[RELEASE] FLAIR DEVICES with new capabilities for building physical zones in your home and controlling your mini/window splits, portable heaters/coolers

⚙️ Custom Apps and Drivers Custom Drivers
1

Hi,

I'm happy to announce 4 more new devices under Hubitat for better comfort and energy savings in your home automation scenarios.

A contribution fee is required due to the amount of work for the design, development, and testing of the devices (equivalent of a few cups of coffee).

Please note that the code has been optimized for the Hubitat platform. It's derived from the code which has been running for several years under the SmartThings platform (since Oct 2017).

To download the hubitat optimized code, go to

https://ecomatiqhomes.com/hubitatstore

My Puck device

HubitatPuck
HubitatPuck1804×909 100 KB

MyHvacUnit

HubitatMyHvacUnit
HubitatMyHvacUnit1882×904 102 KB

MyFlairVent

HubitatMyVent
HubitatMyVent1842×833 88.9 KB

MyFlairThermostat (read-0nly)

HubitatFlairTstat
HubitatFlairTstat1818×888 90 KB

The Flair devices enable multi zoned heating/cooling solutions for your home with new capabilities under Hubitat:

  • Amongst others, ability to control mini/window splits, portable heaters/coolers (ex. on/off, heat/cool/dry/fan modes, low/medium/high fan speed, swing on/off commands are supported) for heating/cooling some colder/hotter rooms using scheduled zone(s).
  • Support of the US and metric systems.
  • Compatible with my Zoned heating/cooling smartapps (ecobeeSetZoneWithSchedule & ScheduleTstatZones available at my store for targeted heating/cooling in your home)

For more details on the Flair HW capabilities, refer to the flair website.

I've developed more than 10k lines of code for integrating the Flair devices.

  • The code exposes all the relevant Flair devices:

    • The Puck device: the puck can be used as a sensor (temperature, humidity, room's pressure) and a gateway for your other flair devices. With My Flair HVACUnit (see below), the puck can control your Mini/Window splits, portable heaters/coolers via IR in a smarter way.

    • The Flair smart vent: can help you directing your airflow when you mostly need it in your home for colder/hotter rooms

    • The HVAC Unit: The device can control a large number of mini/window splits, portable heaters/coolers, etc. Flair supports over 250+ brands. You can find a full list at their website. If you don't find yours in the list, don't worry! Flair can easily add it to its database.

    • The Flair Tstat: at the moment, the Flair virtual Tstat can only be used as a sensor (humidity, temperature, heat/cool capabilities). It can be linked to the most popular brands of smart wifi thermostats (ecobee, Nest, and pretty soon Honeywell).

All Flair capabilities, commands & attributes are exposed for easier integration with Rule Engines (Rule Machine, WebCore or others)

- The code unlocks all Flair's rich APIs features.

- The code has been designed to work with my ecosystem of Zoned Heating/Cooling smartapps.

Here are the names of the zoned heating/cooling smartapps:

_For the ecobee thermostat:

EcobeeSetZoneWithSchedule (compatible with MyEcobee device only)

_For any ST (z-wave, zigbee, wifi) connected thermostat with standard capabilities:

ScheduleTstatZones

_This last smartapp has less features but can control the vents based on rooms' temp thresholds.

ScheduleRoomTempControl

Note:

**My zoned heating/cooling smartapps (ecobeeSetZoneWithSchedule, ScheduleTstatZones) have been designed to control your HVAC unit (window/split unit, portable heaters and coolers) in a smart way.

For example, as a zone/room thermostat, ecobeeSetZoneWithSchedule & ScheduleTstatZones can automatically choose the right fan speed depending on the temp differential in the zone and turn off the unit when it’s not part of the scheduled zones for a specific period of the day or when a specific room is not occupied (customizable options).**

Regards.

12 Likes
2

Hi,

With my zoning smartapps, you can enable targeted heating/cooling and leveraging all your temp/motion /contact/presence sensors in your home based on the concepts of rooms/zones/schedules.

See

Regards

3

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The award-winning Flair Puck

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Flair is proud to announce that the Flair Puck Pro was recently named the winner for mini split controls in the Lighting & Homes for Tomorrow competition. The judges said:

The Puck Pro fills a niche for mini-splits and has the ability to operate primary and secondary heating systems together for a seamless experience.

P.S. Here is a referral link to get some additional discounts (usually 10%) at Flair:

4

Is the Flair Puck required or is any temperature (and humidity) sensor already working on Hubitat OK?

Will this work with my Zen thermostat?

Can I still use Thermostat Controller which is currently referencing two temperature sensors in the master bedroom even though the Zen is in the living room?

My intention is to keep my daughter's bedroom from getting too hot or too cold compared to our bedroom.

Thanks for any information or suggestions!

5

Hi,

First, I need to know more about your use case.

  1. Do you want to install a portable heater/cooler in your daughter's bedroom? If so, you'd need the HVAC unit bundle which includes both the puck driver (which acts more like a sensor) and the hvacUnit driver which acts more like a thermostat.

