I hunted for a IR blaster to work with smart things but found none.
So i took a punt on this.
Thought I could control and fan and TV using smartthings routines and some virtual switches to trigger alexa routines.
However I have installed smartlife and configured the ir blaster (works ok from app), but cant get the devices to appear in alexa - so no route to control from smartthings.
any idea where im going wrong? The device claims to work with alexa but no devices show up.
Have you installed Tuya/SmartLife skill to the Alexa?
yes I have installed it, should have stated that
There are a couple, but most require doing A fairly clunky integration like creating scenes in the IR blaster’s app and then getting to those through either Alexa routines or IFTTT.
For example, you can use this method with the SwitchBot minihub. This device is inexpensive, available in both the US and the EU, and has a manufacturer – provided integration with smartthings. But the integration is more limited than you might think at first, so a lot of people do use the scenes method for the IR blaster.
Remotec makes two zwave to IR blasters but both will require custom code. Both are available on both the US and EU frequencies. I don’t know if anyone is working on edge drivers for these yet, though. But there are existing groovy DTHs for them. Although theoretically they should offer the best integration, historically, it’s always been hard to get them to work with smartthings. But some people have done it, at least for a particular period of time.
Some people use BroadLink, but that requires an additional hardware device to create the integration.
And of course Logitech Harmony was very popular until Logitech discontinued it.
There’s an article in the community – created wiki on integrating
IR devices with SmartThings that discusses all of these options and a couple more.
I haven’t heard anything one way or the other about the tuya device. @Paul_Oliver might know. 
Most similar devices work with Alexa through Scenes (except for air conditioners and lightbulbs, which can use a predefined set of Alexa commands), not by having the device itself show up in Alexa. You might try that.
Ok. Then It is hard to say what problem might be. I only have one device using SmartLife skill. I can’t remember how Alexa finds new devices from SmartLife
Great, that works, I created two scenes in smartlife and they are exposed in alexa.
Should be possible to build a ST routine then based on a switch to start the scene in alexa.
A little clunky but it should work.
Glad it worked!
BTW, you are limited to a total of 99 routines in Alexa per Alexa account, so just something to be aware of.
The scenes you created in SmartLife will probably show up in Smartthings. That would eliminate the need to use Alexa as a middleman. But I don’t have a Tuya IR blaster so I can not say for sure.
Rerun your Tuya integration in ST and see if the scenes show up. Let us know what you find.
This so nearly works.
The Tuya integration spots the two scenes I created.
They appear as “devices” not scenes in Smartthings
However they are offline and cannot be executed.
I know of 2 ways to wake them up.
create a ST scene with both switches. Operate it once and they will wake up. You can then delete the ST scene.
use the ST web portal (my.smartthings.com) and toggle the switches once and they will wake up.
You only need to wake them up once and you are good to go.
Thanks,
I tried both and neither work unfortunately.
That is too bad it didn’t work, because that method usually makes a very reliable integration.
Initially the Tuya devices scenes always appear offline in the ST portal. But will appear online after you wake them up.
Did you open the device tiles in the web portal and push the button inside a few times?
I clicked on the device tile but there is no button on the inside, it looks like this.
The cog allows rename or delete. I cant see a button to click?
Without a button there’s no way to wake it up in the portal and probably explains why you can’t add it to a ST scene.
You probably would need a simple on/off scene (Tap and run) in SmartLife to make this work.
So it looks like you are stuck with Alexa if that works for you.
The Bond bridge can send out IR signals as well. It is supported in the Bond Bridge driver I have posted for the Edge beta. It is commonly used for fans. Supporting a TV would require manually recording each IR button on the remote, or at least the buttons that you care about.
So the following is how I handled my 4 speed ceiling fans with Tuya WiFi switches:
I made 5 tap and run scenes in Tuya for each fan. Each one has an On or Off command + a speed level.
On + level 1 speed (see screen shot)
On + level 2
On + level 3
On + level 4
Off with no speed level.
Maybe you can do something similar with On + a temperature setting. With the On switch ST has something it can control.
Here is my test smartlife routine
It does have a “power on” but not sure smart life treats the power on signal any different to any other IR signal. In this test the routine turns on a fan heater waits for 4 seconds and then switches mode to high heat.
Did you try it in ST and did it work?
The Tuya integration in ST detects the SL scene “warmer” and generates a device not a scene called warmer. However the device in ST appears as offline so i cant click it or use it in a routine or scene.
