[Al Skierkiewicz]

Venkatesh,
The Spikes I have opened use an optocoupler for control interface. I would suspect that they are designed for a 20 ma loop (standard interface) for control. So the 85 ma make me think something is wrong.(either metering or control) Remember that Spikes do not use a PWM input, they are fed from the relay outputs of the RC. The optocouplers inturn feed into switching transistors that control the relays. Relay power comes from the power input (+12v). There are the standard complement of clamp diodes across the relays and steering diodes for reverse current protection. I thought the major difference between red and blue was that the red output leads were not independent. (That is why you had to add steering diodes to a dual solenoid control for red spikes) In the blues you can have both go high, both go low or one high and one low. The default for blue is both lines are low with no input.