Just installed a Hue Outdoor. Great sensor and very nice driver by @mike.maxwell. But it's one of the most expensive sensors I've installed to date, so I'd like to get the most out of it.
So far I'm using it for...
Activating Wyze Cam recordings
Turning on my garden lights after they have turned off to help enhance Wyze cam IR recordings
Additional outdoor temp gauge
Outdoor Lux readings
The obvious is to turn on my deck light, but after some head scratching, I've decided against that. The reason is I don't want it coming on every time someone briefly walks in range of the sensor. The next door neighbor does Air B&B and people enter from the rear door of his home, so this would cause my deck light to come on too frequently. I tried to come up with a rule that would only turn it on for lurkers, meaning if they kept the sensor active for more than 30 seconds, it would turn on, but this turned out to be more complicated than I could figure out.
Think maybe I want too much. Want to be able to turn on but only after a delay, but don't turn on if motion doesn't continue for longer than 30 seconds. But I still want to be able to turn on the light manually and adjust its dim levels from a pico without motion activity kicking in and automatically shutting off the light. Motion lighting seems to answer most of it, except for delayed on. One thought is a separate rule that activates a switch to disable ON, then turn that disable ON switch OFF after a delay. But the issue I can't figure out how to get around is that my wife and son like to use Alexa to turn on the deck light, while I like to use the Pico buttons. If I start triggering the lights with virtual switches, it gets overly complicated and I'm not certain I can maintain level control by voice. If anyone has ideas, I'm all ears.
What else can you do with an outdoor sensor? I may also add it as one of the triggers for auto-unlock, in the same way I have the front door, but I think it's largely unnecessary to have both doors setup for this.
Have you looked at the HomeSeer outdoor sensor? I have one on my desk but have not done anything with it. However it looks reasonably robust, it is however wired to the mains.
After reading your post I looked at the Hue motion sensor. I must say it looks great (plain and simple, not industrial looking).
I haven't thought this all the way through yet, but is there any way you could have the motion sensor turn on a virtual switch, then have that virtual switch trigger the "real" light under the right conditions (e.g., if it stays on for more than 30 seconds) while also being able to use it as a restriction in Motion Lighting? Again, haven't thought through the details--just seems like one possibility if you want to use ML.
You could have two covering the same desired area bit excluding each other's undesired areas (e.g., your neighbor's AirBnB), then turn the lights on automatically only if motion is detected on both instead of waiting 30 seconds. I guess that doesn't help with the "these are expensive" thing, though.
Yeah, I didn't want to go the mains powered route. If I had, I would have just added a contact sensor to a relay of a standard IR sensor. I was looking for something more refined and with more capabilities. Definitely found it with this sensor.
The inside / outside corner mount is so helpful too. Really doesn't stick out too much.
Maybe. I tried a few combinations with RM and virtual switches and kept running into roadblocks. I'll give that one a try with ML.
Yeah, I'm not going to cover such a small area with two of these expensive sensors. Our houses in my area are semi-detached. We have only 8 feet between each set of two attached houses. My neighbor that does Air BnB is the next semi over, so the distance between my Hue motion sensor and where his renters are walking by is just 16 feet.
This may sound a little hokey but can't you use a lower cost motion sensor and cover the part of the lens that would detect your neighbors? (you probably thought of this already)
this device taps out at something like 250 Lux, so effectively it can only distinguish between night and day, which you get for free in HE by using sunrise/sunset...
I use the hue outdoor Sensors along with a Gaurdline driveway motion sensors with a contact sensor wired to the base. The motion sensors are really good plenty of settings and crazy range. Also their field of view is pretty narrow and can be adjusted with the lens cover. 4 sensors per zone up to for zones. Not cheap though but neither is the hue.
With no Z-Wave repeaters in my house, and only two Z-Wave devices (will shrink to just one in a few months), it wouldn't be the one for me. Appreciate the recommendation, and someone will surely find it useful if they're looking for Z-Wave. But for me I think it would just be an issue outdoors beyond double brick.
The LUX range is 30 - 200 Lux and is only reported to Group 2 associated devices in the current version. The next version (2.0) will report LUX values to the hub (Group 1) as well.
Maybe. I tried a few combinations with RM and virtual switches and kept running into roadblocks. I'll give that one a try with ML.
