This is my first contribution to the Hubitat forums.
I've moved over from Smartthings and have about 60 or so devices.
I've had some ZigBee bulbs that lose their connection and won't even re-connect after a power cycle of the bulb or a reboot of the Hubitat hub.
I did manage to re-connect the bulbs after a unpairing and then pairing with the hub but then after a few days, connection was lost to the bulbs again.
The bulb to hub line of sight is quite short without too many obstructions for the ZigBee radio signal.
I would appreciate any advice or tips on this issue.
It would help to know which bulbs you are using. Bulbs make terrible repeaters and will tear up your zigbee network fairly quickly. The most highly recommended bulb in hubitat would be sengled because they don't repeat. There is a huge explanation as to why, but I ask that you take my word for it. I literally lived this nightmare for about 3 weeks. Bulbs wreaking havoc on my mesh. Shutting everything down.
If you're using sengled, then it sounds like you may need to add some repeaters like peanuts or iris plugs to your mesh to strengthen it. If you're using another brand, consider firing up that smarthings hub and running hub connect and separating your bulbs to another network so that they don't interfere with the rest of the daily business. I said smartthings because you already have a hub. Most people with problematic bulbs run a second hub. May it be a second hubitat or connect a bridge, there are many answers to this. I don't have anything other than sengled, so I only have one hub. I can't help with running a second hub. But the seed is now planted and you know where to look. If you could tell a bit more about your bulbs and setup, it would help. Good luck!
I’ve learned this the hard way... I am replacing all my zigbee bulbs with inovelli z-wave bulbs... I just got my last shipment today.. But the bulbs I have replaced already have made a huge difference already...
Thanks for your reply.
As you've correctly deduced, I am still running a couple of z-wave devices off my old Smartthings V2 hub but also in addition, I'm running a Hue hub too with some Hue bulbs.
As regards the bulbs that are proving unreliable and dropping connections, they are ironically Sengled bulbs.
So maybe my first course of action, could be to migrate any devices still paired to my Smartthings hub to my Hubitat hub and then, power down the Smartthings hub, to see what happens?
Hi, thanks for your help.
Unfortunately, I'm in the UK and it seems anything made by Inovelli isn't available here.
I guess this may be down to the radio frequency for ZigBee devices here is a different to what it is in the US?
Yes the issue with migration is that as you rebuild one you weaken the other and untill there are enough device on the new one it doesn't work correctly anywhere.
Once you get your sengleds moved to hubitat, maybe you need to add some repeater plugs? Sengled don't repeat. So if you don't have good zigbee repeaters in your mesh, you may experience loss.
@jscsltd This can definitely be the cause. If you’ve had Zigbee repeaters working for the Sengled bulbs that have been left behind on the SmartThings hub, they will need to be migrated and allowed to take part in the mesh rebuilding before stability can return.
The Hue bulbs definitely shouldn’t be an issue on their own bridge, and the Hubitat Hue integration app is excellent.
Thank you again for your suggestions.
I have just one ZigBee repeater (IKEA tradfri one) and then one ZigBee outlet at the moment that also acts as a repeater.
The Sengled bulbs are attached to the Hubitat hub, so more ZigBee repeaters attached to the Hubitat hub are required I guess . Unfortunately, I have thick brick walls between rooms too, so I guess this isn't helping much either.
Shame there isn't some way of visualising the ZigBee mesh built by the Hubitat hub, that I currently have in place.
Just a further thought. I guess all the bulbs attached to Hue hub have their own independent ZigBee mesh to the ZigBee mesh that's built by the Hubitat hub?
Thanks for your help.
The Sengled bulbs are already attached to the Hubitat hub in afraid.
As suggested by @april.brandt and yourself, it seems I need more ZigBee repeaters.
Does anyone know of a ZigBee repeater they could recommend that is available in the UK?
Correct. Hue is an independent Zigbee mesh that routes by way of Hue bulb to Hue bulb. You can see the routing of HE Zigbee mesh, but it isn’t visual. For a visual representation of the Zigbee mesh, you need an Xbee.
The IKEA TRÅDFRI plugs route just fine, but are a bit weak so you need more of them. Can you get the new Samsung Zigbee outlets there? They are decent routers I have read from other accounts.
I have moved the ZigBee repeaters to the Hubitat hub.
I'm wondering if there could be issues with the fact that the Smartthings hub is also transmitting on the same radio frequency as the Hubitat hub.
I seem to recall that you can specify a channel number for ZigBee radio transmissions, so maybe something to pursue.
Alternatively, I could decommission the Smartthings hub sooner rather than later.
Ooh, didn't realise the IKEA repeaters were on the weak side.
Yes, you can get the Samsung outlets here and I did pair this outlet with HE, as U was going to use it for Xmas light automations. Oddly though, I had connectivity issues with that outlet. In the end, I reverted to a Tp-link kasa outlet I have instead.
I do have a spare IKEA repeater that I haven't paired with HE yet, so will try that.
How would you suggest the best way to force a rebuild of HE's ZigBee mesh?
Shouldn't need to force a repair as it does it it's self but if you must, your need to just safely shut down your hub and once it's shut down, down power it for 20-30 mins. Then power it back up, leave everything else powered during that time.
