Why PLCs Malfunction Occasionally, But Not Always

PLC devices are very useful to improve Internet speed and avoid dead zones that we can have in certain rooms. However, sometimes they can stop working properly . There are certain factors that could cause signal loss, outages, or severely limited Internet speed. Let’s see which are the main ones.

What causes PLCs to fail sometimes

Why PLCs Malfunction Occasionally, But Not Always

Knowing what can happen with this type of device is very useful to find a solution. If you notice that your PLCs work fine, but sometimes they stop doing so, it could be for one of these reasons. The important thing is to identify it and carry out actions to optimize the connection .

Interference with other devices

One of the reasons why PLCs can sometimes go wrong is because of interference with other devices. If, for example, you have it next to a television and turn it on, it may start to malfunction for this reason. It will create interference and that will cause cuts and failures when connecting.

For this reason it is important that you always place the PLCs as isolated as possible. Always avoid other devices nearby, such as a computer, television, video player… Any electronic equipment could affect performance and cause the connection to malfunction.

Have you plugged in a power strip?

Connecting the PLCs through a power strip will make them work worse. But if you plug other devices into that power strip, the problem gets worse. It may even happen that you plug in a power strip near where you have one of the PLCs connected and that causes problems that put the proper functioning at risk.

To avoid this, the ideal is that you connect the PLCs directly to a wall outlet and never have power strips and other devices nearby. This will make them always work correctly and you won’t have those annoying cuts that can appear at any given moment.

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You connect to a band that is malfunctioning

Many PLC devices allow us to connect to the 2.4 and 5 GHz band . Each one has its advantages and disadvantages and sometimes one of the two may not be the most suitable for the situation in which we are. Therefore, choosing well which one to connect to is essential. If we suddenly change bands, the connection may start to malfunction.

In general terms, we can say that the 2.4 GHz band is the best when we connect far from the PLC. For example, if you are going to connect from a far away room, it is the one that will offer the most stability, although it will have less speed. On the other hand, the 5 GHz band is the one that will offer the highest speed, but it is more sensitive to distance. If you are connected to the first one from afar and you switch to the second band, you can have cuts.

Network saturation

Yet another reason why PLCs can suddenly start malfunctioning is due to network saturation . After all, the more devices connected, the more problems we can have. Especially this will happen if we have a limited bandwidth and we connect many devices.

Why is this happening? Maybe at certain times you connect more devices to the network or make more use of the connection. For example, if you turn on the television and connect to watch a movie or series in Streaming in high definition, you will need a certain amount of bandwidth. If you connect a computer to download and a mobile phone to use the cloud at the same time, for example, the connection will be more saturated and perhaps the PLCs will work worse.

All in all, these are some of the main reasons why PLCs can suddenly start going bad. Ideally, you should always keep them in good condition and avoid any interference and problems that affect the connection. It is always important to know why PLCs malfunction.