Garage door automation - Zooz Zen16

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21

Hi.
Question on this please.
My linear garage door opener has acted up a few times and i'm planning on ripping it out the next time it glitches and installing a ZEN 16.
I do have a couple of questions though please on your app.

I have a linear / go control garage door opener that i bought form Lowes when i had an IRIS platform.
When i installed it on Hubitat i'm using a generic Zwave Garage door opener

  • With the linear door opener, the tilt sensor ties directly to the opener - not back to the hub...at least i believe it does as i don't have any tilt sensors as devices on my setup.
    Does your app require the use of a tilt sensor or contact sensor to confirm open / closed states?

  • Uncertain if this will operate any differently...but would like to ask. On my dashboard, a green tile represents closed, a red tile represents open.

  • When i call for the door to open, my dashboard will go to a grey state and the text in the tile updates to "opening" Once open, the tile turns red and updates the state as "open"
  • when i call for the door to close, the tile will once again go to a grey state, update the text as "closing" , then when closed, the tile turns green and the text will then say "closed"

Does all of that work the same way when using the Zen 16 as a garage door opener? easy enough to use the App when inside the home but if i want to open the door when off the network im presuming i will still have to use the dashboard.

Lastly...and this isn't a big thing. I note in the ZEN 16 instructions for using it as a garage door that a siren can be connected to the zen to alert people on a change of door state. With the linear door controller, it beeps a few seconds before it starts moving. Is that something this can do too? having a little advanced warning is beneficial if it closes automatically and someone or something is in the way

Thanks
Mac

22

The ZEN16 just offers the control part for the garage door, you will need a separate Z-Wave / smart open/close sensor connected to your hub to monitor the status of your garage door. You can get it in a value kit with the ZEN16 here.

I think you should be able to customize the colors of your tiles in the dashboard unless some are fixed to the particular attributes (like open or close) in which case they would display the same way.

@krlaframboise should be able to comment on the display options for the app better.

The ZEN16 is just a relay device without any additional built-in components since it's a multi-functional device that can do much more than just activate a garage door. It's not a dedicated garage door solution as the Linear device is. If you'd like to add an audible alarm to your set-up, you will need a connected siren you can activate using the settings in the app.

You can access a step-by-step wiring and programming guide for the ZEN16 and this garage door app here.

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23

Yes, each door you create in the app requires a device that supports the Contact Sensor capability and the ZEN16's child device it created for the relay attached to the door opener.

Technically you should be able to use your existing tilt sensor if it has wires currently connected to your door opener and I'll explain how, but you're better off purchasing the package that comes with a z-wave tilt sensor.

You would need to attach the contact sensor's wires to the inputs of a relay you're not already using, manually create a virtual Contact Sensor that you'll use with the App, and setup rules that sync the virtual device's open/closed events with that child relay's on/off events.

I'm not sure if any wired sensor can be attached to those inputs, but @agnes.zooz should be able to answer that.

The app creates a child device that has the "Garage Door Control" capability and it creates the opening/closing events so it should look and function the same.

Yes you can do that. The app has a delay setting for the switch so if you set it to 3 seconds it will create the opening/closing event and wait 3 seconds before sending the on event to the device.

You'll also need to purchase a device like the Zooz Multisiren that can play a beeping sound and setup rules that makes the siren/chime start playing when the door device changes to opening/closing and stop when it changes to open/closed.

Disclaimer:
Custom built garage door openers have multiple points of failure and don't have the safety features built-in that are required for actual Smart Garage Door Openers so use at your own risk...

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24

has anyone used this is a really cold location or is it too new.. I see it is only rated down to 32 degrees and i know our garage gets colder than that when it is 10-20 below..

25

Depends. @agnes.zooz - does the zen16 have mechanical relays or solid state relays?

Edit - the right thing to do would be to use it within the design spec. However, I'd be tempted to use it in your situation if it used solid state relays.

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Iā€™ll know in a couple months.. I have one in an unheated detached garage in the northeast. Will definitely get cold in there.

27

ya im tempted to try it.. i have an older zwave relay and in our other house...had to remove it as things kept trying to route through it clogging up the net..
the only other two zwave (dry contact) options i see are the quibino 55 bucks and a mimo2+ 80 bucks.

i also have a mimo lite inside a yellow top deep cell battery (in a plastic case) being used for a gate open closer.
I plan for now to leave that in place as it is outdoors totally and has worked through the winters in nh and since it is outdoors I doubt anything will try to route through it other than the open close sensor on the gate..

on the other hand the quibino is only 20 bucks more.. rated to 10 degrees.. and I only need it to control one door

28

Appreciate all the feedback. Iā€™d feel comfortable using the zen for a garage good controller based on all of this.
Thanks.
Mac

29

As long as it's a dry contact output (no voltage), it can be connected to the Sw terminals on the ZEN16 but it will only report on/off so creating a virtual open/close sensor may be more hassle than it's worth. Is it even possible to use this in an automation where the sensor is on the action side (if relay 1 is on then change sensor state to close)? I didn't think virtual sensors could be controlled like that. Unless there's another way to sync these 2 somehow?

It's not just about the relays, it's the Z-Wave radio chip and electronic components inside of it as well :slight_smile: But I'd say that you can definitely try it. As long as it's not outdoors, it should be fine.

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30

This is the Hubitat forum, lol. Rule Machine supports custom commands and attributes.

