Motion Sensor with Switch Override

Not sure how best to address this scenario:

I have an Iris Motion Sensor in our Utility Room with a Jasco On/Off 3-way switch and Jasco 3-way Add-on Switch. I have used Simple motion lighting to turn the switch ON during motion detection and then turn off after 1 minute. It works fine but my wife wanted the ability to "override" the light so it would stay ON if she was in the room but wasn't necessarily "active" (sometimes she is loading clothes in the washing machine which is outside the sensor or is arranging items inside a pantry which is outside the sensor too). Both of the switches are inside the room. Typically when someone enters the room, the app will turn the light on and off once motion detection has become inactive as expected.

But what I can't figure out is how can I create an "override" if the motion app has already "turned on" the switch to light the room. Pushing the UP/ON on the either 3-way switch doesn't send an additional signal to the hub as it is already "ON".

Any other ideas or suggestions on how to address this situation?

Hi Gary, probably not the answer you are looking for, but I was trying to do something similar and read several posts here that answered it with the simplest solution, increase the turn off time to 5 minutes or 15 minutes etc.

Thanks, cfunk30. However, the utility light typically shines directly into our Den which is why I've set up RM to turn off the light after no motion activity like 10 seconds since most the time someone is just travelling through and not staying in Utility room for very long.

I don't have any GE switches anymore (hooray!), but do they send scene/button events even if they don't send another "on" event? Turn on debug logging and keep live logs open when you tap the paddle up for a second time, even after it's been turned on, and see if it logs anything. It may not; I'm just saying to check; if you see something but it's not interpreted as anything by Hubitat, then there is at least hope. If that doesn't work, try a double-tap. Their newer switches support a poorly-documented multi-tap function (I don't think older ones do, but again...they don't really brag about this). If you see something with either one of these (single or double tap when already on), there is a community driver that could help you make use of these events, though the Generic Z-Wave Central Scene Switch driver might do it too. So if that works, a double-tap up could be used for this, and you could use that button event in Motion Lighting as a "button to keep on" (or whatever that setting is called).

1 Like

Thanks, @bertabcd1234. Yes, they are the older gen 1 GE/Jasco switches. I had checked the logs and didn't see any additional events when tapping or double-tapping those switches. I just installed an iNovelli On/Off Red Series switch in another part of the house and have since thought that replacing with a similar switch would be a better solution as my wife could double-tap to turn "on" a virtual switch to keep the utility light turned on -OR- add several more motion sensors within the room to capture the entire room for any motion.

I truly appreciate the suggestions!

Also, most all of my switches I installed years ago were the GE/Jasco gen 1 switches (Z-wave, not plus). I've replaced a few throughout the house with Gen2 Zwave-Plus. Do you suggest another make/model?

On the Inovelli, you could double tap but wouldn't even need to--it will send some event on a single tap regardless (pretty sure even the Black Series will do this too). I highly recommend eliminating the classic Z-Wave GE switches, especially if you have to poll then for your usage, but lots of people use them still even if only for less common areas like closets.

I like Inovelli and Zooz, but the newer GE ones don't look bad either (either the current/slim or previous generation). I don't mind my HomeSeer, but they're kind of expensive (but were the most featured option at that time; Inovelli has caught up, if not surpassed, and Zooz is similar feature-wise if you don't need the LED).

1 Like