Am I doing this right?

[Olfer]

Hi all,

I'm totally a noob when it comes to home automation. I've browsed through hundrets of websites, forums and youtube videos, just to come to the point where I'm totally uncertain if I'm thinking correctly. If a gentle forum user is willing to drop his or her two cent, I would really appreaciate that.

Currently I'm in the planning phase. In my house there are no Smart Devices at all atm. my Windows are equipped with Siegenia Aerocontrol UMS001 wired Reed-Contacts for detection Open/Close, forced movements and movements of the window handle.

As I'm not very experienced, I would like to start with a small beginners projekt. I want to automate my heaters ind the first floor. Second step would be implementing a Doorbell (outside at our garden door, approx 2m away from the frontdoor) and extending the heater automation. As a third step would consider smoke alarms and then, when I've gained some experiance, I will try to integrate the wired Window contacts. Also I'm dreaming of motion sensors and infrared cams to track the outside of my house.

For this, after all my research, I think z-waye would be an optimal and future safe technology.Domoticz seems for me a good Software to start with and to learn. I'm a windows user, but with some experiance with ubuntu.

For the HW part I plan with a Raspberry Pi3 and the Aeotec z-wave USB stick. Also to have the GPIOs free for the window contacts (if this will work at all!!)

The heater thermostat will be the the omes from Devolo (high WAF, and more sensors as the Danfoss, but what do I do with the Sensors?)

.. all the rest is not decided yet.

Here are the specs for the window contacts : https://catalog.siegenia.com/aerocontro ... .html#/16/

My questions now: does this makes sense at all? Is someone using a similar setup? What would be a typical sandtrap? Any hints or tipps to iprove thisnsetup? Do you think that I have any chance with the window contacts a a Raspberry Pi (or maybe a second one in the basement just for these...) What about extending the system with enocean? Am I on a good way with my thinking?


finally: sorry for my rusty english!

[sach]

Hi Olfer,

I'm not sure about windows contacts.....but the rest seems feasible.
I'm running Domoticz on a Pi 2B with the Aeotec z-wave USB stick for zwave devices (mainly heating devices at this point) and a RFXCOM RFXtrx433E controlling my LightwaveRF lighting and (touch wood) everything is working great!

For the heating, I initially started with 1 Devolo TRV and with some help from this forum managed to get it working and reporting back temperature correctly. As the radiator is behind a curtain, I decided to use a Fibaro eye to act as an external temperature and motion sensor. After all that was working how I liked, I moved on to the next bedroom but this time used a Devolo Room Thermostat as its easier to adjust the setpoint using a physical device (WAF factor). Plan is now to fit the same TRV/Thermostat combo in all the bedrooms and the living room.....hopefully tonight as I've just taken delivery of the TRV's and Thermostats

I should point out that I have so far managed to make this work without using any scripts. I'm a windows guy that has dabbled in a bit of Linux over the years but still consider myself a NOOB, and asides from some simple batch files and a bit of powershell I try and stay away from scripting where possible. I was prepared to try and learn Lua for this project if required but so far have managed to achieve what I wanted with Blocky and the incredible useful posts on this forum and the wiki.

Good luck!

Sach

[blackdog65]

Hi Olfer,
welcome to Domoticz.
As you may already be aware, Domoticz isn't dependent on one protocol so most of us use a mixture of systems.
Z-Wave is good for critical systems as it give feedback/2way communication. But it is expensive.
RFXTrx is very handy as it covers a wide rage of cheaper devices. However communication tends to be one way.
Then there are wifi/lan devices such as https://www.domoticz.com/wiki/EQ3_MAX! which I use for my heating and is excellent.

So looking at your proposed projects,
If your heating is conventional hot water radiators... EQ3_MAX! is a brilliant option. viewtopic.php?f=34&t=841

For the doorbell, I have 4 lightwaverf/siemens mp3 doorbells (big house). They work with the RFXTrx and can make 8 different sounds. I have the conventional "Ding Dong" for the door, my alarm warning is a zombie voice saying "I will kill you" (kids idea), a dinner gong etc.

Does the wiring for your windows sensors all come back to a single point? If so, how many? It may be possible to link in a fibaro z-wave binary sensor or, as I have, an ESP8266-12 that transmits via wifi back to domoticz.

So, it's all doable, it just just means you have to work out what you want exactly and then the cost/effort balance (effort gets better results),

As to Windows/linux... think of the cost of a full pc running 24/7 compared to a Raspberry Pi.
There are plenty of guys here that will help/guide you once you get started.

Hope my ramble helps... and your English is fine

Sean

[Westcott]

Hi Sean,

Don't forget RFlink!

Not sure if this counts as OT, but is the a write-up of how to use 'an ESP8266-12 that transmits via wifi back to domoticz'?

[blackdog65]

You're right about rflink. I mentioned the esp as it's a method I have used to link wired alarm sensors back to domoticz.

my Windows are equipped with Siegenia Aerocontrol UMS001 wired Reed-Contacts for detection Open/Close, forced movements and movements of the window handle.

I thought that or fibaro binaries would work here

[Olfer]

Thank you all for your replies! They all lead to another hundred cycles of rethinking everything just to rethink it all again afterwards! Hehe! I'm shure you know what I'm talking about!

I will go with the expensive Z-Wave. I've read some negative things about the future if 433Mhz in Germany and even if these articles were old, they left a bad gut feeling.

Just shortly after new years eve I've finally ordered three Devolo/Danfoss radiator, a Devolo Room Sensor and a RPI to play around and get started. I had to take some hurdels, as the Aeon Gen5 Stick is not working well for some reasons. Finally I got the Devolos included via the WebUI.

For the window Reeds I'll give the ESP8266-12 a try. But for that I'll have to learn a lot about electronics
(Already started with an Arduino Nano. First success: Blinking LEDs and a light-sensor. Woohoo! )

Right now I'm on a point where I could need your help again. If I set the Setpoint on the Room Sensor, how does the Sensor control the Radiator? Is it just transmitting the Setpoint? (how? Blockly is no help, as I had to experiance) or is it a more 'sophisticated' solution with secret algorithms and some fancy magic?

Anyway.. I don't know how to connect these thingies and appreciate any hints and help!

Thanks in advance and a happy new year to yall!

[sach]

I use a simple blocky (one for each room):

TRVBlocky.JPG (54.54 KiB) Viewed 1873 times

In this case the Living room temperature and Living room Setpoint are from the Room sensor.
Living Room Radiator is the Setpoint on the TRV. 15 is off and 28 is on.


And another to switch the boiler on/off whether a zone requests heat or not:

Capture.JPG (127.25 KiB) Viewed 1873 times

Might not be the best way to do it but its been working great for a couple of months now.

[Olfer]

Thanks a lot! That really helped! I didn't know that there is actually a way to set the setpoint with Blockly! Unfortunately I don't use the Beta version right now, and in the latest Stable the setpoint blocky is not available.

That lead to another noobie question: How stable are the Domoticz Betas? I mean, there are Betas like Microsoft and Betas like Google, so closer to an Alpha or almost a Stable? What are your experiances?

[sach]

If you don't fancy trying out a beta you can always set the setpoint from within blocky with JSON:

Http://127.0.0.1:8080/json.htm?type=com ... value=TEMP

I used this method before the feature was introduced.

[disasterman]

I tried many Heating Thermostates and for my way the best are the Devolo.

To change Automatic the Setpoint, i combined it with the Outdoor Temperatur.

Setpoint.png (59.12 KiB) Viewed 1616 times