Integrating Kidde Smoke / CO Sensors into SmartThings Properly

My girlfriend, making dinner last week, overheated some oil in a pan that started to smoke and then hit a smoke sensor in the hallway. This of course set it of which then set off all the others which then set off the relay which closed the contact. Within about 3 seconds of the alarm going off all the lights in my house (what I set it for) turned on and we both got notification alerts from SHM.

All I can say is try a real world test.

-Allan

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I’m trying to follow all this. But getting confused. I’ve got the Ecolink door/window sensor and I think I have it wired correctly, but in a normal state, it shows as ‘detected’ or ‘smoke’, but when I push the test button on the smoke detector, it goes to clear and triggers ST to alert me. So it seems the reverse is happening from what it should. I don’t understand what is meant by wiring the ‘normally closed’ wire instead of the ‘normal open’ one. There are two wires going into my Door sensor, should I reverse those? There was also a third wire coming from my relay (I think grey) that is never wired to anything, should I have used that one? I tried changing some of the code in the device handler, but nothing seems to change anything. But I really don’t know what I’m doing. Any help would be appreciated.

Okay - the first thing is which wires you are using. The only wires from the SM120 relay you should wire into the sensor are the blue and either the yellow or orange.

The blue is what’s known as the common so it has to be wired to the sensor. The yellow wire is normally closed and the orange one is normally open. What that means is when the alarm trips, the yellow wire will “open” and the orange one will “close”

The bottom line is this: if you use vseven’s device handler, you’ll need to use the working on orange wire.

Feel free to PM me or reply back here if you need more help.

BTW, I’m working on a new device handler myself where you can simply flip this via the settings for the device.

Well, I think I have a slightly different setup, because I didn’t use a SM120, mine is a BRK Brands RM4 used for First Alert. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0039PF21U/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
So I don’t have those color wires you mentioned. So I might be out of luck for your help. So the only colors I have coming from the relay to the door sensor are blue, brown and a grey (not currently wired to anything). The black, white and orange wires from the relay, I had going into the wires to the smoke detector. Somewhere along this thread, someone had the color wires I had and the sensor, so I followed that picture. Hopefully I don’t have the relay reversed. I’ve even tried two different device handlers but with the same result. Both default to the ‘open’ or ‘smoke’ in a normal clear state, but when I test with the button they go to ‘closed’ or ‘no smoke’. The handler I copied for right now is MikeMaxwell (vseven had a CO2 which I don’t have).

Looking at the relay literature, it says the blue wire is normally open contact and the gray is normally closed contact. So should I change out the blue wire I have currently in the sensor for the gray one? And leave the handler alone?

I looked up that relay and the brown is supposed to be “common” and the blue is supposed to be normally open, so it looks like you have it wired right on that side, assuming you have it wired right to the smoke detector. The only thing that makes sense to me is if it’s wired backwards on the smoke detector side but it doesn’t really sound like it.

What you probably should do is meter your relay outputs and see what you have and when. In the meantime, you can use this device handler if you want. It’s based on vseven’s handler which I used initially, then built my own for a different purpose. But the advantage it has is in the preferences, there’s an input toggle. So whether you have it wired normally open or normally closed doesn’t really matter - you can just flip the toggle if you’re not getting the results you expect instead of having to rewire it.

https://github.com/doncaruana/SmartThings/blob/master/DeviceTypes/door-for-smoke-with-toggle

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Thanks! I’m giving that handler a try now. Replaced with that one and it initially came on with a status of ‘detected’. So then I went into the ‘gear’ on the device and found the toggle, I switched the toggle but it is still showing ‘detected’. Surprised me when the toggle didn’t seem to do anything. Not sure if I have to refresh anything, but I can’t test the smoke detector yet since the family is still asleep :slight_smile: .

As far as if I have something wired wrong on the smoke detector side I have the white with white, black with black and color with color, so hoping that is right.

At this point I’m getting close to just using the default door/window sensor handler and live with the open/close and just do an automation when it ‘closes’ (since normal state is open).

Thanks again,
Tad

What I’ve noticed is that after you make a change like that, you have to trip it a couple of times for it to sort of take effect and reflect the right status, even when doing it via hardware instead of in the handler. So try testing it a couple more times and see if the result flips the way you expect.

I just tested it on a contact I had sitting here so it should work, you’ll just have to trip it again for it to recognize the flip.

Sorry I didn’t mention that before - I’ve been playing around with these so much, I forgot. :slight_smile:

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Thanks for all the help…I think it is working fine now. After my first few triggers, it was still reporting reverse, so I went back in and toggled back to the original and triggered a few more times and now it works as expected. Thanks for the help!! So what is the handler you are making for this? What will it do differently than this one?

Thanks,
Tad

At this point, nothing. :slight_smile: What you have is perfect. Roll with it! Glad you got it working!!

I just submitted a pull request that updates these 2 device types for the newer SmartThings UI. Everything is moving this way so wanted to keep things consistent.

Accept, reject, whatever you want but thought anyone using these would appreciate the continuity.

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Changes merged and committed. Thanks!

People using this device type should be able to pull the update from the IDE.

-Allan

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There was a slight issue in the “Smoke” device type. It worked for SHM/alerts but the screen didn’t update for smoke. It’s been fixed…please update your device type for the smoke when you get a chance:

I have all CO/Smoke Combo detectors in my house, does it distinguish between the two with the single wire that runs between them or do I just pick one or the other and get the relay for that?

It sends a different single for each. So to integrate both you need both sensors. With that said you could “cheat” and tie both sensors into the same contact closure and save yourself $30 but then you wouldn’t know if it was really smoke or CO.

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A+ project Allan. About an hour of work, less than $40 in components. More effective than the $80 pair of first alert zwave monitors I returned. Kid tested, mom approved.

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Thanks for creating your device handlers (and this guide in general). I’m having one issue though: the smoke sensor shows up in Smart Home Monitor but the CO sensor does not. Is there something special I need to do?

I don’t have my CO in SHM either, you are correct it doesn’t see it (just the smoke). Lemme look into the device handler and the docs on SHM and see why.

Sooooooooo…apparently SHM won’t see a Carbon Monoxide Sensor even though its a good type in there documentation. It will see something that lists its capabilities as a “Smoke Detector” even if I then give it the CO images and say its CO.

So in the interests of being able to add it to SHM I modified the CO DTH. Download the update from the repo and it should show as available.

-Allan

Allan - Thanks very much. I see you removed the CO Detector capability from the DTH, but do you think there’s any harm in leaving it in there in addition to the Smoke Detector capability (in case SMH gets updated to correctly support it -or- some other SmartApp that can use it correctly) ??