Boat Alarm System

Wiki Projects & Stories
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I’m starting my boat alarm system project. I had a pretty decent boat alarm working well on my old platform, a Lowes Iris system. This included a hack of the contact closure sensors to create a dry contact sensor.

My new Smartthings hub shipped from Samsung yesterday. I also ordered several Frotrezz MIMO units. These will be used to sense contact closure, and I would also like to use one to sense the 12V DC battery system on the boat and set alarm points…

Of course there is also the re-pairing of devices like my water sensors for bilge water, and adding new motion sensors, and re-pairing the zigbee outlet controls, and the controlls for the electric built in heaters.

Can’t wait to get started.

Question… I read about the new App vs the classic App. Is the classic app more powerful?

Also, rewgarding reading voltages using the MIMO, hve many people done that?

Thanks, and I cannot wait for the new hub to arrive so I can start learning the new system.

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Welcome! What kind of boat? :sunglasses:. (I used to spend a lot of time on the water, mostly sailboats but also deep-sea fishing, but that’s no longer practical for me. )

for right now, the classic app is much more powerful than the new app, if only because you can’t use any custom smart apps with the new app. But they’ve also told us that the classic app will be going away eventually, although no timeline has been given. You can use both at the same time, and some people are, so that’s another option for now. Just be aware that the “smart home manager” in the new app is a completely different features than the one in the classic app even though they have the same name. So if you set up something with SHM in the new app you won’t be able to disarm it in the classic app, and vice a versa. ( that confuses a lot of people.)

See the following FAQ (the topic title is a clickable link)

I’m tagging @johnconstantelo and @twack on the mimolite questions. @ogiewon might also know of some similar use cases as he’s one of the major maker contributors to the community.

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Welcome!

Depending on what you do, the device handlers (especially custom ones) you use, and some SmartApps, Classic may be more appropriate for your use case. New new app will probably work for you, but I think Classic may work better for you.

I used those at one time, but not like what you want to do with them. I can’t recall if anyone has done that either. I’ll search the Community a little later tonight to see what I can find.

My advice is to be patient, especially with the differences between the new app and Classic, and which one to use to get your hub set up. We’re all here to help.

I’m also a boater, so I’m curious to see what you come up with!

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You might also find the following of interest.

This one is specifically about setting up complex rules:

And you might also want to take a look at the quick browse lists in the community – created wiki. They are a much faster way of searching the forum, particularly for project reports and custom code. :wink:

http://thingsthataresmart.wiki/index.php?title=How_to_Quick_Browse_the_Community-Created_SmartApps_Forum_Section

Also this, if you haven’t seen it already:

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Thanks! It’s a Bayliner 4788, basically a ocean going coastal cruiser. I’s my almost full time home.

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OK, as a fellow boater here is what I had with Iris, so I’m going to try to reproduce that and grow as well.

GE on off switches for each of the three 120 volt built in heaters. These took temp from themotion sensors in each room and turned on and off the electric heaters.

Diesel furnace control. This was through a smart outlet tied to a relay that would allow me to turn on and off the desel furnace. Had two of these. For this I am thinking of replacing the smart outlet with a MIMO lite and use the relay function to control the furnace and currently unused 12 volt signal to report back furnace flame status.

Shore power, inverter power sensing. This was used through hacked contact sensors fed from 120V relays to report loss of shore power, and loss of inverter power. This is something I’m looking at using the MIMO devices for.

Battery state. This was previously a hacked contact sensor to read the contact state of the boats State Of Charg meter that I had set to alarm at 12.25 volts indicating a battery charger failure. The hope is to use a MIMO to read the voltaqge directly, and then setting alarm points for notification. If that does not work I’ll use the MIMO to read the contact state like I do now.

Water sensors. two of these for both watertight compartments in the bilge.

Smoke, CO alarm integration. This is for reporting and alarm sounding.

Motion sensors, used for intrusion and temp sensing.

Smart outlet used for engine room electric heat
Smart outlet used to control a fan to direct air from the deisel heated main cabin to the engine room based on temp.
Smart outlet, used to control a alarm bell

Again, Thanks for the help. I’ll have a bunch of questions.

