Aeon Labs D/W sensor

[Mac Gyver]

I've been using X10 and x10RF for years now and I felt recently that it was time to experiment with zwave although availability is scarce in europe.
I decided to go with a few ACT HomePro plugins and an Aeon Labs Z-stick as a gateway/controller.
So far so good, it works as expected although a bit deceived that you have to rely on polling for the ACT stuff status.

Now, I also bought a Aeon Labs Door/Window sensor, because they are very small and tidy and they received good reviews.
But I must say that so far this sensor has been very deceptive.
So much that I think it may be defective or there is a bug in Homeseer.
First, the range is borderline unnacceptable at about 10m from the nearest node.
But what I don't understand is how this sensors reports its status.
For instance, when the tamper switch is activated, the sensor reports an alarm on in the HS log, but when the tamper switch goes back to normal, HS never seems to receive the alarm off status. So the last received tamper sw. status change in HS remains at the first switch activation that ever happened after the sensor was configured.
Battery status is only updated when the sensor is tripped by opening the window, so if you put it on a window that is normaly never opened, you will never know that the battery is empty. I don't understand that as the sensor should report it's status at regular interval, but either it doesn't, or if it does, it doesn't send it's status but some sort of keep alive message.
I've tried to modify the cycle to 6 minutes, but even if the sensor is in awake mode, the cycle time doesn't seem to be modified by HS as it comes back at what was displayed in the drop down box.
Even worse: when for some reason the status is out of sync, it never comes back in sync without intervention, like opening/closing the window.

So, as is, it is pretty useless compared to my good old DS10/90's, hence my call for help.
Has anyone here some experience with these sensors ?
I would like to now if it is normal behaviour or a bug in homeseer, as in the first case i'm still in the return period.

Thank you,

Yves.

[Rupp]

From your description it sounds like the device may not be associated with HomeSeer in the z-Wave options. Have you kept the device awake by using the tamper switch and optimize your network at least 4 times ensuring the device is awake?

[AutomatingIT]

These sensors are working great for me. Most battery devices have a reduced range but when used with a good mesh of Z-Wave devices they work beautifully.

[kaldoon]

What version of HS are you running? What Lib and App is the D/W Sensor? I have been using these sensors for over a year now. When I first got them I had to manually associate them with Homeseer. Just rebuilt my network last week and did not have to do that(running 2.4.0.11). Root Device 58 thru Root Device 61 are the D/W Sensors. The binary sensors are for open and closed. I would take sensor and rescan it - it sounds like it didn't scan correctly when it was added.

[Mac Gyver]

From your description it sounds like the device may not be associated with HomeSeer in the z-Wave options. Have you kept the device awake by using the tamper switch and optimize your network at least 4 times ensuring the device is awake?

Hi Rupp,

I have one association in group 1 to Homeseer, but the source is the route device, I don't know if this is ok or if the association should come from a child.
Obviously I have kept the device awake each time I tried to configure it and I deleted the node from the stick and HS several time, did complete reset and so on.
Also optimized dozens of times.
But the result has always been the same so far.
Actually the sensor is working, I mean, when the window is opened I get a Open status and a closed one when it is closed, so HS is receiving the sensor correctly.
It is the lack of spontaneous updates that puzzles me, like the battery level and the tamper switch that sends only alarm-on messages and no alarm off.

[Mac Gyver]

These sensors are working great for me. Most battery devices have a reduced range but when used with a good mesh of Z-Wave devices they work beautifully.

Ok, so you can confirm your tamper switch changes are reported in Homeseer ?
And you confirm, you have status updates without having to tripp the sensor ?
In that case, can you tell me how long it takes to have a spontaneous periodic update from the sensor ?
For instance, mine has been out off sync with HS ( I forced a missed transmission by moving the sensor out of range briefly) for about 30 hours now. The magnet is away and HS still reports "closed" where it should be "open", no batery level update, no tamper switch update.
I know that if I put the magnet close now, I will get the "closed" status, and a battery update but this is not what I want, I want to get updates even if I put this sensor on a window which should never been opened.
If I miss a transmission from one of my DS10/90, I know that a few minutes later, I will get a health status mesage that re-sync the status in HS.
I also know that if there is no messages coming for a while, RFXcom will raise a warning that the sensor is dead, this doesn't seem to happen with Z-Wave with Homeseer.

