I’m having trouble with the range of outdoor lighting and of further ZigBee devices and wonder if anyone can recommend a solution please. In illustration everything beyond Outdoor Light 2 is “unreachable”. I was hoping that the outdoor lights would act as a ZigBee repeater, however this seems not the case.
All Outdoor Lights are connected through Hue Bridge.
Also the Hue Plug and Hue Outdoor sensors
All are displayed correctly in SmartThings (ST) Hub
Outpost ST sensors connected directly through ST but appear offline
I tried out these things also:
After I placed another “Hue Smart Plug” next to Outdoor Light 2 all devices were reachable (ok). However, I cannot easily install a plug socked outdoor due to safety reasons.
I also tried a setup without Hue Bridge, however Lights 2 and 3 seemed too far to connect to ST Hub and were not discoverable.
When you use a hue bridge, that forms its own mini network. Zigbee devices attached to that bridge can repeat for other Zigbee devices attached to that bridge, but cannot repeat for devices which are attached directly to a smartthings/Aeotec hub. They are two completely separate networks from a Zigbee aspect, with the communication being handled by the hue bridge over ethernet. So the outpost ST sensors will never send messages through the Hue outdoor lights, they aren’t on the same network.
I see. So in order to fix the “unreachable” issue of the outer Hue Light (3) should I install some nearby repeater device running on Hue (ZLL I think). I was hoping Lights themselves would act as repeater.
For the SmartThings devices (Outpost ST sensors) I would need the equivalent on ZHA?
Generally they do, but a quick search didn’t turn up the PICS for that model, so I’m not sure. You could contact Hue and ask them.
As far as Zigbee profile, you didn’t give the model numbers for your smartthings Sensors, but the newer ones are all Zigbee 3.0. (Same with the Hue devices). I would go with zigbee 3.0 devices as repeaters, they should be able to repeat for all the profiles that work with the smartthings hub and they do have some technical advantages.
It sounds like you do have a socket for a plug-in, can you add a plastic weatherproofing enclosure? These are common in the United States but I don’t know if they are used in Canada. Try to avoid the blue clear plastic, for whatever reason they seem to block signal more than the tan, clear, or gray.
Something like this is usually big enough for a smart plug. But I don’t know if you’re plugging it in to a lamp post or something like that where this isn’t possible.
I ended up installing a Hue Smart Plug into the frame of the outdoor lights 1 and 2 and despite the metal frame they generate sufficient range to enable all lights. Seems a bit of an overkill but still convenient.
What solution do you recommend for the “Outpost ST sensors” ? They monitor the status of a letterbox, run under ZHA and appear offline.
Sure, most zigbee smart plugs that will connect directly to the smartthings hub will work as repeaters, with the notable exception of Sengled. ( being able to act as a repeater is optional, but most Mains Powered Devices do. Sengled however has chosen not to make any of their devices repeaters.)
Any zigbee 3.0 repeater can also repeat for ZHA, So again I would recommend a zigbee 3.0 device. You’ll get better range, for one thing.
IKEA Tradfri smart plugs are good repeaters in a smartthings set up, and very inexpensive if you get them from IKEA directly.
Don’t get their “repeater“ Device, though. That’s a specialty device intended for use with their curtains and it’s actually lower power than the smart plug.
