Another motion sensor/light question

[OtisFrump]

I am using ActiveEye motion sensors, Z-wave units, and the DooMotion plugin to turn lights on and off depending on occupancy. Everything works as planned but I've run into a problem: I don't want the lights to turn on automatically at night in some areas so I have set them to be off after a certain time in the "conditions" box. Sometimes, though, I want to turn these lights on and the way I have it configured now won't allow this. Is there a way to by-pass the conditions so that I can turn a light on manually using the wall switch?

Thanks,
Alan

[Rupp]

I don't want the lights to turn on automatically at night in some areas

Then why not put in the CAC for these lights the hours you do not want the motion to not trigger lights on?

[OtisFrump]

The problem isn't having them turn on when I don't want them to (although the gremlins do that every now and then.) As an example, I've set the conditions to turn the lights off at 10pm when my daughter goes to bed. On weekends, she may stay up longer and wants to use the light in her room. I could set the conditions by day of the week but that still doesn't give me the flexibility I need. What I want is a way to flip the wall switch on and have the light come on even if it's after 10pm. So I guess what I'm looking for is a way to tell Homeseer that I've switched the light on manually and I don't want it turn off automatically.

[Rupp]

Otis,
Can you explain a bit more. What "conditions" are you speaking about? Conditions in an event or conditions in DooMotion?

[OtisFrump]

These are conditions that I've set for an event using the Event Properties dialog. Using the same example as above, I've selected the bedroom light and set the ON trigger as motion sensor on AND time is after sunset AND time is before 10:14 pm. The OFF triger is motion sensor off. There are no entries in CAC. The reason I haven't used DooMotion troggers/occupancy triggers is that I'm having some kind of problem where the occupancy sensor status changes to vacant at the same time the motion sensor status changes to no motion; about 30 seconds later, the occupancy sensor changes back to occupied. No one has figured that out but that's another problem that I am just working around for now.

[jamie_internet]

Hi,

I have a question on the topic of sensors - I am new to home automation and this is my first posting - so go easy on me please!!

I have converted all of my light switches to x10 and have installed homeseer and just installed doomotion by reading some threads on the message board,

Basically, when I walk into a room in my house - I want the sensor to send a message to homeseer to turn the light on and when I leave the room and the sensor does not detect me in the room anymore - it sends another signal and homeseer turns off the light.

I thought I had set everything up ok - but then when I tested it - the light comes on ok when I walk into the room - but no matter how much the system detects me on the sensor - it still switches the light off after a set 1 minute - I have checked in the homeseer logs and it shows occupied everytime the sensor picks me up but still switches off after a minute - can you help please!

Many thanks

Jamie

[bdickhaus]

Jamie,

Welcome to the HomeSeer community!

I have all my lights set up this way (although I am using mostly z-wave controllers, the setup is the same).

How are you turning the lights on and off? There are several ways to do this, and lots of examples over in the DooMotion forum. Probably the most straight forward is to use DooMotion Custom Action Code (or CAC) to turn on the light when motion is detected, and at the same time create a delayed event to turn it off using dm.NewNoMotionDelayedEvent. I also in some cases use occupancy sensors to turn off lights, but that is more complicated to set up.

Bill

[Rupp]

Jamie,
What do you have set as the "off delay" inside the motion sensor? I believe they default to 1 minute when you insert the batteries. This would over ride a CAC wouldn't it?

[jamie_internet]

Thanks for the fast reply!

I'm not sure if ive set this up correctly - there was a 1 minute off setting on the sensor - I have now set this to over an hour so it shouldnt cause any conflicts with homeseer I hope!

I have basically set the sensor up as a occupancy sensor - when I am in the room the device shows as occupied and then when it goes off it shows as vacant in the devices section. Is this perhaps where I have set it up incorrectly, - ive then setup an event that says when the room is occupied - switch on the light and when it is vacant - turn it off.

I have just tried it again now I have turned the off delay on the sensor up to an hour but it still switches off after 1 minute - does this mean that I am not therefore running and cac's at all and need to do this?

[bdickhaus]

Using events is another way to turn the lights on and off and works as well as any other.

In DooMotion occupancy is tracked using a virtual device called an occupancy sensor. To use it, first, in the HomeSeer device window, define one or more motion sensor devices that are the actual motion sensors themselves (like an ActiveEye). In DooMotion define these as motion sensors. Then define a virtual device in HS (I use the same house code as the motion sensor but a high number like 80). In DooMotion define this virtual device as an occupancy sensor. DM has ways to do this in one step, but I'm used to doing it the long way. Once the occupancy sensor is defined, select one or more motion sensors that are associated with it. In most cases I have two or more motion sensors per room for better coverage. Then set up your on/off events based on the occupancy sensor. If we can get this much working then I'll go into more depth on how to tweak it.

Bill

[jamie_internet]

OK - All done and just tested it out with the motion sensor and it has just turned the light on ok - the only thing is that I have now been waiting for over 5 mins and the light has not yet gone off on its own! - probably now using the 1 hour 'off' setting on the sensor itself?

I'm ready to do the tweaking!

Thanks for this so far - much appreciated,

Jamie

[bdickhaus]

Jamie,

How quickly do you want the light to go off after motion is not detected?

A couple of settings you might want to change are OET and FST. OET (Occupancy Elapsed Time) is the number of minutes of NoMotion before turning off Occupancy, this is set per motion sensor. The other is FST (Fail Safe Time) this is the number of minutes after the last Motion On was received that DooMotion assumes it has missed the Motion Off. You can use this to override the Off setting of the motion sensor itself, but I usually let the motion sensor default, or set it to just a few minutes, then use OET to tune how long a light stays on after no motion is detected.

Bill

[jamie_internet]

Bill,

Ideally I would like the light to go off as soon as it does not find any motion - about a minute after no motion would be fine.

Where do I alter the OET and FST times?

I also find that the motion sensor I have does not always pick up any movement in the room unless I am walking about - if I am sitting in the office - it normally does not detect me until I get up or move my arms and often the light will go off even when I am sat in the room!!! - is this why you put two sensors in one room or do I need to look at a better sensor - what sensors do you use?

Jamie