Garage Door Control after v2?

Apps & Clients Android
41

today this solution stopped working for me. it will not open the door teh icon changes to opening but never triggers the relay, pressing the relay still works just not the all in one button

42

very weird! I deleted both devices and started again and it just will not work today with @chrisb 's code. yesterday it worked fine, Iā€™m not sure if its a smart things issue (status says its all good but Im not sure that means anything at all). my multi is still (again) a SmartSense Garage Door Sensor Button as it was when working yesterday, and my relay is still (again) a Z-Wave Virtual Momentary Contact Switch.

43

I have decided this is in fact a smartthings issue playing with device types I keep getting server error 500 pages instead of the device I clicked on, have also had the page time out several times after hitting edit on a device and a door auto lock notification just came in 7 times telling me the door auto locked. I will give it a few hours and try again hopefully whatever the issue is it will be fixed soon

44

I want to thank everyone that contributed to this thread with suggestions and apps/devices. I have aV1 hub but just finally got around to adding remote control to my garage doors. With the help of this thread, it works like a champ. My hardware is an ecolink tilt sensor and a linear FS20Z relay. Using the supplied smart app and the custom device, my garage door is opening and closing via my smartphone with a single button which shows the doors status. Again, thank you to all. Until I found this thread I was stumbling since they removed the code from the V2 app.

Steve

45

Okay, this is a major late replyā€¦ nearly a month late! Butā€¦

Iā€™m assuming you are using an arrival sensor in your car, yes? If so, then hereā€™s what you need to know:

These devices use a very low powered Zigbee radio. Itā€™s low powered to help preserve battery life, which is a good thing. But that also means itā€™s not uncommon for the radio to have a hard time seeing the hub, even over a relatively short distance.

Hereā€™s what you can do to help:

1.) Minimize the physical interference. I mounted my sensors in the very top of the windshield in my cars with a small bit of 3M command strips. Less metal from the car in the way.

2.) Move your hub away from your wifi router if you can. Because Zigbee and WiFi use the same freq. they can step on each other. Even moving it a few feet from our router can make a difference.

3.) Install a zigbee repeating devices in your garage. Zigbee if of course a mesh network, so each node passing along communication. I put a Zigbee outlet in my garage. Another option is one of the first generation motion sensors which will act as a repeater when plugged in. With a repeater sitting just a few yards or less from the windshields of my cars with more or less direct line of sight, connection is a lot stronger.

46

also look at my modified device type for the smartthings presence sensor if that is what you are using.

47

What does your modified device type have it in?

48

it keeps track of state and disallows a state change if you already are in that stateā€¦ie
no your back when you were already backā€¦ so no doors unlocking or opening in the middle of the night.
Havent head one since I wrote itā€¦

49

Thanks - definitely will try #1 - everything was working fine until I upgraded to v2 hub and thats the really annoying aspect.

50

This actually isnā€™t unheard of. Iā€™m pretty sure Iā€™ve heard others who have complained about the new hub having poor Zigbee or Z-wave connection in relation to the old hub. Best guess is that the antenna in the new hub is oriented differently than in the old hub. And yes, even something as minor as antenna orientation can make a difference, especially with Zigbee when itā€™s competing with many other signals on the same frequency.

51

Not sure if this helps, but I have been able to get my garage door to close using an Ecolink door/window switch and an FS20Z relay(and V2 hub).

The Ecolink is mounted on the door and reports on the open/closed status of the door.
The relay acts as a switch to open/close the door.

I use the Rule Machine Smart App to link the two together so to speak.

I can create a rule that says:
If
The garage door has been open for X minutes
Then
Toggle the relay switch to close the door.

This seems to be working very well.
Iā€™ve only been testing this for a few days, but so far so good.

Hope this helps.

1 Like
52

So i kept getting irritated that this solution couldnt be handled with routines to open and close the garage door.
I modified the newest SmartSense multi sensor device type to include a button similar to the old Garage door sensor button device. I also enabled it to act as a switch to use with Alexa (turning on or off the garage door will open or close it).
I then looked at the code for the linear garage door opener i had before that worked so well with routines and figured out how to modify the smartsense device to handle it the same way.
Using Chrisā€™s smartapp to control the relay it all works perfect now and routines are working perfect.

I am not sure how everyone else got routines working but i couldnt do it and i didnt like having it set up as a light. I also modified the 3axis sensor number for open/closed as i was getting some false readings with the original device type.

I am not a programmer and honestly have no idea what i was doing but it seams to all be working great.

Let me know if anyone uses it and how it does. Again, i am not a programmer so if anyone has suggestions please feel free to add in. I also dont know how to post code so here is a try at that:

1 Like
53

Thanks for putting this together. I havenā€™t yet purchased a relay, but was waiting to see if something like this would be available. Surprised no one has tried and provided feedback yet!

Is it still working as you expected?

54

I have been using this for about 18 months without any issues at all. It works great (though itā€™s not up to building codes as a remote garage door solution).

Iā€™ve even been able to control it via tasker on my android phone.

55

So I how do I associate the relay with the button in this particular device handler? Do I name the relay the same thing as the multi-sensor?

56

Iā€™m not at home but there are 2 parts. A device handler and a smartapp. You need both.

57

Shit. I see it now. Thanks for the heads up. I did some searching and turned up the device handler here at the bottom, but I didnā€™t see the smartapp further upā€¦was just thinking I was missing something on the device handler.

58

Your welcome. Glad you got it working.

59

Hi Chris, great write-up. I have done it twice and can see how it all comes together but itā€™s not working. My LFM-20 and SmartThings Multi Sensore are doing the following:
The sensor shows closed (correct)
When I hit it it shows opening (correct)
Once it is open it doesnā€™t do an auto refresh. When I manually refresh after a while it shows closed again but itā€™s open.

Any idea what the issue could be? Migration to Hub V2 has been a little painful and Iā€™m glad you have the code and instructions. Unfortunately I canā€™t get it to work.

Cheers,
Jens

60

Hey Chris, Thanks for the hard work. I have one question. How can I see the battery status of the sensor? After changing the device type I have no info about the battery percentage of this device. I did have this with the default device type of a contact sensor. Please advise.
Thanks