Using target temp from ecobee in an event

[eschleicher]

Hello All,

I have an evaporative cooler and a whole house fan that are both connected to zwave switches. I'm trying to create some events that will turn on the different cooling methods based on temperature in the house and outside. Right now I have events created that will turn on the different items based on time of day, temp inside the house and temp outside the house and everything is working correctly.

The last thing I would like to add is the ability to change the temp where the fans turn on and off from the ecobee on our wall. right now I have the temps hard coded into the events and if you want to change them you have to open 3 events and change the temps in each of them. I would like to read the target cooling temp from the ecobee and use that to determine when to turn the fans on and off. so say read the target temp from the ecobee and in the auto on event say if the temp goes above that value then turn on the fan. then in the even that turns the fan off use the target temp -3 degrees or something.

Does anyone know how to do this?

[ericg]

I don't have an Ecobee, so I'm not sure about the thermostat.

If you have an HS device that holds the target cooling temperature (read from your Ecobee), then you can compare your current temperature (held in another HS device) with the target temperature using a device compare trigger option provided by the EasyTrigger plugin.

Since you are a NOOB, it's likely you don't yet have that plugin. My advice, if you don't have it: just close your eyes and buy it. You won't be sorry. Anyway, all of the HS paid plugins offer a free 30-day trial period. So you can easily download and install the plugin, then see what it does for you before you commit.

Welcome to the forum!

P.S. - That 3 degree offset you mentioned is also easily handled by EasyTrigger.

[eschleicher]

That is perfect thanks so much for the reply. I just got it all setup

[eschleicher]

well it looks like I may have replied a little too fast. I got the plugin installed and the options show up when creating an event however I can't get the event to trigger. I created a dumbed down event that just turns off some lights if the comparison of the target temp to the actual temp shows the actual temp higher however I can't get it to actually trigger. Here is a picture of the event. when I was trying to get this to run the master bedroom temp was 73 and the target temperature high was 71. so I would have thought that it would be 73>71+1 which is true so the lights would turn off. I checked the master bedroom temp device value as well as the target temperature high value by going through the actual devices and the status/graphics link and they both have values that are integers. I was thinking maybe the comparison wasn't working because it was trying to compare two items that weren't formatted the same but I don't think that is the case. I can go repost this in the easytrigger forum if no one here has any ideas.

thanks for the help

[TC1]

You're doing a static comparison which will not work. One has to remember that Event triggers are single points in time. You need to use a trigger that says "if this device's value changes..." or you can use the trigger you have but you have to put a recurring trigger in front of it, like "check every 5 minutes". You need to decide which temperature sensor when it changes to become the Event trigger, then do your mathematical comparison with an additional AND IF condition.

For example, here's how I check on my EcoBee whether I need to adjust the cooling on my mini-split if the humidity is too high...
(the second conditional AND IF is so I don't keep sending commands to my mini-split if I've already adjusted for a high humid condition)

[spud]

You're doing a static comparison which will not work.

I think the EasyTrigger comparison trigger can work for what he wants to do, but the comparison needs to be false and then becomes true after a change of one of the 2 device value:


From the EasyTrigger user guide:

The comparison trigger/condition let you compare two devices value. You can optionally add a positive or negative offset to the the second device value.
In the trigger case it will only fire the event if and only if

(a) the condition was previously false
(b) one of the two devices being compared has its value changed
(c) the condition is now true

[TC1]

Good point spud , I did not realize that ET comparisons were non-static. Thanks for the clarification!

[eschleicher]

So you were right if the logical was false first and then went true it seems to work, however even then it wasn't consistent. I ended up putting a trigger at the beginning that says if the thermostat changes temp then run the rest of the event. This has seemed to fix it and now everything occurs as expected

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