Or

  1. You just want to install only some vent(s) in your daughter's bedroom? If so, the flair vent bundle includes both the Flair puck and the vent drivers...

And, in both cases, you need also the Puck unit (HW) as you need at least 1 puck to act as a gateway to the flair cloud.

Also, you may want to look into my zoning smartapps which are (of course) compatible with the Flair devices, and can leverage any Hubitat connected temp/motion/contact/presence sensors to control the vents and/or slave thermostats. You can create virtual zone(s) which you can control individually with an offset vs. the main tstat.

Regards.

1 Like
6

Thank you so much for the thoughtful reply!

I am not installing a separate heater/cooler device.

She has one vent above her bed. I measured the opening with the vent off at 8 1/2 by 10 inches at the drywall opening. The flow seemed kind of high with the vent off.

I guess my understanding of the sophistication of the Flair system is limited.

I was envisioning simple heater-on-room-too-hot-close-vent-a-bit / heater-on-room-too-cold-open-vent-a-bit, etc. sort of logic flow.

I wasn't thinking about the Flair Cloud. I am not a cloudophobe, though. I am open to any option to keep my daughter's room from being uncomfortable for her.

Probably a good option would be to have a separate return duct installed for her room but I would like to avoid major renovations.

This is a 40 year-old house that we moved into about six months ago.

Thanks again for your thoughtful reply!

:slightly_smiling_face:

:cold_face::cold_face::cold_face:

7

Welp, we survived the freeze!

It was 48 degrees inside the house.
Fortunately, we were able to move in with in-laws until our power came back.

So, 8 1/2 x 10 vent seems to be the biggest challenge right now because it is outside the Keen line. I saw spacers mentioned in another thread. Is that what spacers are for? I could replace the vent and do a little sheet-rock work but obviously I'm not excited about that.

Thanks for your comments.

8

Hi,

I have 21 smart flair vents & 4 regular (dumb) vents, located on two floors, between 15 rooms. I have 1 nest thermostat connected to a central heat/hvac system. I have hubitat hub (Rev C-7) running the latest release 2.2.7.126, that integrates with the nest hub using (Google SDM API) and controls it via the standard Thermostat Controller & Thermostat Scheduler packages.

Currently I am not controlling the flair vents. I would like to do this because some rooms in the basement tend to be, up to 10 degrees lower than the rest of the ground level. Also I have invested already in nest thermostat and various temperature sensors that are integrated with hubitat.

I would like to create zones in each room, that can be then maintained at the set temperature, as needed, by being heated or cooled, as needed.

I have downloaded the complete HubitatFlairBundle & the HubitatMyNextBundle.

I was able to add the Hubitat Flair apps & devices without issue and also instantiate MyFlairServiceMgr successfully.

When I attempt to add the MyVirtualZoneForHubitat.txt, I receive an error message at the top of the App Code screen: "Cannot get property 'input' on null object on line 20". Can you please advise how to resolve the issue I am running into?

Also do you see any challenges in accomplishing what I am trying to do?

Regards

9

Hi @misbah, the virtual zone device for Hubitat is part of the ScheduleTstatZone package included in the MyNextBundle.

As such, you cannot paste the code as an app, but a device only. Pasting the driver code as an app will give you the error message that you mentioned.

Please follow the readme steps at the github for ScheduleTstatZones:

In order to properly control your flair vents, please follow the prerequisites at the community wiki.

https://thingsthataresmart.wiki/index.php?title=My_Flair_Vent#Prerequisites

Especially, the following:

  • Manual mode enabled in the flair app (as you're letting your automation hub control the flair device(s), not Flair)

For more details on the use cases supported by ScheduleTstatZones (which allows you to control your Nest tstat and your flair vents based on the concepts of rooms/zones/schedules) please refer to the use case documentation:

https://thingsthataresmart.wiki/index.php?title=ScheduleTstatZones#Configuration

P.S. My zoning smartapp has been integrated with MyNextTstat driver, and as such, I cannot guarantee that any other Nest driver implementation will work with it (ex. Google SDM API). MyNextBundle has a more thorough implementation of the Nest Tstat as the APIs I'm using have more commands available, and are not subject to rate limiting. For example, ScheduleTstatZones can switch your home structure to present or away using all your connected motion sensors; such commands are not available in the standard Google SDM APIs.

Regards.

1 Like
10

Thank you for your guidance. I was able to use the instructions to successfully get MyNextManager working with the nest thermostats & sensors. I had to reset the nest thermostats, however, that resolved the issue of them not showing up initially -- not a bid deal.

I have proceeded to configure the ScheduleTstatZones for the area I described:

I have 21 smart flair vents & 4 regular (dumb) vents, located on two floors, between 15 rooms. I have 1 nest thermostat connected to a central heat/hvac system. I have hubitat hub (Rev C-7) running the latest release 2.2.7.126, that integrates with the nest hub using (MyNextManager).

