I recently spent about two weeks rebuilding my z wave mesh, updating firmware, etc. All of a sudden in the last few days all of my Zwave devices (so basically all of my devices) have slowly stopped responding started with a couple bulbs, then switch, now it's all bulbs, switches and locks don't respond to anything. Commands from the devices screen, dashboards or Alexa. What is happening? I have no clue where to start with this. Any help is appreciated.
It sounds like the mesh is becoming unstable. That will typically happen if:
- You have ghost nodes
- You have devices that are spamming the mesh
- You have devices that don’t play well with the rest of the devices (and usually spam the mesh (See #2))
- You have a lot of devices paired at security S0 (which “talk” too much)
- Something else…?
First off, do you have a C-5 or a C-7 hub? You can tell by looking at the sticker underneath or going to “Hub Details” under the “Settings” tab.
I will start by assuming you have a C-7.
For #1: To determine if you have Ghost devices, go to the “Z-Wave Details” screen from the Setting Tab (or the 3 dots menu on the top right of any screen). Look for devices that have no data following both the “in:” and “out:” in the Clusters column.
If you have some ghost devices, you will need to remove them. One way to do this is by pressing the “Refresh” button until a “Remove” button ends-up appearing (If I remember correctly, that’s what it’s called…). Another is to use a USB Z-Wave stick on a PC. It is more complicated to setup, but easier to do once it is setup.
For #2: Devices that are spamming the mesh - That is typically power reporting devices like devices that report power/energy usage. Examples are Aeotec’s HPM, Inovelli’s Red series switches, etc. Sometimes devices will go “bezerk” for no apparent reason.
If you have devices that report power, you want to delay the reporting period as much as possible or disable power reporting if you don’t really need it. This information will quickly overwhelmed the mesh and cause your devices not to respond.
Devices going “bezerk” are harder to identify. Typically, this is done with a device that can show how much noise there is on the frequency, which most people don’t have. (Ex.: Z-Wave Toolbox). To fix this, you need to pull power from the devices to reboot them. This can be done by pulling the air gaps from switches, unscrewing bulbs, turning off breakers or pulling batteries. It can be very time consuming as you would suspect…
For #3: Some devices don’t work well on the C-7 Hub. They include Zooz’s SE40 4-in-1 sensor and some other switches and Z-Wave bulbs. Searching the forum will reveal some of these. They must be removed from the mesh and replaced by non-problematic devices, unfortunately.
For #4: Only door locks should be paired as S0 if they can’t be paired at S2 security. S0 security sends 3 times the data and can quickly overwhelm the mesh. Some devices like the Iris and Zooz motion sensors, the Inovelli bulbs (with older firmware) and other older devices will pair at S0. Unfortunately, there is no easy way around this. The Z-Wave standard doesn’t allow Hubitat to let you pair without security if S0 is the only option supported by the device. Options are to have a 2nd C-5 hub to pair them without security and share them via Hub Mesh or to pair them with a USB Z-Wave stick without security. That 2nd option is much more effort and doesn’t always work correctly. (There are quite a few posts detailing that in the forum).
For #5: Something else… well, we might need more information and the input of other members of the community.
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Multiple hubs, but the devices all live on a C7. These are:
4 Inovelli ZW42 Bulbs (running firmware 2.31; 3 show s2, one doesnt show anything)
4 Innr ZigBee bulbs
1 Yale Zwave lock (Generic Zwave lock driver; Paired S2)
1 intermatic screw in light bulb switch (Generic zwave switch)
1 zooz zse motion sensor
1 zooz zen25 double plug
That was used when I rebuilt the mesh a couple of weeks ago. so yep, Have the USB Zwave stick.
I have one, but I honestly think it is legit. It is a zooz double plug that I thought I was using as a repeater to reach devices in my bedroom. However, it is blank after both in and out.
No zwave device should ever have both blank in & out clusters. Any paired device HAS TO (per the spec) have what Hubitat calls "inClusters" (really they are the supported command classes for the device).
Now, that might not be your actual mesh problem, but I thought I would at least comment on that item.
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I went ahead and removed it. I have a couple of other devices I can add back as a repeater if I need them. I had a heck of a time getting rid of it. IM not really adept at some of this, but it seems if it is functioning as a repeater, it should have in and out. The truth is I rarely use the actual outlets except maybe at Christmas.
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Well it seems that may have been at least a large part of the problem. Once I removed that, everything seemed to start responding except for 1 bulb. now I'm trying to figure out why that one is mis-behaving.
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I didn’t realize those supported S2 now! That’s good. I had 5 that were paired without security on my C-7 and had a lot of issues. I ended-up pairing them on my C-5 and they work great. All that to say that there is a possibility that they could be part of the issue.
