Lyric SIXCT: First Impressions

Hi, DIY'ers, Sterling with Alarm Grid here. And today we're going to do a first impression video of the new Lyric LCT500 door or window sensor.

So we are in beta still. We have to put caveat out that the LCT500 product number still could change, but we're hoping they kind of got the right naming conventions that they're going use going forward. And we have our first beta system here. And so, we're just going to kind of give you our first general ideas of the devices, and how it differs from some of the existing wireless sensors.

This device only will work with a Honeywell Lyric System; want to get that out of the way. You cannot use this with a LYNX Touch or a LYNX Plus or a Honeywell Vista Wireless System. This is a SIX, S-I-X sensor, or SIX Series Sensor that's going to be the new series of sensors that the Lyric uses. The traditional sensors, we have both the 5816 and a 5811; the two most popular 5800 Series sensors. And these are the traditional sensors that work with the LYNX Touch, LYNX Plus, and Vista Wireless systems.

So you can see the first thing to note is the size. It's pretty much got the same footprint. In fact, they're almost identical in terms of the back plate as the bigger and boxier 5815 sensor. Got a nicer looking design; it's got the rounded cover, and not nearly as deep off the wall. So it's not as big as the 5816, but it's certainly on that bigger side. When you compare it to a 5811, you can see how the 5811 is much skinnier, with a much smaller footprint. We are told though, that there will have a sensor for the Lyric that will make this one look big. So, we're hoping this is kind of the traditional 5816 style. It's bigger and boxier because it can accept the wired input from a wired sensor just like a 5816 can do. And eventually, they'll have a more streamlined version that we're told will make this look big. So, we're impressed by the idea of a wireless sensor with the kind of range that the Lyric System boasts to be smaller than this 5811.

When you compare to the 5816, there's always two pieces to a contact. You have your sensor which we just compared, and then you also have your magnets. This magnet is for a 5816. This magnet is for a 5811, much smaller, and kind of simulates the idea that the 5816 sensor is much bigger than the 5811. And then here's the LCT500 magnet which is the magnet for the Lyric sensor. This magnet is skinnier than the 5811 one, although it kind of tapers back towards the back. It's a little bit shorter than the 5816 magnet. But it's pretty deep off the wall. It's actually deeper than the 5816 magnet. It's got a little more depth to it, but it's skinny. We think, it's not going to look as good as a 5811 of course, but it's also a little bit nice to look than the 5816. And like I said, we're hoping soon enough that we'll have another sensor option. And as they build out the Lyric, we're expecting a lot more sensors. But for now, they kind of just have the traditional one door contact, one motion, one keep out, one glass break.

You do get a spacer to along with the magnet. If you pop the cover on the magnet, you can see there's screw holes here. You can screw through this spacer, so that if you are on a lip like this, where the sensor is going to be deeper off the wall than the magnet, this spacer can get the magnet closer to the same plane so they're in line. If you did just the magnet without the spacer, you might be too far away. I mean, certainly test it. There is a magnet spacing gap, so it might still work. But the spacer just helps you to build it up off the wall. Obviously it'll give us even more depth that way. But that can help offset a change in plain from the door or window to the frame.

On the back side of the sensor, you'll notice there's a back plate, and there's a little tab at the top. On the older 5816's it was kind of hard to remove the back plate, you had to use a little screwdriver. They're making this a little more DIY friendly. If you pull this tab, so let's say this is on the wall. All you have to do is push against the tab, and then slide, slide up and it just kind of pulls apart. So again, from here you pull the tab, and you slide it. And then there's a tamper switch. It's got a case tamper. You pop the back plate, and basically you've got your tamper switch right here. If someone were to pull your tab off, and remove the sensor, you get a tamper indication at the panel. And if you want, you could even use this little break-away piece of plastic, and put a hole or a screw into a stud, or a longer screw that would stay connected. So, if someone tried to rip the whole thing off the wall, this piece of plastic stays behind, and the sensor gets pulled away, and therefore the tamper pops out. It's got two different ways it's protected for tampering.

