First Time Zigbee Mesh Setup

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New user to the Hubitat family. Been doing some things with Alexa, but wanted to take it a step further and was pointed to the Hubitat. Bare with me as I try to wrap my mind around all the nuances of Hubitat etc.

I have a C8 that I would like to add some Zigbee devices to. I have a couple of Sonoff Z3 USB plus dongles, 4 thirdreality Zigbee Smart Plugs and 4 Sonoff Lite Smart Plus S40s. I've flashed the Sonoff USB dongles to repeater mode and added them to the Hubitat. I've also assigned the Sonoff USB dongles the Zigbee Monitor Driver and have Hub Mesh enabled.

Here are my questions:

  1. Should the Sonoff USB dongles be set to Hub Mesh enabled, or leave that disabled?
  2. The C8 is located in the main house. I planned to set one of the Sonoff USB dongles in the house and some of the Smart Plugs in various locations in the house to establish the mesh. Is there any kind of management that needs to be done to setup the Mesh or that just gets done automatically with the Hubitat?
  3. How would I go about linking the Zigbee sensors etc to the devices in the Mesh like the Sonoff USB dongles or the Smart Plug repeaters?
  4. Now behind my house is a shop. This is connected to my house via fiber and has cable and wifi network setup. I'm guessing from my basic knowledge of a Zigbee mesh, that it would be a challenge to extend the mesh to the shop just using repeaters. If that is the case, I would need to install another hub of some kind in the shop, correct? What kind of hub etc would I need out there - any recommendations?

Sorry for peppering you with all the questions (here and in other threads.) I've been reading a lot of posts from the community and finding a lot of answers. However, some questions I can't find or figure out from existing threads.

Thanks for your help and assistance.

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Hub Mesh is networking between Hubitat hubs so it does not need to be enabled (unless you are running multiple Hubitat hubs).
The mesh networking between and amongst end devices is part of the Zigbee and Z-Wave protocols. It is largely "hands off".
The Zigbee sensors should find the routing devices when they attempt to connect to the hub. Again, this is mostly "hands off".
You could place another Hubitat in the shop. This is where you would use Hub Mesh to connect the shop hub with the home hub. That is also where you would want to enable hub mesh for the devices located in the shop.

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Does it need to be another Hubitat in the shop or is there an Ethernet Zigbee gateway or something that would work out there? Seems another Hubitat would be redundant for this kind of setup.

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I don't know if there is another device that would accomplish what you want. The Hubitat hub is a proven solution and quite a number of people use it for applications similar to yours. Maybe someone else can suggest an alternative.

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Thank you! As I've search more and more, either people are modifying their repeaters for more coverage or using a second Hubitat to accomplish this task. I'll have to look at another Hubitat.

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Where did you read this? I assume you mean adding antennas to increase range which isn't strictly necessary unless you need to bridge a reasonable distance.

Zigbee operates as as an interconnected mesh network (with the exception of battery powered devices which only function as end nodes). If you want to cover a larger area you should ideally have your hubitat in the centre and have multiple repeaters fanning out to blanket the area you want to run your devices in.

Most people probably would run more than 1 HE in order to cover mutliple storeys in a home, not primarily to cover a planar space.

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@Eric.C.Miller and @rocketwiz have provided some great answers, I'll probably only offer up some minor details (in a lengthy reply) and perhaps a different way of explaining some of the same concepts.

As @Eric.C.Miller mentioned, Hub Mesh is networking across Hubitat Hub's. The best way I can think to explain it is through examples. If you have 1 HE hub with Zigbee and other devices paired / configured, these typically produce events, like a motion sensor detecting motion or detecting no motion, a contact sensor opening or closing, a light turning on and off, etc. You would then typically setup automations triggered by some of these events and call commands on devices in response, e.g. when a motion sensor activates, turn the light on. In these examples, these three sets of devices may all be paired to HE hub 1, forming part of it's Zigbee mesh, but they can also be shared via Hub Mesh with a HE hub 2. All the events that are produced on hub 1 are automatically replicated on hub 2, meaning that anything you choose to setup on hub 2, like another automation, can work with the replicated version of the device as though it was paired with hub 2. Similarly if you call a command in an automation on hub 1 that acts on devices shared with hub 2, the same events that result from that command will also be represented on hub 2, e.g. turning the light on. The replication of events and other details sync in both directions as well, you can have automations on either hub to suit whatever it is you need.

