How to successfully inherit ActiveRecord::Base?

How to successfully inherit ActiveRecord::Base?

Environment: Ruby 2.0.0, Rails 4.0.3, Windows 8.1, PostreSQL 9.3.3, Devise 3.2.4

I have an operational app and would like to add a comprehensive logging class to it. This will be a complex class that not only logs messages but also creates an SQL database that logs transactions by object. I need this class available throughout all of the classes in the application.

To do this, I wanted to inherit ActiveRecord::Base into the class and then have all other classes inherit it, though I don't plan to use STI. That seemed to be a lot simpler in concept than in practice, even though I thought such inheritance was a common best practice. Am I missing something?

One of the initial tables was this:

class Device < ActiveRecord::Base
...
end

I set it up like this:

class XLog < ActiveRecord::Base
  self.abstract_class = true
  def initialize
  end
end
class Device < XLog
...
end

Prior to this change, the app was working fine. After this change, when I login I receive:

ArgumentError at /devices/sign_in
wrong number of arguments (1 for 0)

The error occurs in:

bin/rails, line 4

bin/rails is:

#!/usr/bin/env ruby.exe
APP_PATH = File.expand_path('../../config/application',  __FILE__)
require_relative '../config/boot'
require 'rails/commands'

Device is the Devise "User" class in this application and the error occurs when I try to login. If I change Device to inherit ActiveRecord::Base, it lets me login and run.

But, then I get another error whenever I call "new" on the other classes:

undefined method `[]' for nil:NilClass

I am definitely missing something when it comes to this inheritance. Advice appreciated.