You can see a pull to connect tab here, that's for when you're ready to give power to the unit. And one of the things with the Lyric sensors is we really do not recommend giving it power until you're ready to enroll it. So that's something unique. You didn't use to have to do that with the LYNX Touch. It's a little more particular when you're learning the sensors to the system. We urge you to leave this connected until you're ready to enroll it for the programming. And we'll have programming videos of course, but this is just the first impression video.

You'll notice this sticker here? Instead of a serial number, which has a seven digit serial, well instead a serial number like the seven digit serial number that we use with the older 5800 series sensors, this actually has a 16 digit unique Mac address. So this device itself is basically a computer. It can get Firmware updates. We're told that eventually, this door sensor could be a temperature sensor just with a Firmware update. So no new hardware, and all of a sudden you'll have the ability to say, "Okay, this door contact in my living room is at 72 degrees", for instance.

We're really impressed by the idea that the sensors themselves can get Firmware updates, because we're excited about what Honeywell can do with that as they release added features to the system, and to the sensors. Of course the system is Firmware updateable as well. That's great. But if the system had a feature that your sensor didn't, you'd have to buy a new sensor. This idea is, when you buy the equipment up front, everything that comes after that potentially will be a Firmware update. So we're hoping that will be the case.

We do have a sticker on here, talking about that it's not yet been authorized for use by the FCC. Obviously, again we're in beta, so this is not full resale or retail item yet. But we're anticipating it's going to look exactly the same, and this is pretty much what we'll be using.

When you open the unit, they've made this also easier so that an end user can replace the battery. Even if you're with a full-service company, and you're not a do-it-yourselfer you do have the ability to pretty easily open this up and change the battery out. With the back plate still connected, you simply slide up away from the back cover tamper tab, and it just slides up, and then out. And you can see on the inside we have what looks very similar to a 5816 style sensor. You've got your lithium battery in here. You've got your two screw terminals for wiring to an external contact. You can use this as a wireless transmitter if you do have a wired sensor in the house. It's got a tamper for the cover, as well. So it's got that back wall tamper, but it also has an internal tamper; if someone pops the cover, you'd know. And it's got this circuit board here, and the read switch here.

So, just like on all Honeywell wireless sensors, there are indicators, hash marks on the plastic here; one here and one here. I don't know if you can see that in the shot, but one here and one here. They're not on this side. And when you look internally, those two hash marks happen to straddle this internal read switch. A read switch is a little mercury read switch in a glass vial. Then when the magnet is close to it, it's closed, meaning the circuits closed. When the magnet moves away, it opens up the read switch which activates the device. So that's how the sensor technology works on this LCT500. And just keep in mind you have to have your magnet on this side of the sensor then. If you're on this side, it will not reliably fault and restore, or go into alarm when needed. Make sure you're keeping that in mind. But we like the idea of this case removing so easily. If you did have a low battery, it's as simple as popping this out. This happens to be a Panasonic CR123A. It's a lithium squat AA battery. So, CR123A, that's what comes with the unit, and if you ever had to replace it, very easy to access this case. It just slides up, and out, and then down, and back into place for when you're ready. It says Honeywell here on the side, which is a new added feature. They didn't have the word Honeywell on the sensors in the past, but they're adding that.

Overall, we're pretty impressed with the LCT500. Looks like a pretty streamlined sensor. A little bit bigger than what we're used to with the 5811's, but remember the 5811's came out years after the first Honeywell wireless systems came out. The fact that they're already talking about a sensor that will make the 5811 look big, we're excited and hopeful that there'll be a smaller sensor too. If you do not need those internal screw terminals to wire into an extra contact.

We hope you've enjoyed this introduction video to the Lyric LCT500. And if you have any questions, on the Lyric or the new contact for the Lyric, please email support@alarmgrid.com. And make sure to subscribe to our channel, so you can stay up to date with all of the great new videos that we'll be releasing as we introduce this revolutionary new Honeywell Lyric Security System.