I have four Yale Zwave locks. They all work well except that they all show 100% battery all the time, even when the batteries are too low to allow the lock to function. They are installed using the generic Zwave lock driver. In that drive there does not appear to be any way to manually "refresh" the device. Would appreciate any suggestions on next steps to try and get correct battery level information.
Are they lithium batteries? If so, that's not at all untypical.
I let almost all of my battery devices go to complete battery failure before replacing (so I don't even bother monitoring %s anymore).
The only exception are my locks -- those get a fresh set of lithiums every fall no matter what (those batteries last at least a year with no worries).
It's printed right on my Yale Assure 2 and in the manual "use only alkaline batteries."
I found this in a similar discussion.....
"The reason for not using rechargeable batteries for things like locks is the discharge rate of the battery with some chemistries can have a rapid fall at the end of their charge. Alkaline batteries have a smooth and gradual voltage drop over their life. Rechargeable can maintain full voltage to near the very end, then rapidly drop. Low voltage warnings on devices rely on voltage levels, so an Alkaline will have plenty of life still after a battery warning, but a rechargeable might give you only a couple openings or a few days of standby before it’s dead. If you change batteries immediately at the first warning, or just on a preemptive schedule, you can use rechargeable batteries."
Generally, I'm a rule follower. So, I use alkaline batteries. YMMV
Yep, me too. But, I do monitor battery % on all my battery devices, with variable reliability.
There is a refresh button on the device page. Might not show up in RM unless you use custom actions.
I have a Yale Assure SL2 YRD256.
It does not appear to get a battery report with the refresh though.
Lithiums or rechargables are perfectly fine & safe to use, as long as you understand and account for the sudden EOL drop-off. That's why I started my post above by saying OP's battery behavior isn't untypical if lithiums are in play.
Yale uses that "alkaline only" language because they (very understandably) don't want to deal with the hassle of upset customers who got caught short by that steep EOL drop-off.
My method of mitigating that drop-off is to preemptively swap the batteries annually, and my mileage there has been excellent for 10+ years now. I use lithiums because their cold-weather performance is leagues above alkaline or rechargables.
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Appreciate the responses although this has turned into a thread about battery type and life and I am concerned about battery reporting to my Hubitat system. Sounds like everyone is more or less saying the 100% is probably correct, only I have had locks go dead from low or dead battery while still showing 100%. I can also do an annual battery swap, like a smoke detector, I suppose but I would still like the make the system work like it is designed to work. I will go back and look for that refresh button again.
What kind of batteries are you using? If alkaline, then you should be able to get pretty decent % monitoring, since the decline is pretty steady and linear.
If lithium or rechargeable, the EOL decline is very abrupt and steep -- nothing will change or improve that.
The hub just displays whatever the device reports, there is no magic to it. You can check the event log to see when it is getting reported. Typically battery events are forced so it should show in the everts even if it has not changed. Locks typically report the battery level multiple times a day.
The only way the reporting could be changed is with a firmware update from the lock manufacturer. Or possibly parameter settings.
