HoustonFirefox
Active Member
Hi All,
Since it appears that Elk has pretty much given up on receiving any status signals from Z-wave devices that "weren't sent from the Elk Zwave controller" I decided to do a little experimenting...
I have several Z-Wave motion detectors that are enrolled and copied over to the Elk Z-Wave controller (in addition to all of the other devices). This is a straight copy from my "master" handheld controller.
Elk states that the M1 Z-Wave controller cannot see status signals unless it sent out the request in the first place (light on/off, etc). This would seem to rule out the Z-Wave motion detectors since nothing is ever sent to them to change state.
ANYWAYS; I installed an RS-485 signal sniffer on the bus and began examining the data coming across the bus (Keypad, Zone Expander, Z-Wave interface, etc) and lo-and-behold. There IS data being generated from the Z-Wave interface to the Elk when the Z-Wave motion sensor is being tripped!
My question is; the data stream is not in an easily recognisable format and I'm not sure exactly how the Elk's firmware is set up to respond to it since I don't have the messaging spec for it. Is it available or is it a proprietary spec?
I have been able to, by examining the data, discern which of the (currently two) motion detectors is being tripped so my next project will be to program a BASIC STAMP to examine the data across the RS-485 bus, see if a motion detector was tripped and then trigger one of two zones on the Zone Expander to signal the motion.
To be sure, it IS a hack-job but since Elk appears to have given up on the Z-Wave expander, this is the only way I know how to get the Elk to respond to the motion detectors. Today I'll be ordering some of the two-way Z-Wave switches (that send back status codes) and see if there is traffic generated for that as well. If so, the Basic Stamp will be re-programmed to handle those as well. Instant and Correct status reporting with no polling!
All of this would be totally unneccessary if the Elk would simply respond to the codes being sent from the Z-Wave expander when the motion detectors go off. As a programmer, this would seem quite easy to implement in the firmware (as opposed to my hardware-hack workaround). Why doesn't Elk do this?
Regardless, I'll be programming and wiring up the Basic Stamp this weekend and will send pics if anyone is interested.
Just thought I'd let the Z-Wave crowd in on "The New Hope".
HoustonFirefox
Since it appears that Elk has pretty much given up on receiving any status signals from Z-wave devices that "weren't sent from the Elk Zwave controller" I decided to do a little experimenting...
I have several Z-Wave motion detectors that are enrolled and copied over to the Elk Z-Wave controller (in addition to all of the other devices). This is a straight copy from my "master" handheld controller.
Elk states that the M1 Z-Wave controller cannot see status signals unless it sent out the request in the first place (light on/off, etc). This would seem to rule out the Z-Wave motion detectors since nothing is ever sent to them to change state.
ANYWAYS; I installed an RS-485 signal sniffer on the bus and began examining the data coming across the bus (Keypad, Zone Expander, Z-Wave interface, etc) and lo-and-behold. There IS data being generated from the Z-Wave interface to the Elk when the Z-Wave motion sensor is being tripped!
My question is; the data stream is not in an easily recognisable format and I'm not sure exactly how the Elk's firmware is set up to respond to it since I don't have the messaging spec for it. Is it available or is it a proprietary spec?
I have been able to, by examining the data, discern which of the (currently two) motion detectors is being tripped so my next project will be to program a BASIC STAMP to examine the data across the RS-485 bus, see if a motion detector was tripped and then trigger one of two zones on the Zone Expander to signal the motion.
To be sure, it IS a hack-job but since Elk appears to have given up on the Z-Wave expander, this is the only way I know how to get the Elk to respond to the motion detectors. Today I'll be ordering some of the two-way Z-Wave switches (that send back status codes) and see if there is traffic generated for that as well. If so, the Basic Stamp will be re-programmed to handle those as well. Instant and Correct status reporting with no polling!
All of this would be totally unneccessary if the Elk would simply respond to the codes being sent from the Z-Wave expander when the motion detectors go off. As a programmer, this would seem quite easy to implement in the firmware (as opposed to my hardware-hack workaround). Why doesn't Elk do this?
Regardless, I'll be programming and wiring up the Basic Stamp this weekend and will send pics if anyone is interested.
Just thought I'd let the Z-Wave crowd in on "The New Hope".
HoustonFirefox