I am observing that the HVAC system does not flip to heat to raise the temperature of zones/rooms when they are too cool. I see currently:

ZonedRoomsMinTemp: 58.6F
ZonedRoomsMaxTemp: 77.0F
ZonedRoomsMedianTemp: 67.8F
ZonedRoomsAverageTemp: 68.8F
ZonedRoomsTempCount: 14
AvgTempDiffInZone: -6.6F

Which is a significant delta in max and min -- which why I installed the zoning solution. In the schedule setup I have specified the temperature I would like to maintain the different zones at over the course of a day. Any thoughts on what I may be doing wrong?

Misbah

11

@misbah The zoning smartapp can adjust the thermostat's setpoint based on different calculation methods (average, median, min, max, heat-min/cool-max) in GeneralSetup page for all your zoned rooms that are part of your active schedule.

You can also adjust the target temperature for each zone using the virtual zone devices. The target temperature will be used for the vent adjustment settings in order to redirect most airflow to the cooler/hotter rooms.

Please follow the configuration steps below:

https://thingsthataresmart.wiki/index.php?title=ScheduleTstatZones#Use_case_.231:_I_have_a_single_HVAC_system_with_1_main_thermostat

As you have only 1 HVAC, the zoning smartapp will not call for heat/cool based on each room's threshold to avoid short cycles, which can damage your HVAC.

All features of my zoning smartapp are documented at the Community wiki:

https://thingsthataresmart.wiki/index.php?title=ScheduleTstatZones#Supported_Features

Regards.

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13

So I got my flair vents working with Hubitat.. However, I can't seem to get them to show up when linking them in the Google Home app.. I was able to do this with Smartthings, but every time I try to select the vents when linking hubitat to google home, they don't show up.

Any suggestions?

Thanks!

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Hi, I've already replied to your email.

P. S. I assume that you have asked Google Home to rediscover your devices, as this is not done automatically.

Regards.

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That might be someone else since I have only reached out here and not via email.

I already authorized and relinked all devices to google home but the flair vents don't show up in Google home. Everything else does that I add.

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Hi, there is no difference between the capabilities in SmartThings vs Hubitat. So, I don't have any explanations for this behavior.

Regards

17

Trying to add/authorize just a single vent from hubitat to Google Home I get a "Something went wrong. Try Again." message.. attached screenshots.

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Only thing I could add was the hvac (in room ac) from hubitat that uses the flair integration.

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Hi, this is beyond the scope of my code. I cannot help you on this (and I don't have Google Home at home). There may be an issue with your Google Home account.

Regards.

19

Yeah it doesn't recognize the vent device type being sent from hubitat. I'll try to work around it using a virtual switch.

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I have a three-level house. Large areas of the house were experiencing up to 10 degrees difference in temperature. I looked into zoning solutions and eventually decided on the promise of flair vents + Hubitat (with maisonsecomatiq.com software).

After spending 1 hour with Yves from maisonsecomatiq.com I have been extremely impressed with how well the solution works. My house is now finally comfortable everywhere. Different zones say with 1-2 degrees F using the system. And each zone is functioning as you would expect. Very impressed with how Yves' solution pulls it all together. And simply works well. Moreover, Yves' software is quiet flexible for different use cases and system configurations.

A little bit about my setup to give you an idea:

  • The ground floor and basement combined have 15 rooms split into 7 zones. There is 1 nest thermostat that controls a forced-air heating & cool system with 19 vents among the rooms, 2 flair puck in 2 rooms.

  • The 2nd floor has a separate AC (connected to a thermostat) that runs to all 7 rooms and 7 zones. 6 of the rooms have electric radiant heating systems, each connected to a separate nest thermostat. The 2nd floor has 1 flair vent in a room.

A flair puck on each floor was sufficient to give me connectivity. To give you an idea each floor is spread over 1700-2000 sq ft.

For temperature sensing I have combined the multiple temperature sensors in each room by averaging what they are sensing for each room -- to get a more comfortable room temp. For this I use the "Averaging Plus" solution. All rooms have at least one Philips hue motion sensor. Some have a nest thermostat and nest temperature sensor as well. Combining all through Averaging Plus is perhaps overkill but ensures the locations of temperature sensing devices becomes less of an issue that I need to tweak for.

I choose to run the flair vents and nest temperature & thermostat integration on one habitat hub. And the scheduler integration on another hub. This created an extremely responsive solution. I could have probably gotten away with a single hub solution.

Thank you Yves! I feel great about my investment in Nest, flair vents, Hiubitat & Averaging Plus! The system while complex, simply works well. And I have not had any robustness issues. Moreover, I can tell through my sense energy monitor my energy consumption is more efficient. I do not have metrics to share since I have brought in multiple smart home improvements over time and did not track precise outcomes. But in relative terms, I can tell the system is working well, creating a comfortable home, while saving energy.

Misbah

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