I installed my new Kwickset 914 lock on the front door with a new contact sensor also. I am trying to figure out how to automatically use the lock. What is the best way to automatically use the lock but also keep a secure house. I would prefer to have the door lock open when I get close to the door, and close soon after. The issue is that the range of the presence on my phone is really large even after editing the location and making the circle as small as possible. I don’t want to go for a walk around the neighborhood and my door lock stays open because I am in range of the house. How is everyone using their door locks and the best apps to use? Thanks in advance!
I have the Kwikset 916 Z-Waye door lock, and we do not use the ST’s presence status to unlock/lock the door, mainly due to:
- ST’s GeoFence settings are too wide and you cannot set separate GeoFence’s for SmartApp access (doh).
- ST occasionally reports {and changes my modes} that we are home when we are 10+ miles away, or that we are away when our iPhones are in the kitchen happily charging…
Our family unlocks the Z-Wave enabled lock on the door using our personal unlock codes from the outside, but use the “Lock after Close” SmartApp for automatic door locking.
I was hoping that ST would allow unlocking the Z-Wave enabled lock on our door when our iPhones would be within 10 feet of the door, but that hope was quickly crushed when we setup the geofence for the hub and observed the same disappointing large circumference you experienced.
Thanks for the reply! I completely agree with your findings. I had the same expectations that you had and really disappointed that I can’t use it in that manner. I am receiving my v2 hub today, and I hope that will solve the Geofence issues. Have you heard anything about the v2 geofence features? Does it do a better job with this? Does it have any added functionality specifically to help with door locks?
Thanks!
If you have recent iPhones for all of the folks who live in your house, you could pretty easily set this up with some iBeacons and @obycode’s excellent BeaconThings app.
I have presence detection working down to “room” scale, so about 10’ from the beacon depending on walls, etc… It is very quick.
The only thing to remember is that without further logic, your phone will unlock the door from either side. That means your door will unlock as you approach it to check who is ringing your doorbell. That may be a deal breaker for you? It would be for me.
Basically, when it comes to parameter security I’m okay with ST automatically controlling failsafe actions (like locking a door I forget to lock), but never automatically controlling actions that could leave my home vulnerable.
IMO, the new V2 hub does not change any of the GeoFencing functionality that ST has minimally included. One would hope that in the future, ST developers could allow for some finer granularity in this ABNORMALLY large area they default to in the location APP, and/or add additional geofencing beacon capabilities, like Bluetooth, WiFi SSID, Signal Strength, etc to get better confidence on the actual location of the device.
One can only hope!
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On Android, there are folks out there who have used Tasker to set presence based on SSID, etc.
On iPhone, BeaconThings is a great solution.
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