The MailChime-Contact Sensor hack has worked most of the time over the last couple of years but the intermittent failures galled me. Enter a couple of long range zigbee devices recently mentioned in the HE forum:
Routers like Tube ZB
&
Visonic MCT-370 SMA contact sensor
I placed the router in a front windowsill with a not-too-good line-of-sight to the metal mailbox 200 feet away. There are shrubs and a couple of small trees blocking a straight path. I put the contact sensor in the mailbox and VOILA! mail notifications every time I tested.
The Mail Chime had an indicator light which we found handy. And we also have a separate package dropbox beside the garage that I'd wired with a contact sensor but an light would be a nice convenience.
So I cobbled together a 3-light "Alert Lights" box for one of the kitchen counters.
1 - Zemismart Tuya Zigbee 3-gangl Light Switch
1 - Plastic Project Box ABS IP65 Electronic Junction Box Enclosure 6.2 x 3.54 x 2.3 inch
3 - 120v indicator lights (red, clear, blue)
I’m curious about this, because I’ve not been able to get anything working reliably from my mailbox so far.
But I can’t quite figure out what a Zigbee router is, even after doing some searching. Does it work with Hubitat, so that the sensor in the mailbox shows up as a device in the Hubitat hub? Does the router itself get added as a device on Hubitat?
I’d also love to see a picture of your indicator box.
So a zigbee router is more or less just a repeater for lack of a better of a better description. It is stand alone. If you have any mains powered zigbee devices they are routers/repeaters They relay packets between end devices and the hub...
Yes. it shows up as a contact sensor. IF the hub was close to the mailbox and the signal strong enough, you wouldn't need a router at all. In my case, the signal wouldn't go the distance so I added the router as an extender.
The router is paired with HE as a 'Device' and -once paired & placed- you don't do anything else to it. It automatically becomes a transparent part of the zigbee network working in the background.
Tube ZB routers (linked to by @rcjordan) appear to be out of stock for a little while. I just want to point out that there are other high-powered routers available.
Some of us have flashed the Sonoff Zigbee 3.0 USB dongle with router firmware. It works well with Hubitat. There are some details and links in this older post:
IF the hub was close to the mailbox and the signal strong enough, you wouldn't need a router at all. In my case, the signal wouldn't go the distance so I added the router as an extender.
Yeah, I’ve tried both Zigbee and Z-Wave Plus sensors at my mailbox. It’s been a while since I attempted to do anything with it, but I think Zigbee didn’t work at all. The last set up I left in place was a Z-Wave Plus contact sensor with an external reed switch so the sensor could be outside the box. It was able to connect, but ultimately wasn’t stable enough, even doing the best I could to have repeat-capable devices as close to that side of the house as possible. I gave up for a while after that.
I appreciate the info! I don’t know that I want to mess around with flashing a device at this point in time. I did see the Tube was out of stock, but I’ll think on it for a while, maybe it will come back. Or I saw something about a waitlist on the site.
If you change your mind in the future, the programs to flash router firmware are available for Linux/Mac/Windows. Pre-compiled router firmware binaries are also available, and the entire flashing process takes about 2 minutes. All it requires is that the device be plugged into a USB port on the computer being used to flash firmware. The dongles are about $17-20 on eBay.
I’ve flashed about half-a-dozen for myself and friends, and I know that @Ken_Fraleigh has done a similar number. I used Linux and I believe he used Windows.
In case you change your mind, I’m not a programmer and I found the process pretty straightforward. There was nothing extra needed; plug it in to the usb on your PC, use TI’s free software to do the update, and the firmware is on github.
Thanks. It’s not really a matter of technical know how, I’ve got that. It’s just that I had a baby, she’s now four, and my brain is still scattered to the winds.
Hummm yah, maybe... but I think there's another version of that,
like when she hits 14 there will be days you'll WISH you could subtract 10 and go back to 4.
Been thinking about LOOOOONG RANGE Zigbee today and what could be done "at the device level" to improve signal.
Certainly a small solar panel, battery, and one of these low voltage Zigbee router/repeaters in a weatherproof enclosure on top of a well placed telephone pole (not one with bare wire 220V service mind you) would go a LONG way towards closing the gaps in a Zigbee mesh on most properties with reasonable line-of-sight to the boundaries. If one had lots of HA devices to reach "on the periphery" this would be the best "pure Zigbee" solution in my mind.
But I got to thinking of the inexpensive "passive" signal boosting hacks folks use try (still do) to extend Wifi and if you just had one device way out there....what could be done more simply.
If all one wanted to do was measure a remote temperature,
or have a simple contact sensor say wired to an external set of contacts,
and not control anything ...where reliable two-way communication would be critical,
could you use one of these Wifi dish backing techniques and at least make the one-way long range shot TO the hub (or an intermediary repeater)???
Questions to @mike.maxwell and anyone else that might have some knowledge here -
[With the assumption that most if not all Zigbee devices have variable (conservable) radio signal power levels.]
Do all Zigbee devices need to always hear from the hub from time to time after initial configuration/settings, even simple ones?
Do Zigbee devices rely on the hub to say "you're signal is poor, turn it up" or do the devices use their reception of the hub's signal to make that decision?
Does the highest level of radio transmission on most Zigbee devices burn up their batteries without question or is this heavily dependent on how busy/chatty the device is or is told to be?
Is that "highest level" actually a self varying feature in all cases or do some devices have a fixed signal level?
Lastly, is that "highest level" designed to be used just occasionally (like on a bad weather day) or is "high-all-the-time" designed in for cases where the device's positioning is poor relative to the hub or repeater?
@aaiyar uses a good outdoor zigbee repeater and @iharyadi 's presence senor has shock built in. It's very sensitive. This could work for you. Combo works good for around a 1/4 mile
Didn't know about that. Substantial reach for sure! EDIT: Whoops, I DID know about that but I wasn't as focused on the distance at the time as much as I was all the modular creativity he was building in.
Let me just add, my interests are indeed for that kind of distance and better.
In my (admittedly rural) experience, folks not able to get 150-175' outdoors with standard solutions just need to move stuff around, "look at what's in the way", and get the right channel(s) selected. Not saying it's not a stretch, but it's doable with a lot of the kit folks talk about in this forum (and often easier than getting across the dang house)!
EDIT #2:FOLKS SHOULD NOTE - That really IS tracking down the right path for a useful long ranged multi-tool. I forgot he had the standard external antenna connection. Stick that thing in a weatherproof enclosure with an external antenna, slap on a solar panel and battery, and presto. It's not the stick-a-metal-reflector-behind-a-cheap-sensor-solution but it also isn't likely to cause you the same level of two-way headaches.
