That's a new one. Yes the battery level is now gone.
FYI mike.maxwell
@hydro311 I am having issues with my Third Reality shades too since upgrading to the C8 hub (not opening/closing at all, partially opening or closing, opening/closing correctly but hub not reflecting the correct status/position of the shade). Would you mind sharing more info about what you meant by “tweaked my repeaters.”
Huge disclaimer -- I'm not advocating any of the following as a solution that would work for everyone.
The first thing that helped me was changing to ZB channel 25 and lowering the radio power to 4. My blinds would still regularly drop offline once or twice a week, but at least not daily. My blinds seemed to perform more reliably if going through a repeater (versus direct connection to the C8).
I realized I had just 2 repeaters that weren't zigbee 3.0 (my Halo smoke detectors). so on a whim, I decided to remove them. And that worked - I've had no problems with the blinds or my zigbee mesh since then.
@hyrdo311 Thanks for sharing what tweaks that you made. Sometimes seeing what others did in their unique set-up helps me think through changes I could make in my unique set-up. In this case, you did spark a few ideas for me.
I have a C8 hub and 13 third reality smart plug repeaters (all zigbee 3.0) in my network of 120 or so zigbee devices. All other zigbee devices are sengled bulbs or battery operated (like the shades) and do not act as repeaters. I went to the extreme step of taking out all of the bulbs last week to see if that made a difference. It did not. The strange thing I have noticed with the C8 hub is that even though the hub is far away from all of the shades, most of the shades connect directly to the far away hub instead of to the nearby repeater. So it makes sense to me to try changing the power level to 4. Maybe this will help encourage the shades to connect to the nearby repeater.
I have also been playing around with the zigbee channel to see if there is an interference issue. I have several other proprietary specific-use smart hubs and an orbi mesh wi-fi network in the home. So far, I haven't seen a significant improvement on the various channels that I have tried.
I have been wondering if I should get a Third Reality hub to dedicate to the operation of the blinds, but I am reluctant to add yet another proprietary specific-use hub to the set-up. I'll keep this idea as my last resort.
Thanks again for sharing what you did.
Heidi
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@mike.maxwell - I just installed 4 of these using the Hubitat delivered generic driver (installed by selecting Third Reality > Shade Controller) . All controls seem to function fine, but not getting a battery report. Any idea on a reason why? I tried refresh, configure, etc. Thanks!
Here are the debug logs for a configure:
For me, it would be battery. The batteries on these come out of the end of the bottom piece. My blinds are inside mounted, so if the batteries die on me with the blinds in the fully open position (typical), I won't have enough length to swing the bottom out to replace the batteries... I'll need to completely remove the blind, which requires an extension ladder.
I haven't tried the driver above posted by Third Reality due to the issues reported in this thread, but with the Hubitat "Generic Zigbee Shade" driver, adjusting the blinds via the remote or the buttons on the blinds themselves does report the resulting position back to the Hubitat device to properly reflect it there. Only a couple days in, but for a little over $100 each on Prime day, these seem like decent blinds. Also quite compact and clean look when fully opened.
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I purchased one to try. I am using the generic driver so no battery report is available. I have had an issue with the blind resetting it's closed reference 1 to 2 times per week. This makes all movements inaccurate until the open/closed positions are reset using the remote. Based on the device event log it looks like the shade makes an un-commanded movement and then treats this new position as closed. I am on a main city road so suspect EMI interference from passing vehicles with two way radios. Too bad, these are quiet and look nice in place of our manual roller shades.
