Monoprice garage tilt sensor not recognized correctly by hub

Greetings everyone,

I have two Monoprice garage door tilt sensors (ZG8101US) which are integrated into a Smartthings V2 hub along with other devices. I have been using these (identical) sensors with external - open/close sensors enabled (instead of tilt detection). One of the sensors (let’s call it sensor #2) was not recognized by the hub and I had to delete and add it again to the hub (via Z-Wave). Sensor #2 is now being recognized as a “Vision Door/Window Sensor” and it is lacking “EnableExternalSensor” function in settings, which is still visible in the sensor #1. I tried removing adding sensor #2 couple of times, but still the same. Sensor #1 does not seem to have any name/brand within Smartthings Information, as opposed to sensor 2 which is being shown as - Vision Door/Window Sensor. Sensor #1 does not have an option to list/change a driver, sensor #2 does have a driver option, and it lists as a Name - “Z-Wave Sensor”, a developer - “SmartThings” and a version number. The way I am adding sensor #2 is by a generic Z-Wave Device.
Anyways, my question is, why do these two devices are having different options and are behaving differently even though they are identical and how do I change sensor #2 so that it has similar functions (in this case to enable external (open/close) sensor)?
I do not want to delete and add sensor #1 as I am sure it will also be recognized as a “Vision Door/Window Sensor” and it will lose the external sensor functionality.

Thank you in advance

Anyone, any ideas?

it sounds like both identical sensors were originally using a DTH. though now that you deleted and re-added sensor #2 it is incorrectly pairing with an internal edge driver. the sensor info is associated with the wrong edge driver and needs to be re-associated with the correct internal edge driver. this would be something that youd need to notify the help desk.

i have this same monoprice garage tilt sensor and its still tied to a DTH.

Thanks for your reply. Would you know how I can submit a support ticket in regards with this?

It’s an officially supported device so I doubt a ticket will help, you’ll need a custom driver to enable the external sensor feature

I personally would just replace the sensors with something newer and supported. If you’re using the external contacts anyway, just use a door/window contact sensor that has external inputs. There are several options, the forum has discussed it before.

  • This is an older device (pre Zwave plus) that is no longer sold. It is based on the 300 series chipset.
  • To report the external inputs it uses a non standard notification event type (0xFE), so this would require a custom driver.
  • I would be willing to write a driver but I don’t have one of these to test with, they don’t seem easy to get, and it would be spending time to support a device that isn’t very popular and easily replaced.

I would recommend another option to your external sensors. Use a door/window sensor with external inputs, or if you have power nearby a ZEN16 or ZEN17 would work great to read external inputs as well.

Thank you all for your input.
I did contact Smartthings support about this, will update the thread if they are helpful. Otherwise I will just get new sensors with external input support.