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31

Doesn't Rule Machine use Actions and Triggers? :slight_smile: Sorry if I made it sound confusing or as if I was referring to ST but I just wasn't sure if it would be possible to set a virtual sensor type of device to follow the status of an on/off device since on the Z-Wave side, sensors aren't controllable in any way. But maybe there is a way around it using the custom commands as you mentioned, just more advanced rules than I'm used to :wink:

32

Yep, the trigger is the "switch" turning on and off. When the switch turns on - set the virtual sensor to close, when off - set to open. I use this for a wired magnetic contact sensor on my washing machine lid. Works great.

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33

I was just kidding because a similar question was asked on the ST forum recently and I had to tell them it couldn't be done without modifying the app...

In Hubitat, all the built-in virtual drivers have set commands that create events to change the state and that allows the virtual devices to easily be used for triggers and actions.

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34

I have a wired tilt/contact sensor from a WiFi garage door opener I'm not going to use any more. Since it's already wired up, is there a way to connect that to the SW2 contact instead of using a separate Z-Wave sensor?

35

Never mind. I figured it out.

36

J/K. There's a special level of hell for people who post that without explaining.

  1. Connect your physical switch to the SW2 input on the ZEN16.

  2. Use Rule Machine to create a global variable. I called mine "virtual_tilt."

  3. Create a Connector to that variable of type "Contact Sensor."

  4. Use Rule Machine or Simple Automation Rules to set virtual_tilt to True when Zooz MultiRelay-Relay 2 is off, and virtual_tilt to False when it is on.

  5. In the Garage Door app, select virtual_tilt as your Open/Close Sensor.

4 Likes
37

I have the Zooz Garage Door app set up, and it's working great from the dashboard. Would really like to link it to Google Home through the Google Home app the same way the rest of the switches in the house are. Every time I add it, though, it removes itself shortly after.

Is it possible link a Zooz Garage Door device to Google Home? Not looking for "open on a voice command" -- just for a button showing in Google Home.

@agnes.zooz: Not sure if you might have some expertise here?

38

Not that I know of but creating a virtual lock device helped with getting it to appear on Alexa as explained here.

You could also program it with the garage door mode on the relay that's controlling the opener and just use the child relay device from HE on Google Home - have you tried that?

39

First the short story... I've discovered that the default settings for the Zen16 create a vulnerability to power interruptions that can cause the garage door to open. I'd encourage anyone using this relay to cycle the power to their Zen16 to confirm system behavior. The good news is, there is a setting that will eliminate this vulnerability.

The long story...

I've been using the Zen16 now for about 7 or 8 months on my two garage doors, and it has worked mostly flawlessly... until a week ago. I'm using a simple contact sensor on each door, and using the Zooz Garage Door App to control the two doors. The only issues I've had are not with the Zen16, but rather with flaky presence detection that would occasionally trigger a door to open even though we never left home - but that is another story. The issue I experienced a week ago was directly related to the relay configuration, and resulted in an unintended garage door open command while I was away on vacation. Thankfully my neighbors were watching out for us.

We left for vacation very early on a Friday morning. Knowing we were going to be gone for a week, I paused the apps that open the doors on our presence flags, just to be sure it wouldn't somehow falsely activate. Late that night, I get a text from my next door neighbor that both of my garage doors are open (both were definitely closed when we left). They tried closing them for me, but neither the key pad codes nor wall switches would make the doors close. They ended up disconnecting the doors from the openers so that they could close them for us.

They commented that a severe storm had blown through earlier in the evening, and the power had gone off for some period of time. All I could guess at that point is that when power was restored, the relays triggered, opening the doors. I also recalled that when I first hooked up the Zen16, the wall switches did not work until I cycled the associated relay on and back off. This made me think something about this power cycling caused the same effect. Unfortunately, I was not able for some reason to command those relays remotely to try to correct it on the spot, and the neighbors were left with disconnecting the openers so they could manually close the doors.

We arrived home late last night, and this morning I did some experimenting and learned something important about configuring this relay. By default, the relay preference for "On/Off Status Recovery After Power Failure" is set to "Restore Relay States From Before Power Failure". This seemed like a perfectly rational setting - just pick up where it left off - so I left it in this default state. However, what I discovered is that this setting does not work as expected. When I unplugged the relay, then plugged it back in, it triggered both doors to open. This suggests that the relays toggled on then off, even though it would have been in the 'off' state when power was interrupted. I decided to change this parameter to "Turn All Relays Off", and the problem has been eliminated.

Sorry for the long post, but I think this is a critical thing to understand about using this relay for garage doors. I've done a bit of searching today, but have yet to find any mention of this issue. I've also not seen any comment on how to configure this particular setting, other than to leave the Zen16 in its default config and use an App to control it (which I am). Hopefully my experience helps others. I'm going to post also under the garage door app, maybe the app can be adjusted to force this configuration, or at the very least, make people aware of the setting.

40

Good call! I use a Z17 in my garage, but I did preemptively set the "Power Fail State Restore" to "All Relays Off" for this very concern...

I figured that even if a power outage hit while the door was open, I'd rather it all just goes back to the most secure setup once power is restored. My garage door is only open if we're going in or out, so the chances of it being open at the time of an outage are incredibly slim.

Yesterday, I was doing some work on my GDO circuit (unrelated to the Z17 on that circuit), so I had that breaker off... When I restored power, the door stayed closed, but my 2 contact sensors were out of wack - a simple (intentional) cycle of the door fixed the contact states, but I was grateful to confirm that the door didn't open on its own when power came back on.