So real long story short I migrated from a v2 hub to v3. Overall the process worked great and everything (knock on wood) has been stable. Except for two ZigBee leak sensors. Now the two that I’m having a issue with are in bad locations. One is at the drain under my furnace (big sheet metal return duct above it) and one is between my washer and dryer (between to big metal boxes). If I move them out of those spots and refresh they come back. So I did what I though was logical and started with adding a ZigBee outlet in the kitchen (first floor) about 8 feet from the laundry room and above the furnace (basement). I gave it a couple days but it didn’t help at all, both still unresponsive. So I then added another ZigBee outlet in the basement about 6 feet from the furnace and about 10 feet underneath the washer/dryer. This outlet literally has line of site (through a hallow wooden door) to the basement leak sensor and one standard construction (wood) floor between it and the laundry room. However after 3 days it seems they have not updated their routes.
Now there is a Ubiquiti AC-Pro access point in the basement near both these sensors but there is a third leak sensor just as close to the AP (and even further from the hub) that does work. I also changed the channel to be as far away from the ZigBee channel as I could. So I can’t blame that yet, especially since I have another AP on the second floor a few feet away from a leak sensor up there that’s fine. I went thought the SmartThings guide on wireless range and looking over everything the last thing to do was unplug the hub, wait 20 minutes, and plug it back in so these two leak sensors hopefully attach to the repeaters.
Did that, actually closer to 30 minutes since I forgot about it, waited 24 hours, everything back up except these two leak sensors. Physically move the leak sensors out from where they are and voila they talk.
Anything else I can do? I’m about to physically move the hub to a central location in the house, which is doable (have a outlet in the utility room, just have to run some Ethernet), but rather not if I’m missing something dumb. Also I have arrival sensors in both cars along with a multi purpose on the garage door that are all zigbee with no issues. I thought that when the hub was off the leak sensors would try to find a new connection, which would be the very close by outlets, but they didn’t seem to.
Yes, those. And I have to imagine The hub is the parent and they just won’t switch based on the results I’m getting. I haven’t bothered to contact them yet.
One of the things that can happen when you migrate is you end up adding devices in a different order than they were originally added in and this can result in the wrong parents being chosen. This can be tricky to diagnose and troubleshoot and smartthings doesn’t give us any mapping utilities.
What’s the brand and model of the repeater pocket sockets that you are using?
It’s possible that the parent device is filling up all its child slots before the device that you want to have use it gets to select it. This is actually more common when you are having some signal strength issues because the strongest children may get chosen first.
You could try forcing the problematic sensors to be selected first By taking everything else off power except the hub, then adding the new repeater, and then adding the problematic sensors. And then powering up everybody else.
The biggest problem with this kind of selective route approach is that if your hub loses power in the future, when it comes back, you lose control of the routing again unless you repeat the original procedure. So just something to be aware of.
It’s something you could try, anyway. If it doesn’t work, then for whatever reason it just seems like those locations are not going to be suitable.
Everything zigbee in the house right now is a new 2018 Samsung sensor including all of the outlets. And when I set the new hub up I purposely installed the outlet in the kitchen first, followed by one upstairs, followed by one in my living room and after those three were set up I went through and added all the multi-purpose sensors, leak sensors, and motion sensors. So I would think the order how I set everything up is correct.
I have a couple 50 foot ethernet patch cables, maybe I’ll just temporarily move the hub into the utility room and see if everything comes up. It’s literally in the exact center of the house in the basement. I might even unplug all the pocket sockets and see if everything comes up with the hub at that location. If so I just might leave it.
“In the basement” is never a good place for a hub. Same with a garage. Typically there is cement, lots of metal, water pipes, etc. “Centrally located” for a hub means vertically as well as horizontally.
Do you still have some of the older Centralite OEM Leak Sensors? Newer does not always equate to better, in my experience. I still feel Centralite Zigbee devices are among some of the most reliable I have used. If you have them, try using them in those two locations. I have one in my attic, in a steel HVAC drip pan, with a steel HVAC unit directly above it. I am always amazed at how reliable it has been. I bought a bunch of the Lowes Leak Sensors on clearance (all Centralite) and they are working great.
Samsung/SmartThings changed away from Centralite most likely for cost, not quality. I like the design of the new ST Leak Sensors, with a sensor on top as well as on the bottom.
The hub is currently in the basement, in a corner storage room. Old hub was in the same spot and I didn’t have this issue (had outlets/sensors in the same places also). Technically if I wanted to use the v3 hubs WiFi I could put it in the center of the first floor and unplug all the outlets and see how it does. Its a pretty boxy house…the furthest point from dead center is maybe 40ish feet. I just am trying not have the hub out in the open.
I do have a couple of the older leak sensors, I can definitely try a couple and see if it makes a difference. I really do think though that they just aren’t updating their routes…especially the one 6 feet away.
Maybe I should kill the hub then pull the batteries on the sensors to reset them, wait a half hour or so then bring the hub back online. Maybe they never woke up while the hub was down so they didn’t move.
Just a follow-up. Turns out the devices were sleepy and just never tried reporting while the hub was down so therefore they never changed their route (I’m assuming). I unplugged the hub again and actually removed the outlet in the basement in the hopes they would sync up to the one in the kitchen. I opened each device, pull the battery for about 10 seconds, and plugged it back in. Both after a few seconds went to a solid LED and then turned off. I put them back in their respective locations and now 24 hours later they are still communicating just fine. So it appears when they woke up they looked for the nearest repeater which was my kitchen outlet and connected to that. I haven’t verified by unplugging the kitchen outlet but seeing as things are stable I don’t really want to rock the boat.