Yves.

[Mac Gyver]

What version of HS are you running? What Lib and App is the D/W Sensor? I have been using these sensors for over a year now. When I first got them I had to manually associate them with Homeseer. Just rebuilt my network last week and did not have to do that(running 2.4.0.11). Root Device 58 thru Root Device 61 are the D/W Sensors. The binary sensors are for open and closed. I would take sensor and rescan it - it sounds like it didn't scan correctly when it was added.

I'm running HS 2.4.11 and the sensors are lib 2.64 app 1.2, just like yours.
Mine are associated with HS (root device) and I get exacltly the same results as you show in your screen dumps.
What's interesting is that you don't even have a status on your tamper switches.
Did you try to tripp them once ?
You should get a date status update on the tamper switch and then nothing ever, even if you push back the switch, the tamper status doesn't change and the binary sensor stays open forever even if the magnet is close. ( when the tamper switch is activated, the binary sensor goes open as well even if the magnet stay in vicinity)
Can you try this ?

Yves.

[kaldoon]

Take a look at Root Device 61:

[Mac Gyver]

Take a look at Root Device 61:

Ok, but what am I supposed to see ?
Except that you obviously opened your garage door this morning...

Yves.

[Mac Gyver]

Ok, guys, It has been three days now and not a single update from the sensor
Do you all have the same problem, or not ?
When you activate the tamper switch with the magnet still close (binary sensor part not triggered) and you push back the tamper switch, does your status stay "open" forever until you actually trigger the sensor by putting the magnet away and back again to re-sync ?
I really need to know asap because my return window is closing.

Yves.

[scotchskip]

The HWKHRDS1 sensors that I have never report anything for the tamper switch.

[Otis]

I'm having similar problems with this and struggling to get it to work. The root and children devices all appear and some time after I installed it gave an update on all statuses and battery level to HomeSeer. However, when I move the two pieces apart or back together again (simulating an open/close), there is no report to the Homeseer log. Shouldn't this be sending info to Homeseer immediately upon a status change, so I can create events triggered by a change in status? I don't have to actively poll this do I?

Also, I note that the alarm tamper sensor, when I play with that, sometimes seems to send an update to Homeseer.

Any thoughts on this? Thanks.

[Mac Gyver]

Otis, the status of the sensor should update immediately in homeseer and in the log if logging is enabled for this device.
Did you check the association ? Usually it is done automatically when you add the sensor, but sometimes it fails.

Anyway, what you describe is not really similar with what I experienced.
But it could be due to the extremely weak signal coming from these sensors. Mine has never worked relliably beyond about 5 meters from my Z-Stick, so you really need a very densely meshed network with many powered devices (read: capable of routing because mains powered).

At the end of the day, I completely abandonned the idea of using these sensors as well as any Z-Wave sensor for that matter because they are totally under specified in comparison with the average x10 or Visonic RF sensors and thus even more unreliable than x10/Visonic stuff, not to mention the ridiculous range.
Don't read me wrong, Z-Wave is vastly superior to x10 for actuators like plug-in modules and the like, but the sensors have proven useless to me so far.

[kaldoon]

Have a 1/2 dozen of the Aeon Labs D/W sensors in my network and have for a while all work fine and do what they are supposed to. All are utilized in events and the work great. How are you setting up your events?

[Otis]

Otis, the status of the sensor should update immediately in homeseer and in the log if logging is enabled for this device.
Did you check the association ? Usually it is done automatically when you add the sensor, but sometimes it fails.

Anyway, what you describe is not really similar with what I experienced.
But it could be due to the extremely weak signal coming from these sensors. Mine has never worked relliably beyond about 5 meters from my Z-Stick, so you really need a very densely meshed network with many powered devices (read: capable of routing because mains powered).

At the end of the day, I completely abandonned the idea of using these sensors as well as any Z-Wave sensor for that matter because they are totally under specified in comparison with the average x10 or Visonic RF sensors and thus even more unreliable than x10/Visonic stuff, not to mention the ridiculous range.
Don't read me wrong, Z-Wave is vastly superior to x10 for actuators like plug-in modules and the like, but the sensors have proven useless to me so far.

I was able to get mine working by just rescanning in Homeseer. Worked like a charm.