I love that I have a device connected to my garage that lets me know if the garage door has been open for more than ten minutes. My girlfriend forgets all the time but SmartThings makes sure that we are always notified so that we can close the garage door.
Today we found out that my girlfriend left the oven on for the entire day. I’m glad my house didn’t explode, but this seems like a preventable issue. I realize of course that this isn’t possible right now, but it would be great to have some kind of temperature sensing device watch my gas oven, and count how long it maintains a high temperature. If a high temperature is maintained for over 3 hours, for example, I would get a notification from SmartThings.
Maybe perhaps a laser thermometer hooked up to a z-wave trigger? Spitballing
im cheap and like to play. I would connect a thermal sensor to a open close sensor. place it on the outside rear,side, or in the lower storage drawer (touching the bottom) of the oven as it would heat up enough to trip 40C (you could go lower say 30 or 35c and make a rule in rule machine
I use a gocontrol motion sensor in my fume hood above the stove. If you want to detect heating for too long a time period, consider comparing a temperature from there, to room temperature from another sensor…even leaving the oven on affects the air above the stove.
I’d think putting a plastic item in your fume hood would be less than ideal. Were there to be a fire you probably don’t want a plastic sensor there to fuel it. At least not on the underside. Put it in the cabinet above or an outside surface, if just to be on the safe side.
I’ve got a Peq leak sensor in my basement freezer. I’d wonder if one of those could be positioned somewhere next to, behind or below the oven to likewise track temperature.
Well you’re right wk…there’s nothing wrong with a little caution. Maybe I’ll put it in a metal project box if I start to worry about it. Though the plastic light diffuser has lasted 50 years in the hood. And I do put a plastic item on my ceiling to detect smoke. So there must be a useful place close by, still near the heat bloom that can be compared with a room temperature sensor farther away.
I like the sensor position under the hood since the motion sensor also tells me when the water starts boiling for pasta. In any case, I posted the code I use for comparing the sensors. It just sends events, I never needed anything more urgent.
Not all plastics are created equal. Something included with the fume hood was pretty likely designed to actually be in there. A case wrapped around a sensor, probably not. That and heat, grease, smoke, etc, are all not going to be very friendly toward the electronics in the sensor. Then there’s the issue of adhesives failing and the gizmo falling, like onto a lit burner. The plastics in a lot of modern devices emit unpleasantly toxic fumes when burned.
I’m all for giving things a try, but find it’s best to err on the side of caution when FLAME PRODUCING APPLIANCES are involved. Water heaters, furnaces, ovens, etc. Those are the kinds of things that don’t lend themselves to automation going wrong.
Still, the notion of motion detecting water boiling… talk about turning the old ‘watched pot’ saying on it’s head!
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bamarayne
(Jason "The Enabler" as deemed so by @Smart)
12
Here’s something I just thought of.
I have an over the range microwave. The fan on the microwave is designed to automatically come on if the area above the stove gets too hot.
I’m sure (if yours does it too) that you could connect something like an open close sensor to that wiring so that when it turns on, it closes the sensor. I bet the ecolink open/close sensors with the external pins would work perfect for that.
Then, just set up a rule in ST and have it send you and alert!
Of course, if you don’t have a microwave that does that, I’m sorry. But mines a GE so you can look into the option. Maybe you want to put one of those in your kitchen as well?
EDIT:
This is apparently a safety feature built into all of the GE and Hotpoint over range microwaves. It’s not for safety of the stove, but to keep the internal electronics of the microwave cool when the stove is being used heavily.
So, I’m thinking just wiring it into the fan circuit itself would work pretty good. You could set up the rule so that it only alerts if everyone is away from home or something like that. That way it doesn’t send one every time someone turns on the fan.
In any case, I posted the code I use for comparing the sensors. It just sends events, I never needed anything more urgent.