It was actually @thebearmay. I saw the post @user911 made earlier wishing that a troubleshooting document detailed the procedure. While in the past (a few years back) the Zigbee radio on C5 model occasionally stopped working, is not the same with C7. While in rare situations the radio may drop offline and restart on power cycle, more often than not the problem resurfaces, without taking measures to remedy what caused the radio to shut off, in the first place.
@user911 hope your situation is one of the rarities and the radio stays online. But if it goes offline again, please send me a PM. You may be dealing with a hardware malfunction.
This is a big community, the knowledge gets passed around quite a bit, and many times no one can recall who said it first. Main thing is that if there is a solution to be found someone on here will generally find it, even if it has absolutely nothing to do with their own implementation. None of us walk in here knowing everything about the platform, the strength of this community lies in the fact that as a collective group someone knows the answer and is willing to share that information.
I have 5 of these door sensors and I like them because they use a Hall effect sensor rather than a reed switch for sensing, and they seem very sensitive meaning I can have the magnet further away and the sensor will see it.
HOWEVER I am having a problem with the battery level being reported.
They seem to report NO MORE than 48% battery with NEW batteries.
So I measured the voltage at the battery holder while powering the sensor, and it was great! About 3.2 volts.
SO I tried an experiment, realizing that I might cook the sensor, but I wanted to test.
I connected a regulated bench supply to the battery contacts and increased the voltage until the reported battery was 100%.
That voltage was 4.35 volts.
I would imagine that the electronics are rated for 3.3 volts with a max of MAYBE 4.5, so 3 batteries might cook the sensor, so I didn't try for very long.
I wrote to 3rd reality to see what they have to say and am waiting for a response... we'll see.
I just like to monitor my battery devices to make sure they don't die without knowing, and things don't work.
What are others seeing as a battery level on these sensors?
Something seems odd with the way 3R reports battery, or HE parses it or something like that... There's another thread about battery reporting issues with 3R motion sensors.
I have 1 each 3R motion sensor and contact sensor... The motion sensor seems to be reporting OK on some Eneloop rechargeables, although it dropped from ~70 to 30-somthing in the last couple days so that seems odd...
But my contact sensor -- I use a AA battery conversion kit on that one, and I just now reverified that it's kicking out ~3v (2.99 to be exact) - exact same as the day I installed it last fall. My contact sensor was reading ~70% for as long as I can remember, but when I checked it after reading your post here, it's down to 34%. That's what prompted me to check the conversion kit.
I really like 3R stuff - though not super sexy, it's very reliable gear and the price is right... But there definitely seems to be an issue (maybe HE related, maybe not) with 3R's battery reporting.
Hi Hydro..
Thanks for responding!
I am happy to hear that someone else is having the same problem, although NOT what you want to hear!
Interesting that yours are reporting very low as well.
If I remember, when I first installed mine, they were reporting 100%... all of them!
Then over the last week or so, they dropped to where they are now... even after R/R the batteries.
Seems strange that all of the sensors are dropping off like this (the 3rdreality ones).
The fifth one I spoke of I JUST tried today so it was only on for a few MINUTES, unlike the others that have been on for weeks, and it too reports about 43%!
I wonder if one of the hub updates changed the way the battery levels are calculated for these sensors only.... weird.
I am going to try a few more things, but my opinion of these sensors is still high!
Thanks...
