[2.3.5.113] C8 Z-Wave dropout at random times of the day

In the Zwave page, I've found if the device name isn't listed (note where the word "Discover" is present you have a ghost device. ghost devices destroy a Zwave network. You need to delete them. The problem is Hubitat really doesn't do this procedure well. You need to first attempt to repair it several time and at some point that icon will turn to delete. Once you've deleted all ghost devices I suspect your zwave network will become significantly more stable.

Note the big red cross in the middle from devices 22, 23, 24, 26, 41 and 44. I suspect those 6 devices are actually ghosts. You can confirm this if they have no actual device name and are still in discovery mode. I suggest deleted them then running a z-wave repair to help clean things up.

@danabw quite literally wrote the book on removing ghosts.

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You're right about ghosts being an issue when they occur. 22, 23, 24, and 26 have both names and routes. Unlikely that they are ghosts. Not sure what's up with 41 and 44 since they don't appear on the z-wave mesh report at all. To my untrained eye this looks like some of the unexplained z-wave stuff I've seen post-migration.

In the zwave map built into Hubitat, do you see the word "discovery" in place of any device names. Those are usually the ghosts?

Note the red box I've placed around one of your previous images.

So I just found something interesting.

@brad5 when this happens for you (stuff stops responding). Go to Settings, Zwave Details, and then Zwave Logs. Once that’s open, try a Zwave device.

Mine was non responsive. Opened Zwave log (to see what it said), then hit a button (remote) again, light immediately responded.

Makes me think this actually similar to zigbee issue HE staff are chasing. The hub is losing contact with the Zwave controller. :confused:

Same experience as yours. Sure enough this morning it happened to me right as I sat down at my desk. Z-wave motion sensor blinking green yet I am sitting in the dark. Z-wave logs showed no activity even as I pulled the battery. Green blinking light indicating motion, zero in the hub z-wave log or events for the device.

I powered down the hub for 30 seconds and restarted it and it came back. Which usually tells me the z-wave radio has become overloaded. Yet in this case no evidence of any device spamming (that I could see anyway) and the z-wave mesh looks fine, as it always does.

Something's broke for sure. The symptoms are different than the zigbee issues though. Once a zigbee sensor goes bye-bye it does not come back without intervention. The z-wave devices all recover when the radio recovers.

This all worked fine prior to migrating to the C8 and though there have been many changes in the z-wave mesh I have intentionally added NO new devices other than a ring keypad, which I have since removed (leaving two).

ah, sorry, I mean, when the z-wave stack goes unresponsive (stops responding to anything), see if opening the Z-wave log wakes it back up and it starts working again.

Ah no not in my case... I had the log open while I was fiddling with the sensor. A power down and restart did though.

I haven't been able to test the log thing, but this pretty much sums up what I have been seeing. Its like the Z-Wave radio in the hub was just turned off. Doesn't matter if the device is direct or bouncing through a repeater. Also, when a Z-Wave repair is run, it shows all or nearly all devices as failed devices. Things have been a bit better, and sometimes rather than a complete failure there is just a significant delay before something begins working again (5 seconds or so).

I wonder if keeping the hub more frequently communicating is better? From what I've observed, the days I have my washing machine running things tend to respond better, and dropouts don't occur. It seems like those longer periods of inactivity cause the failures to happen.

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So tonight, same thing. No response from Zwave. So I go to Zwave logs again. No change. But logs is working. So it’s not the hub. It’s the mesh freaking out?

I had an interesting experience this morning. Zwave unresponsive. No activity in the logs. So I did a simple reboot - not a power down. And everything started working again. Which tells me it doesn’t sound like an overwhelmed radio or mesh since it has been my experience that requires a full power down to resolve. Sounds more like something up with the hub preventing it from handling z-wave events and whatever that something is, it is cleared by a simple reboot.

I’ve checked logs for user apps and devices - nothing apparent.

Im back to some sort of system process causing these issues and at least one of them happens nightly between about 1 and 5. THere's a spike in CPU at about 230 and backups are at 215 so I wonder if that may be part of the issue I'm having overnight.I've just moved my backups to 9am. I'm going to see if that makes a difference.

Though this is a horrible solution I am wondering if the hub needs a reboot every day. That wold really be a bad thing but if it keeps the lights on I might resort to it just until someone addresses these C8 issues.

How large are your backups?

3mb. DB is 20mb. Both seem well within the normal range.

For reference of someone having no issues at all. I have my local backups scheduled for every 3 days, cloud every 5. Time is 2:32 AM and I see a load spike to 1.09 at 2:40 AM, on 3/28 and similar on 3/25. On 3/28 it was both local and cloud backups. My database is usually less than 10mb (8 currently). Backups are 3-4Mb

Yeah I think the load spike is definitely related to backups and/or some other nightly process. Whether that affects my z-wave performance or not... hard to tell. And if it does, it definitely should not.

There was another thread where someone figured out that his PoE splitter was somehow not supplying sufficient power and it was creating z-wave issues. I am using the same model PoE splitter - as are others without issue. But I've swapped mine out for a regular (2A) USB-C cable for now. Who knows... perhaps the confluence of increased CPU load (and with it corresponding increase in power consumption) is an issue. I should know in a day or two.

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Interesting comment on the POE splitter, I'm running one too. On day 1 setup I was using a micro USB to USBC adapter with the Micro USB POE splitter that ran the C7, as I was waiting for a USB C POE adapter to arrive. I was seeing Z-wave issues with that setup initially, and once the new one arrived I swapped to the USB C one. Still seeing issues with Z-Wave, on both the Micro USB and USB C ones, so I didn't think that was causing performance issues.

Both are UCTRONICS brand adapters, from Amazon. USB C one is rated 5V 2A, and the Micro USB one is rated for 5V 2.4A. I believe the wall plug that came with the hub was 5V 1A? I haven't measured, but if the voltage is significantly low from the POE adapter, or it is sagging when power consumption increases I could see how that is causing performance issues.

Please let me know if your hub seems to be performing better without the POE adapter. I may swap over to the wall plug that came with the C8 tonight just to see if that helps things. I'd hate to lose my battery backup over POE, but it would be worth the risk testing for a day or two since my power is usually very stable.

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Same brand and model that I am using, and same the other poster was using. But also the same as many other folks working fine. However... I am definitely willing to entertain the idea of a bad batch of PoE adapters and that sure would be an easy fix.

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Yes, would be very nice if this was the cause of the problems. Would be a super easy fix! I'll probably swap the power source out when I get home later today, and see if that starts to help things. Worth a shot at least

@staze are you using a PoE splitter by any chance? That would be too convenient if you were.

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