Need to switch on bathroom lights (ST newbie)

SmartApps & Automations Automation Ideas
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Hello everyone!

I just got myself a ST kit and I’ve added my Sengled bulbs which are working great. Now I want to make use of the sensors and I’ve already found one use case for it in my home but I’m unsure about how to implement it. I’d really appreciate if someone could help.

We have a bathroom door that opens inside the bathroom and the light switch gets blocked when the door opens so it’s a really huge inconvenience to flick the switch by reaching for it behind the door. I’ve already installed a smart bulb in the bathroom that I can switch on using Google Home but I was wondering if I could place a sensor somewhere that could turn on the bulb when someone goes in and turn off the bulbs when the person exits the bathroom.

Any ideas on how this could be implemented?

Thanks again,

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Typical ways of doing this are with a motion sensor or a door sensor. Myself I use both in the bathroom for different reasons.

  1. Motion sensor triggers the light to come on.
  2. Door sensor says whether the door is closed or not. This defines the rule as to when to turn OFF the light.

My rules go something like this.

If motion then turn on light
else if no motion AND door is OPEN then turn off the light

But you could very well use the door sensor as the trigger for the light, IF you keep the bathroom door closed ALL of the time.

Then you will come into the realm of “what is the best motion sensor”… there are lots of threads on that and plenty of reading and opinions.

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Thanks for the info. This gives me a place to start

Currently, I have a motion sensor and 2 general purpose sensors that came with the ST kit. I’m going to play with these and see if I can find a solution

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You might also find the following helpful. :sunglasses: (This is a clickable link)

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this is nice. thanks!

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The challenge i have with Bathroom lights is turning them off. I can turn them quite easily but cant figure out how to keep them from turning off while someone is inside

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How are you turning them off? By motion going inactive on your motion sensor? Then you might have to raise the sensitivity on the sensor or increase the timeout that the motion stays active. It would all depend on how you have your sensor configured.

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tried a few different ways, but when someone is inside the shower, i cant really get a good position for the motion sensor to see them.

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Ah, yeah, that is tricky. Luckily I have a small bathroom so the motion sensor at the top of the wall is able to “see” into the shower too. I guess if there were kids in the shower that it would turn off.
One alternative you might want to look at is what I did to bypass the motion. Basically, I have it set up through WebCore to only turn the lights off if they are under 90% bright. That way, if I want to keep them on no matter what, you just turn them up to 100.

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There’s an older smartapp which handled this particular situation by taking into account the amount of humidity in the bathroom. If the humidity is above a certain level, it assumes someone is taking a shower so the fact that the motion sensor doesn’t detect them doesn’t trigger the off.

I imagine these days you would do this with webcore instead, but the basic approach is interesting. :sunglasses::umbrella:

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That is a brilliant idea - I struggle with this with other motion sensors as well, but they are in hallways etc where it really doesn’t matter. But I have one in the upstairs hallway that lights up a staircase to the attic which is dark, and I have some shelves midway and that is the only light there.

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