Those can be a problem. They are the ZSE40 4-in-1, right? Just one might not be too much of an issue, but still, I would recommend pairing it to another hub if one is a C-5, then sharing it via hub mesh.
Not sure about the other devices, but there are posts that speak about the Zen25 that might provide some information.
When I was redoing everything a few weeks ago, someone pointed me to the 2.31 beta firmware, said it was very stable. Honestly, I TRIED to pair them without security, but I just couldn't click on and off fast enough with the lamp base I use for those tasks, so I just gave up and let it pair secure.
The ZSE 18. I have two, but I was never able to get the other working after I moved, so its a paperweight now..
https://www.getzooz.com/zooz-zse18-s2-motion-sensor.html
The bulb still giving me issues is one of the Inovellis on the garage, the farthest out, but not the farthest from the hub. only about 20 feet. Ironically, that was the first one that tipped me off there was an emerging problem a few days ago, so maybe it will just take longer to heal itself.
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Three hubs here. No mesh. There's a reason for that. I get the idea of logging into one place to control everything, but other than that I have trouble figuring out the value of a mesh. Always seems like more to go wrong, case in point here. Perhaps try things without a mesh and see if stability returns?
Yes, my issue was specifically with the Zwave mesh. I also have three hubs (1 C4, 2 C7's) connected by Hub mesh. The C4 has no devices, it just runs the applications and automations. It has the Zwave and ZigBee radios disabled and the stick removed. All of my devices (both Zwave and ZigBee) reside on 1 C7. I chose this set up because I was having lock up issues with the C4 by itself doing everything and hosting all of the devices.
The other C7 is empty. I originally intended to split my devices, Zwave on one, ZigBee on the other, but decided against that. then I was going to use it the way I'm using the C4, but it just didn't really happen that way. I really am not sure what I'm going to do with it. Maybe use it for experimentation. I should probably disconnect it or at least disable the radios until I do something with it to reduce noise.
I have not had any problems with hub mesh or hub connect (when I was using it).
This issue was specifically with the Zwave mesh, and once I removed that one Zooz double outlet, seems to have solved 95% of my problem. I still have the issue with the one inovelli bulb not responding like it should.
What is weird is I have used those Zooz plugs for a few years (I have 4 of them) and I have never had them, cause an issue with my mesh before. I found a log for it, and it looks like it was sending a power monitoring report about every 2 seconds.
This thread has some details and suggestions for the ZEN25 reporting issues:
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Yep, that sounds exactly like what was happening. Since I sorta stumbled across the Zooz issue, I never thought to look if there was a reported issue before. Maybe I'll include it on that extra hub and see what firm ware it has. I honestly have no idea if it was paired secure or what firmware it has. I think I bought it around 2017or 2018 some time. I Never updated it, so what ever it had is what it still has. I also had no idea I had energy reporting enabled, that is not something I'm usually very concerned about keeping track of.
I do know I had a heck of a time getting it excluded and removed. The normal process didn't work, I had to use the usb Zwave stick to remove it. and even that took several tries before it finally worked.
Hey guys, just wanted to chime in and say that there must be an issue or something as the bulbs do not support S2. It's either S0 or Non-Secure.
While I didn't have the exact same issue as you, I did have similar issues with my C7 and our bulbs in that the S0 was causing some problems with my network.
Once I updated to the beta firmware and included them as non-secure, my network has been rock solid and super quick.
This could be the culprit here tbh.
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Thanks for the input. I will try and exclude and include again. Of 4 bulbs 1 got included without security, 3 with S0.1 of them is very slow to non responsive and 1 is slowing more and more daily.
I have a heck of a time clicking that rocker switch fast enough to get them to include non secure. It also means I have to include them in a different location than where they will be used, meaning I have to remove them and repower in a different location. Doesn't that mess with the mesh? Or am I missing something here?
Do you happen to have a lamp available? That definitely makes it easier to do vs using a light switch.
In regards to the mesh, it could certainly mess with it -- but after you put them in their final place, I'd just run a repair a couple of times and that should get everything back to normal.
What I did was find a lamp, unplug it and put it next to the Hubitat hub for the update and also for the inclusion (you don't have to put it next to the hub for the inclusion, you could move the lamp to the approximate place their final destination is), then ran an update once everything was said and done.
Yep. That was with a lamp. All of my other lamps have the knob type switches(or they would if I hadn't taken the knobs off to keep my wife from turning them off and messing up my mesh). This lamp just has a rocker type switch (like on a power strip) in the cord.
Am I correct, to include it non secure it's on-off 6 times in 5 seconds ounce it's included?
Oh, ok, my bad.
No, it should be on/off 3x to put it into non-secure mode.
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