Intresting about the “smart app” ability on the classic app. Is this s situation where you can load device specific code for devices that the smartthings hub is not familiar with???

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This should answer the questions about what custom code is, how you use it, and what the terminology is. :sunglasses:

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Thanks for the explanaton!

So now let’s talk about controlling devices a bit, so I can get a handfle on how that is done. I am Very perliminary in even asking this as it will probably explain itself when I get my hub, and stasrt bench testing.

Lets say that I want to monitor the temperature from a device, and use that temperature to turn another device like a smartplug, or a smartswitch on and off.

Do I have to write a smart app? Or are these kind of smart apps already built into the smartthings app. Is this where the classic app differes from the new version?

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Did I give you the complex rules FAQ yet? If not, start with that:

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You had posted that earler, but in all my reading I missed it.

I’m impressed. Great writeup, but at this point i am wondering why I didn’t transition to the smartthings hub long ago.

It’s really simple. I saw the Lowes Iris at lowes one day and bught it as a home security system, and then put it on my boat, and kind grew within it’s limitations.

This is going to be easy peasy. I’m not a programmer by trade, but I am a electronics tech that specialized Networking, and electrical utility automation, so easy peasy.

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BTW, The official rules engine built into the new app is much better than the official rules engine built into the classic app. But both can only do about 20% of what webcore, which is unofficial, can. So it just depends on what you need. :sunglasses:

And we need more hardware and networking people around here. You know, the ones who know physics counts. LOL! :laughing:

Network engineer <=======

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Ah, another network engineer :grin:

CCNP Route Switch here. With enough knowledge to realize just how little I really know.

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Also note that with the new v3 hub, you need to use the new app for the initial setup. After that you can switch back and forth as you wish.

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OK, this is how my Iris converson project is shaping up.

This is based on functions

Bilge water monitoring and alarming. Currently I am using two everspring water leak detectors. They are compatible with smartthings so I will just have to re-pair them.

Fire, smoke, and CO alarming. Right now I have five smoke/co alarms that are First Alert brand and are smartthings compatible. These will be re-paired.

AC power sensing. My boat is equipped with a UPS, plus an inverter, and either shore power or generator. The old sensors I had are incompatible. I will use Fortrezz MIMO Lite units for this

DC power sensing. The old sensor is imcompatible. I’ll use a Fortrezz MIMO Lite for this. First step is that I will try to read DC voltage as a analog value and set alarm points based on that. If that function fails then I’ll use the MIMO on my State Of Charge meter’s alarm contacts which is what I’m doing right now.

Temperature sensing. Most of the temperature sensing is currently with incompatible motion sensors. I have 10 smartthings motion sensors on order. This will also serve as the intrusion sensing.

Built in electric heater control. Right now I have three GE smart switches. These are compatible with smartthings and will be re-paired. These are automated using adjacent motion sensors for temperature, making a virtural thermostat. I’m thinking this will be easy with smartthings.

Diesel furnace control. This is just a on off function. Right now I have two Lowes smart switches which are really Centralite Series 3 units. these are smartthings compatible and will be re-paired.

Engine room warm air control. This is also just a inconpatible smart switch. I have a Aeotech smartswitch 6 on order as a replacement. This will be paired with a smartthings motion sensor to make a virtural thermostat

Engine Room electric heater This is also a incompatible smart switch and will be replaced with a aerotech smartswitch6 paired with a smartthings motion sensor to make a virtual thermostat.

Notifications and alarming. I have a Utilitech wireless indoor siren as well as a 120 volt school bell driven by a smartplug. This will be re-paired to work with smartthings. Right now I have phone notificaton through Lowes, but I haven’t found that feature all that useful, so I’ll be dependant on email and push notifications when I’m not onboard.

In the future I’ll probably change things up a bit but this will get me back to my current functionality. For example I’ll probably use MIMO units for the furnace control, and the Aeotech nano switch to control the engine room electric heater, but first step is I need to get a functioning system prior to the Iris shutdown.

As of right now I have all the new comnponents on order and am waiting for things to arrive to start the process.