Automation - Period of Time Issues

SmartApps & Automations
1

Hi All

I’ve created an automation which should turn my smart plug off (if it’s on) and the power usage is below 15w between the hours of 23:30 and 6:30, problem is it’s only worked from what I can see, once. I’ve read a few things around the issues with the period of time option in the automation (like it only occurring on state changes and needing locations to be set correctly) but still no joy.

Any ideas?

2

Can you post a screenshot of your automation? That would help.

3

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4

so if you raise the power above 25W during that time period and then drop it back below, it doesn’t run?

5

The problem could be that SmartThings is looking for that plug to send a new event report of power less than 25W, or power dropped below 25W (which means it would first need to exceed 25W). Can your check the history tab for that plug and see if it is reporting any new power events during those hours? If it’s not, because it’s continuously at 0W usage, test it by running a load, first less than 25W, then above 25W if the lower load doesn’t result in the automation running.

I don’t propose this as a solution, just testing to understand why it’s not working. I’m experiencing similar frustrations with other automations that are supposed to take action when there is no motion for so long during a period of time. The problem is that rather than looking for the lack of a “motion detected” event during the period, it’s looking for a “motion stopped” event, meaning they’re must first be motion detected. This makes the automation useless if I’ve already gone to sleep before the time period.

6

That seems to be the case. I noted that it did run much later on when there was a change in the power usage (there’s always a background few watts for laptop charger etc.)

I guess I was expecting checks to run at 23:30 and continue until it was powered off

7

yeah, the beginning of the time range doesn’t act as a trigger. You can set an automation for a specific time and that will trigger the logic check. SO you may need two automations: one for specific time and one for time range.