Ok, Motion Sensor came with bundle, and bought the more traditional Ecolink Motion Sensor (pet immune) also. The Ecolink works exactly as needed to detect motion for large areas of a home for security. The Samsung Motion Sensor does not. (Seems best at a few feet or so, nothing like the Ecolink). Seems more a trigger device?
So now that I have it, any good use for it? Besides the usual walk by the sensor and turns a light on. I really don’t care much about things like that, but more on the security side of things or maybe some good ideas that aren’t commonly thought about for this?
I positioned mine near the stairs so I disarm the alarm system (armed home) when I come down the stairs at night say to answer the door or get up in the morning and when away (armed away) they are used to trigger the alarm system.
I use the stairs because I do not want them disarming the system if someone gets up to use the washroom.
I use one to monitor my 3D printer, when the bed stops it shuts off the power after a delay. Saves some wear and tear on printer components.
Motion activates a heater (appliance plug) in my daughter’s room. When I walk into the room to get her towel, the temp is checked and turns on the heater in the winter. Makes the room nice and toasty when we return from her bath.
On the same thread, check temps around the house and trigger thermostat when certain rooms are too hot or cold. Adjust thremostat if no motion sensed in house.
There’s one outside to trigger an Arlo camera when the yard gate opens. Notifies me when the landscaper shows up to mow the lawn. Came in handy the other day to monitor the mosquito service, they came and did half the yard… missed or avoided doing the wooded areas where the pests really breed.
Great to check activity in the house while away (via ActionTiles). Check on where the grandparents are with the toddler.
would be nice to add motion sensors in each bedroom and main living areas and have the alarm system automatically go to armed away mode after 12-14 hours of inactivity on all motion sensors (as long as you don’t sleep more than 12-14 hours).
I use it to unlock the smart lock if I’m approaching it when we are home during certain times. I placed the motion sensor so that the sensor only activates if I reach a certain area near the door. It comes in handy when I’m carrying multiple items. It’s lazy I know lol…
I use the stairs because they are away from my bedrooms and bathrooms but you have to come down the stairs from the bedrooms to get to any exterior doors.
I try to setup my smart home to have as little input from me as possible it just does things for me automatically in the background I actually forget I have have it sometimes.
For disarming the home I created a “good morning” routine
which sets smart home monitoring to disarmed and
changes the mode to home,
under additional settings I selected Things start happening and
then the motion sensors you want to use (in my case I used the motion sensors on both the upstairs and basement stairs as I also have bedrooms in the basement) unfortunately SmartThings also makes you select a time window so I went from 12:01 pm until 11:59 am (gave it a 2 minute window when it will not actively reset so it doesn’t conflict but might not be necessary SmartThings should just have an all day setting but does not).
Select done
and then under advanced settings “Don’t automatically do this if I am in one of these modes” select home and away so it doesn’t not just keep activating this routine for no reason and does not get used when armed (away).
Select done again
note: I do not unlock anything incase someone is just coming down to the kitchen to eat in the middle of the night
Then I do the next “good night” routine so they do not have to remember to re-arm the system when they go back to bed as well as automatically arming itself and locking and closing everything whenever you go to bed every night.
creating separate arming routine called good night.
I selected all the lights/switches I want off
Set smart home to armed (home)
select which locks you want to automatically lock
select which doors you want closed (in my case my garage doors)
change mode to night
select automatically perform goodnight when things quiet down select which motion sensors you want to use and for what amount of time that there is no motion (I used 10 minutes) and starting at what time ( I used 10 pm until 8 am)
select done
under advanced options “Don’t automatically do this if I am in one of these modes” I selected Away
select done again
that’s it
placement of the motion sensors is very important, my stairs happen to be next to my kitchen which really helps.
The OP in the first post mentions he only got a few feet range with his SmartThings motion sensor which is odd I get at least 20-30 feet range with mine (I also have a fairly open floor plan in my house).
I’m now using mime as paper weights as they keep locking up and remain detecting motion.
Dragged one out 2 weeks ago and still doing it.
Everything else works perfectly. Xiaomi, hue, Fibaro and Orvibo. None of these motion sensors fail.