I have an Ecowitt Air Quality sensor already in the kitchen area.
My question is:
Is it possible to rely on PM2.5 and PM10 reading from this sensor to detect something
could be overcooking?
If "yes", how fast these values will go up and what should/could be a reasonable thresholds?
I do have a functional sensor but so far I did not have such an event and of course, I don't want
to do some sort of testing.
Ideally (I guess) I should use a Smoke Detector and there is a ZWave Smoke Detector.
But the problem is: My wife does not want it to be installed in the kitchen.
Here is a little history behind this project.
Recently friend of mine had very unpleasant event. He left from his apartment but left something
cooking. Gladly he came back right before potential BIG disaster almost started. This immediately
triggered my brain for automating Range On/Off. Creating DIY High Power Switch was not a big
deal. First I looked for the existing Enbrighten and Aeotec 40A Zwave switches but did not like
both. So I ended up by using this nice 63A contactor with NC contacts: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B088PY31GC?psc=1&ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_product_details
controlled by ZEN51 Relay. Since the contactor is NC it is OFF all the time except for the time
when Range needs to be turned Off. And ZEN51 has an option to keep Relay Off when the device
is logically On.
Next step was - I immediately created two range related automations
(of course, now range has remote On/Off control):
Notify if Range in ON for more than 2.5 hours (checked this number with my wife),
Repeat notification 3 times every 5 min and if there was not any human interaction
turn Range off.
Turn Range Off if it is still On (something is still cooking0 but apartment is unoccupied.
Now I am thinking to detect a smoke from the potentially overcooked food and in case of
this event immediately turn Range Off.
I think it’s unlikely you could reliably distinguish the PM 2.5 and 10 readings of regular cooking from #s that are caused by something that’s about to turn into a fire.
To add to what @marktheknife says, do not rely on Hubitat to be any sort of life saving device. Use purpose built things like an actual smoke detector. Sure, add the smoke detector into hubitat if you want, but don't rely on hubitat. That could be fatal.
Yes, you are 100+% right. But for the case I described above using the HE is better
than nothing. I have never seen anything specifically designed for turning off a
range if something is overcooking. Now I am living in an apartment complex and
to my big surprise the building fire alarm sets off about once every 2-3 months.
The reason is - something is overcooking.
If it's an electric range, you could potentially use the GE 220volt relay. Then use an Ecolink firefighter with your existing smoke detector. If smoke detector goes off, it turns off the GE 220 relay.
You must have missed it a few years ago when this product was introduced (it was called Inirv back then, if that rings a bell) and lots of people made fun of it.
Whether it has that particular feature on its own, I don't know....
Yes, this is electric induction range. I alredy built DIY ZWave Switch and created
few rules. I am in apartment complex. Setting off a building fire alarm is $1000
per case. So far we are OK not to leave something cooking unattended. But I am
a person who wants to prevent a potential problems.
Wonder if that would work to keep my cats from turning the burners on? yes it happened. and there was an empty pizza box on top of the stove. Took weeks to get the smell of burning cardboard out of the house.
My beagle/basset hound did this once. Same exact thing, with pizza box on top of stove. I was lucky I happened to come downstairs just in time to see the box starting to smolder.
Yep, that's pretty much what happened in our house too, and it was right when I was getting ready for work on an overnight shift. On the low-tech, I got some silicone wedges that slip under the knobs. But where is the fun in low-tech?
We have a rule in our house that nothing other than pots and pans go on the stove. And all pot handles are rotated inward so a child can’t grab the handle and get burnt with whatever is in the pot.