So, to answer your question about the dongles... :slight_smile: Unless you have a need to be able to see events they produce on the (potential) hub in the shop, and you won't have any need to issue commands on them from the shop hub, then there would be no need to share them via Hub Mesh.

All that said, I make this out to be a much bigger thing than it really is, it literally takes < 1 minute to open up the Hub Mesh settings page and share a device across HE hubs, so there's no upfront decision you have to make now about whether to use it.

I think the term "mostly hands off" is accurate. There can be teething problems, sometimes in the beginning, sometimes when things change, like removing a device, etc. But for the most part, once you work through and resolve an issue, which on the whole are rare, then you should be fine.

There is a guide in the Documentation for setting up a strong mesh network,

https://docs2.hubitat.com/how-to/build-a-solid-zigbee-mesh

largely focusing on @rocketwiz 's recommendation of fanning out with repeaters and then end-devices from the HE hub in the centre. There are other considerations like potential for clashes with other 2.4GHz networks and the importance of selecting an appropriate channel and power settings. Certain device types and / or versions of the Zigbee protocol used can also be a factor, so it is worth confirming the support for a device ideally before making a purchase, typically looking up officially supported devices or posting a question on the Community in case there is a custom driver, and to gauge other peoples experiences.

My gut feel as well is to incorporate a second hub for the shop. But depending on your need to get it up and running, you could try by starting out with one, either in the shop or in the house, see what works with that setup, then adapt it as you need to, potentially purchasing the second hub after you have trialed one. It would also give you a chance to assess the platform in more detail.

In terms of alternatives for extending your ability to pair Zigbee devices in the shop, if they can't reach the house, you can look at other platforms like Z2M on a raspberry pi, or something similar, but if it is purely Zigbee connectivity, another HE hub would be far easier to work with if that is all you need it for. I would only bring in another platform if it is going to give you additional functionality beyond what HE can deliver, which would not be the case necessarily for Zigbee devices.

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How far? I'm guessing pretty far or you'd just use Wifi for the shop? If not far you might be able to reach with Z-wave repeaters or Zigbee repeaters, depending on what you want to automate in the shop

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Hub Mesh is only for if you have multiple hubs and want to mesh them together.

For the rest, I think you are greatly overthinking this. Setup your repeaters and pair them. Then pair your other devices. Let Zigbee do its thing.

I really put no thought what so ever into my Zigbee "mesh". I have a handful of plugs and a couple of sensor devices. I just put stuff where I need it and see how it works. So for everything works fine. I don't care how it routes to the hub as long as it works.

Yes, and it depends on what devices you want. If you only wanted bulbs / hue devices for example you could use a Hue hub. If you want all sorts of different devices I would recommend another Hubitat, and a C7 would probably suffice for just the shop.

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Thank you all for the answers and suggestions. Here is what I've done so far.

I've added the repeaters in the house for now. That seems to be working as I've now got my Xiaomi sensors staying online and working. That was the first issue I came across, which led to getting the repeaters.

I've also gone ahead and ordered another Hubitat C8 for the shop and when that gets here, I will get that setup including repeaters for the shop.

One question that brings up is can I move a repeater to the shop hub or do I need to remove it on the house hub and then re-add it to the shop hub?

thanks

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Yes you can relocate it, and yes you need to RE-move it from the house Hub or you will leave a ghosted device entry behind. Not the end of the world for Zigbee but easily avoidable.

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Thank you. I'll do that when the new Hub arrives next week.

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