Zooz ZSE40 4-1 Motion Sensor and other Zooz devices (ZSE01, ZSE02)

I agree something is up on the battery reporting. It’s the 13th and my zooZ has been on 1% since the 2nd. I’ll keep going until it stops.

figured out the battery issue.

The device was designed around alkalines… alkalines have 1.5 or more volts to start while NiMh only has at most 1.4, but that top charge quickly drops off to around 1.2-1.3 and then stays pretty steady until they die pretty hard. That explains the behavior completely. I can put a preference in for rechareable / alkaline and have some math put against the reported value but it wont be perfect, just somewhat more accurate… Need to figure out the curve to get it close… I wrote the vendor and we’ll see what she says. To data, Lorenz HD has been super responsive and open to feedback.

That’s what I expected, it seems like it isn’t really report battery life %, but against some voltage and we need to map that to a curve. (likely wrong, back of napkin as I write this post) Super simple linear would be 100% = 3.0v, 30% = 2.5v (1.25x2) and that gives us (.00714v/%) 2.21v @ 1%, or 1.1v/cell.

edit: found a quick curve with both NiMH and Alkaline @ 200mAH just for reference.
NiMH and Alkaline Discharge Curve

I was thinking about this last night. Most devices have a range of voltages they work with. Three AAA Nimh batteries would be 3.6 volts, just .6 volts higher than two alkalines. I kind of want to hack in another battery and see what happens. Longer battery life and higher battery reading… The only drawback besides killing the sensor (unlikely) is the actual low battery point would be higher making the batteries less likely to be chargeable without manual intervention once you did need to charge them. I just went to charge a couple batteries I had in an Aeon Multi, and they won’t charge and are nearly new. The voltage was down to .02 volts which really destroys Nimh batteries. I would love to see @TheSmartestHouse make a new version with a built in Li-poly battery pack and USB charge port with higher capacity than the Nimh equivalent, and a magnetic mount for easy change out. I just place mine on shelves so the mount isn’t a big deal for me for changing batteries but I imagine for some who mint them up high it would be more an issue for.

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Thanks for the feedback @Robert_Vandervoort! We’re trying to get more information on the battery level mapping for you guys to be able to program the sensor for more energy-efficient performance. We’ll definitely try to include a USB charge port in the next version and work on the mount. Not sure if a large magnet to hold the sensor would not interfere with radio communication. But we’ll work out a way to simplify mounting and optimize battery life - these are both very important aspects of any smart home product so we have no choice but to figure it out soon!

We collect all requests and suggestions and pass them on to product development so do keep them coming :slight_smile:

Battery reporting based by percentage never works with rechargeables–as mentioned upthread, they don’t have the same discharge pattern as nonrechargeable’s. Just physics.

If you plan to use rechargeable batteries in a home automation device, you should just put your replacements on a time-based schedule.

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I got an email from Zooz where they identified this Advanced handler code for their ZSE40:

(1% Started on the 4th of July)
19th and still going on 1% (Alkaline).

Love the sensor, it’s similar to the Aeon…but much more accurate. It also seems to be more robust, my Aeon’s don’t last long (sensor life, not battery life). It also has the right set of sensors.

As you have noted, the mount is usable…but it’s ugly and HUGE. Give me a Aeon type mount and sane battery life and I’ll buy a dozen of them!

Thanks for sharing your experience @rsnow! Reworking the mount is on our list, we hope to have a new improved version of the sensor ready in the next few months. Will be sure to announce it here once it arrives :slight_smile:

Our engineers confirmed that the sensor is designed for use with alkaline batteries only, as already explained by @JDRoberts so unfortuntaely, battery reporting will not work well with rechargeables, sorry @Robert_Vandervoort!
We will continue to look for a way to optimize battery life and make documentation very clear on which types of batteries are to be used with this device. Thanks again guys for helping us make this sensor better!

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Great news on all fronts. I’d add in that there are some weird scalings that the engineers are doing that aren’t clear:

  1. Battery Monitoring: It’s weird even with Alkalines. I’ve got a sensors that has been on 1% since the 4th of July, I’m going to let it run until it stops to get an idea of actual battery life vs. reported.
  2. Battery Life: related to above since we don’t actually know battery life at this time, but it sure does seem to report very often, which uses battery.
  3. Lux Readings: I get the goal, but Home Automation folks are pretty savvy and would just assume get the raw data and make their own assumptions and scalings.

Keep up the awesome work and please take my list as positive feedback and not a knock. If it sucked, I’d just throw it away and not bother trying to give constructive feedback.

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Thank you for the detailed feedback @rsnow. We are trying to get more details from the engineers about battery monitoring. Did you see any rapid drops in battery reports before it went down to 1%?

We will adjust default polling and wake-up times to conserve energy in the future release.

Well noted about lux - unless the engineering team comes up with a solid argument against it, we will make the change.

Let us know if you think of anything else, this is all super helpful!

Thank you for being receptive, but PLEASE confer with someone with much more experience than me like @JDRoberts or @Robert_Vandervoort on what makes sense, I’m just a part-timer with some personal wishes…they are the pros!

These are valid points you made on the improvements needed and we’ve heard them before too @rsnow :slight_smile: We’ll definitely get more feedback from developers and engineers before our product development team signs off on the updates. But we aim to get most users happy (it seems impossible to get everyone satisfied), whether they’re advanced or just starting with home automation. It’s hard but we try!

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Are these updates something that can be applied to our existing sensors? I just bought them a little over a week ago, and would rather not be stuck with the “old model” if it’s going to be replaced soon.

Hi @talz13! We estimate to release a new version of the sensor in around 4-6 months. Any firmware update will be performed on demand - if we can’t provide a tool for you to perform the update yourself, we will arrange for an in-house firmware update (we usually send you a return shipping label to send the device to us, update the device at our lab, and send it back to you free of charge). Key features of the sensors will most likely nor be affected since we did not receive any complaints regarding value reporting or accuracy to date.
If the new mount is compatible with the current version of the sensor, we will also send it to you if needed. As mentioned before, nothing is confirmed yet, and product updates usually take a few months before release. Technology develops very fast these days and we’ll do our best to improve all products on a regular basis so any “new model” will eventually be an “old” one as is often the case with electronics.
Feel free to contact us directly with any questions associated with your order.

Thanks, that sounds like a very reasonable idea! Looking forward to any
enhancements :slight_smile:

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(1% started on the 4th of July)
28th of July and still going (Alkaline)

August 4th, 1 month after it first reported 1%, and still going on Alkalines.

August 14th and it’s still running in a high traffic area (bottom of stairs). It first reported 1% on July 4th.