Feel free to come back to this thread to discuss what happened and what was done to resolve your concern!

For contacting support, please give our support team a call at one of the numbers available here. We’re taking additional steps to protect our team and help reduce the spread of COVID-19. This has resulted in longer than normal wait times. If you are outside of the US, please read our response to COVID-19 here to see how to contact support.

HI, I am having the same problem with 2 of my sensors. We just changed the battery - it says ‘tampered’ for both but they seem to chirp when the doors are opened. I have tried to remove one of them via the app, but it keeps saing ‘can’t remove’. So I am stuck with somehting thsts jjust sitting there showing tampered. Any help is appreciated.

Hi there, neighbors! If you are running into a Contact Sensor having issues, you may need to reset it first, which you can find the steps to do so in our Help Center article here. If the reset is not working,

When a Contact Sensor falls offline and is unresponsive to a reset, please check the battery does not need to be changed. When needing to remove this sensor for any reason, here are the steps to do so:

  • Open your Ring app and go to the Main Menu at the top left corner.
  • Select Devices and then Alarm Base Station.
  • Find the sensor that you are trying to remove and select that one.
  • Tap Device Settings for your sensor.
  • Select Advanced Options.
  • Select Remove Failed Device and then remove.

If this concern persists despite trying these steps, please give our support team a call at one of the numbers available here. If you are outside of the US, please visit here to see how to contact support.