After about a month of owning an ST v2 hub I’ve come to the conclusion that Z-Wave is useless compared to Zigbee.
I’ve tried two different contact sensors (one was a GE, can’t remember the other) and an Aeon MultiSensor 6. As long as these devices are in the room with the hub they work. Go right outside the room and its about 50/50. Beyond that and there’s zero chance they work. This is with three of the Iris Smart Plug Zigbee/Z-Wave repeaters, which as far as I can tell only actually repeat Zigbee (which they do a great job of, btw).
I’ve tried numerous Z-Wave network rebuilds (after unplugging hub for 15 mins w/no batteries), device exclusions/inclusions, device replaces, etc. but I just can’t get any range to speak of out of the Z-Wave devices I’ve tried.
Yet I have 10 Zigbee contact sensors throughout the house and only one location needed a repeater (the Iris Smart plug) for two sensors at that location. All of them work instantly or near instantly every time and I have yet to have any fall off the network or give any false open/closes. Makes no sense to me since Zigbee is on the same frequency as Wi-Fi and I have 3 APs throughout the house and numerous 2.4ghz devices yet Zigbee works so well and Z-Wave doesn’t.
Is there any thing else I can try? If i could find more advanced sensors like the Aeon and door locks that use Zigbee I wouldn’t care much but I do want to use these devices and Zigbee seems to be limited to switches and contact sensors.
“This is with three of the Iris Smart Plug Zigbee/Z-Wave repeaters, which as far as I can tell only actually repeat Zigbee (which they do a great job of, btw).”
I believe there is a trick to get the IRIS Smart Plugs to work as both a Zigbee and Z-Wave repeater with SmartThings. I don’t have any, so no firsthand knowledge. Search in the forums and I am sure you’ll find the discussion. I think you end up with an extra Z-Wave device for each Iris Smart Plug when the z-wave repeater is active.
Update: I think this thread is what you’re looking for. You may need a custom Device Handler…
If the iris smart plugs are going to work as Z wave devices, they will show up as two devices in your things list, one zigbee and one zwave. If they’re only showing up as one zigbee device, they are not doing any zwave repeating.
There is custom code to handle the situation if they’re only showing up as one.
As far as other zigbee devices, there are quite a few. Yale, Schlage and Kwikset all make zigbee versions of their locks.
As far as the sensors, the SmartThings branded sensors sold on this site are all zigbee. There are some others as well.
Many SmartThings customers use Z wave successfully, but as the saying goes “all home automation is local” so I don’t doubt that you’ve been having difficulty. Three possibilities come to mind.
One) the Z wave module in your hub may be defective. That’s unusual, but it can happen. However, you would expect smartthings support to recognize that if it’s the problem.
there is some form of local interference which is interfering with Z wave but not zigbee. This is most commonly either a baby monitor or one of the older cordless phones that are operating in the 900 MHz band. We had one community member who had problems on and off for months until they realized the problem was their baby monitor.
as others have said, you may need more Z wave repeaters. It may be as simple as making sure that the ones inside your iris plugs actually get added to your Z wave network.
That’s the thread I used when setting them up. They appear as z-wave and zigbee devices so they are on both networks. Doesn’t matter where I place them, they do nothing to extend my z-wave network.
I don’t have older cordless phones or baby monitors. Most of my wireless devices are 2.4ghz.
You can verify that the Iris plugs are indeed participating in your Zwave network by looking at the logs from two consecutive Zwave repairs, with and without the plugs ‘plugged in’. The logs should look different-- with the plugs ‘plugged in’, after the repair completes you won’t see them called out in any log messages. Unplug one or more of them, and re-run the Zwave repair. The log should then show 2 messages for each unplugged plug: “Failure to update mesh” and “Failure to update route” for Iris Smart Plug. If the Zwave repair logs don’t show any difference with the Iris plugs plugged or unplugged, they aren’t on your Zwave network.
