Z-Wave Lock (Yale Assure 2) - why so many route changes?

[Alan_F]

TLDR: My new Z-wave lock is showing a large number of route changes on the Z-wave details page, but I don't think it is really changing routes. The Z-wave logs are also showing "routeChanged: true" when it doesn't appear any route change happened. The lock wouldn't work reliably until I moved the hub closer to it. I'm looking for any insight as to what is going on.

I just installed a Yale Assure Lock 2 which uses a 500-series Z-wave plus module and connects using S0. This is currently my only S0 device, although I plan to add two more of these locks soon. My only other secure connection is a smoke detector connected by S2. I have a total of 40 Z-wave devices in the network, with a handful being battery powered and the rest repeating. The Z-Wave mesh has always been very reliable.

When I first paired the lock to my C-8 Pro, it was constantly changing routes (as displayed in Settings -> Z-Wave Details) and statuses/commands were sometimes getting delayed or dropped. I tried to exclude it and re-include it to my network, but had not luck getting it to exclude through the Yale app, so I force removed it, used a Zooz Z-stick to remove the resulting ghost device, and reset the lock.

After re-including it in the network, I found it was still changing it's routes constantly. Sometimes it would connect directly to the hub, and sometimes through one hop. I always showed a 40 kbps connection rate, but I was still having delayed commands and missed statuses.

I decided to move my hub closer to the door where the lock is installed, and that seems to have made the lock work 100% reliably. Commands are executed without delay, and status messages sent when the lock is manually locked or unlocked appear in the logs instantly.

The strange thing is that I'm still seeing lots and lots of route changes in the Z-Wave details page, even though I don't think the lock has done anything other than connect directly since i relocated the hub.

This morning it was showing 119 route changes. Now it is at 141... check that.. it went up to 143 since I started typing.

This is what the Z-wave mesh looks like with the hub in its new location. The topology shows a direct connection from the hub to all but two devices:

I installed the "Reliable Z-Wave Locks" app from Hubitat Package Manager and it is polling the lock every 30 minutes. The Z-Wave logs seem to show these poll events:

Why do the logs show 'routeChanged: true' on some lines when every line shows "repeaters: None"?

Should I worry about the high count of route changes on the Z-Wave details page if the lock is otherwise working ok?

Shouldn't the lock have been able to work reliably through a repeater when the hub was further away? Is the C-8 Pro's Z-wave chipset too new to work well with the 500-series module in the lock?

[dnickel]

I have had 4 of this type lock over the past 6+ years.
No matter what chipset (500, 700) they have always changed routes hundreds of times and are rarely DIRECT.
I have tried nearby repeaters but they just don't care; they do whatever ZWave.org's secret sauce tells them to do.
Of my 53 Z-Wave devices these are the only ones that do this.

[csteele]

I have two of them and both are S0. Batteries have been the only thing of any concern at all. They last for a year or more, so I pretty much just ignore them.

The Hub that they are connected to was recently swapped from a C-7 to a C-8 using Cloud Migration. That's probably the reason for missing numbers, such as RTT. Today is the first time I looked at them in the hub since the swap.

This is just my way of saying.. you are right, there is no requirement for large route changes.

Edit:
I did a repair on them followed by a Refresh from each Device Info page. That allowed the numbers to be updated.

[dnickel]

Interesting on the batteries.
I have to change mine every 6-8 weeks.
I have rechargables in them so they do not go down as far as a "real" battery.
2 are S0 and the new 700 series is S2.
My route changes are always nuts. I rebooted 2 hours ago and the climb is afoot.

[Alan_F]

@dnickel - Where did you get the 700-series one? I ordered my lock directly from Yale last week and they're shipping the 500-series. The only source I see for 700-series is EBay at about $100 for a module, which is crazy considering I just ordered my second lock from Amazon for $160 with the module included.

I wonder if any of Z-wave gurus can weigh in on whether these reported route changes are real or whether they could be erroneous reports.

When it was having issues, I could see it going through different repeaters on the settings page, changing after almost every command. However now that it's direct and working well, I've never seen anything but direct to the hub when I refresh the z-wave settings page, yet the route change count keeps going up.

[dnickel]

I got it from where I work, we get them for security jobs.
I will have DIRECT today and 2 hops tomorrow; never stays in one place very long.
I did try to change to ZB with a link from a member here who said his cards worked but mine didn't Same supplier but they came up as Control4 when including. Sadly no returns.

[ireallyhopethisworks]

I don’t have a Yale lock, but I have three Schlage BE469ZP. I installed one maybe two years ago. It paired smoothly and worked well with the Reliable Lock app. However it always had a ton of route changes. 100+ was typical. Nonetheless it always was connected directly.

When I added two more of these locks, they too paired smoothly, were connected directly, and had 100-200 route changes. They also worked well with Reliable Locks.

I concluded there was something erroneous about the route changes statistic and decided to ignore them.

Fast forward 6 months and my original lock when haywire after a battery change. Wouldn’t respond, wouldn’t pair. I replaced it with another BE469ZP. It paired perfectly and works well. I never tried it without Reliable Locks, but it is working great with that app.

Interestingly, after I swapped out the lock that went haywire for a new lock, all three locks had dramatically lower route changes. Not zero, but it went from 100-200 down to 10-30. All three are always directly connected.