2 of them failed while plugged in. The only one that didn’t fail is the one that is in the same room (I moved it there for testing) as the hub. The other is a short hallway and one room over and it failed. The 3rd is much further away than the 2nd so no surprised it failed.
moments ago HUB zwStatus ready Z-Wave network repair finished false
2017-11-01 1:47:17.761 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwNwkRepair finished Z-Wave network repair finished false
2017-11-01 1:47:17.763 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwStatus ready Z-Wave network repair finished false
2017-11-01 1:47:17.761 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwNwkRepair finished Z-Wave network repair finished false
2017-11-01 1:47:03.020 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwNwkRepair failure Network repair for lower garage Z-Wave repeater [2C]: Failed to update route false
2017-11-01 1:47:17.763 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwStatus ready Z-Wave network repair finished false
2017-11-01 1:47:17.761 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwNwkRepair finished Z-Wave network repair finished false
2017-11-01 1:47:03.020 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwNwkRepair failure Network repair for lower garage Z-Wave repeater [2C]: Failed to update route false
2017-11-01 1:46:52.870 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwNwkRepair failure Network repair for Z-Wave Device [33]: Failed to update mesh info false
2017-11-01 1:47:17.763 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwStatus ready Z-Wave network repair finished false
2017-11-01 1:47:17.761 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwNwkRepair finished Z-Wave network repair finished false
2017-11-01 1:47:03.020 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwNwkRepair failure Network repair for lower garage Z-Wave repeater [2C]: Failed to update route false
2017-11-01 1:46:52.870 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwNwkRepair failure Network repair for Z-Wave Device [33]: Failed to update mesh info false
2017-11-01 1:47:03.020 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwNwkRepair failure Network repair for lower garage Z-Wave repeater [2C]: Failed to update route false
2017-11-01 1:46:52.870 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwNwkRepair failure Network repair for Z-Wave Device [33]: Failed to update mesh info false
2017-11-01 1:46:33.132 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwNwkRepair failure Network repair for lower garage Z-Wave repeater [2C]: Failed to update mesh info false
2017-11-01 1:46:52.870 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwNwkRepair failure Network repair for Z-Wave Device [33]: Failed to update mesh info false
2017-11-01 1:46:33.132 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwNwkRepair failure Network repair for lower garage Z-Wave repeater [2C]: Failed to update mesh info false
2017-11-01 1:46:24.463 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwNwkRepair started Z-Wave network repair started false
2017-11-01 1:46:24.460 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwStatus network repair Z-Wave network repair started false
2017-11-01 1:46:33.132 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwNwkRepair failure Network repair for lower garage Z-Wave repeater [2C]: Failed to update mesh info false
2017-11-01 1:46:24.463 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwNwkRepair started Z-Wave network repair started false
2017-11-01 1:46:24.460 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwStatus network repair Z-Wave network repair started false
2017-11-01 1:46:33.132 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwNwkRepair failure Network repair for lower garage Z-Wave repeater [2C]: Failed to update mesh info false
2017-11-01 1:46:24.463 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwNwkRepair started Z-Wave network repair started false
2017-11-01 1:46:24.460 PM PDT
moments ago HUB zwStatus network repair Z-Wave network repair started false
From the looks of that log, not surprised that you’re having issues… The Iris Smart Plugs are Zwave Plus (as is the V2 Hub) so their range shouldn’t be that terrible… my house has aluminum siding and I have no issues pairing my hub to a cheap standard Zwave motion detector I have hanging in a tree 80 feet away in the back yard.
If the Iris plug that passed repair (while in the same room as the hub) also beings to fail Zwave repair when moved a little farther out of the room (and likewise, if the ‘remote’ Iris plugs start to work when they are very close to the hub) I’d suspect that a bad Zwave radio in your hub is the problem; assuming you’ve eliminated other potential sources of radio interference.
Yea if I move the other Iris repeaters into the room they work and vise versa. I don’t have any tools to check for radio interference. I have no baby monitors and my current cordless phone is 1.9ghz. All my other wireless devices are WiFi (2.4/5ghz).
Well, you’ve verified that the Iris plugs are paired properly (Zwave-wise) and that they function close to the hub. Unless you live in some kind of construction impervious to radio waves that leaves some kind of environmental issue (somebody in an adjacent dwelling causing interference?) or the radio in the hub itself as the culprit. I know nothing about the types of diagnostics available to ST support or the Zwave protocol in the hub itself (I don’t know if it can dynamically adjust its transmit power or if that parameter is exposed anywhere diagnostic-wise) but maybe they can see something on their end.
