Z Wave Motion Detectors

foxtail22

Member
I am planning to equip a new house that I am building with Z Wave.  I have Insteon in my present house but decided to move to Z Wave in my next house to get access to a broader device list and gain the ability to test lock states, garage door states, etc.
 
One rather large issue I am running into is finding a Z Wave motion detector for occupancy use.  I plan to use separate motion detectors for security.  The ones for security will be dual technology, hard wired units to my ELK M1G controller.  For the motion lighting units, I want to use Z Wave wireless units to allow them to be moved and placed exactly where needed.  Of the Z Wave units that do provide enough spec details, most have a fixed delay from "Last motion to off" of about 4 minutes.  The insteon units have an adjustable delay starting at 30 seconds and going up to hours.  4 minutes is too long for areas like the master bedroom where I use a detector mounted upside down to only sense motion when someone is standing such as getting up during the night to go to the bathroom.  I set them all to 30 seconds and then use an ELK program command triggered by the OFF from the Insteon detector to keep the light on longer if needed.  The bedroom night time sense gets a total of 40 seconds(time enough to get comfortable in bed), the garage gets a total of 3 minutes, the kitchen and hallways get a total of 2 minutes including the 30 seconds the Insteon needs plus the time added by the ELK program statements.
 
Most of the Z Wave detectors also have lock out periods that cause them to ignore any motion triggers during the "lock out after off" delay period which is a security detector type feature and would render them unusable as occupancy sensors.  This will cause a room to be dark during the lockout unless you added to the already too long "delay to off" by using an ELK statement to even further extend the time the light stays on after last motion.
 
Does anyone know of a Z Wave motion detector that has adjustable "Last Motion To Off Countdown" and "No Lockout Delay After Off"?  Beyond that, it needs to be one that works.  I realize that the shorter times will cause more transmissions and shorten battery life but that trade off is acceptable to have detectors that provide the flexibility to do what is needed.
 
Have you looked at the everspring HSP02?  I think it can be set as low as 5 seconds for the off signal to be sent and I don't believe there is a lockout delay.  Might be helpful to list the motion sensors you have already looked at and ruled out.
 
Cheers
Al
 
Thanks Al, I will have a look at Everspring.  I have looked at Ecolink, Aeotec, Fibaro, Schlage, GoControl, SmartThings, Philio, Enerwave, GE, 2Gig, Honeywell, Monoprice, Vera, etc.  I am sure I missed some in this list.  Many of the suppliers seem to be private labeling units made by other manufacturers so I am not sure who really makes them.
 
foxtail22 said:
foxtail22, on 29 Nov 2015 - 14:06, said:
Thanks Al, I will have a look at Everspring. I have looked at Ecolink, Aeotec, Fibaro, Schlage, GoControl, SmartThings, Philio, Enerwave, GE, 2Gig, Honeywell, Monoprice, Vera, etc. I am sure I missed some in this list. Many of the suppliers seem to be private labeling units made by other manufacturers so I am not sure who really makes them.
Aeotec DSB05 will let you set the motion timeout down to 1 second. Parameter 3, 2 bytes.

GoControl/Monoprice/2Gig/Linear (they are all the same as far as I can tell) will let you set the timeout down to 1 minute. Parameter 1, 2 bytes.

Technical Info for reference:

Aeotec Multisensor

GoControl/Monoprice/2Gig/Linear
 
Keep in mind that the ELK does NOT support any Z-Wave sensors (only simple switches, dimmers, and thermostats {unreliably} - locks are not supported but can be controlled via serial messages). 
If you want the Z-Wave motion sensors for input to the ELK you will need some other Z-Wave controller to read the sensors and then get that info. to the ELK by some other means.
 
I plan to use the Leviton secondary controller which supports beaming encryption used by the locks.  The ELK interface is basically a RS485 to RS232 converter that interfaces the ELK M1G controller to the Leviton  Z Wave controller.  I will also use the Leviton USB Stick for primary controller configuration control of the Z Wave devices.
 
Al, I looked at and liked the Aeotec Multisensor 6.  I will have to look again for documentation that discusses the settings.  one advantage is that it can be powered externally as well as battery so if I can get wiring to a location, I could power it.  It also provides more functionality when externally powered.
 
 The min time spec to off and the lockout time on the GoControl 2Gig sensors is too long for my needs.  I need last motion to off delay of under 30 seconds and a lockout delay of less then 10 seconds for the high positon sensors in the bedrooms.
 
foxtail22 said:
I plan to use the Leviton secondary controller which supports beaming encryption used by the locks.  The ELK interface is basically a RS485 to RS232 converter that interfaces the ELK M1G controller to the Leviton  Z Wave controller.  I will also use the Leviton USB Stick for primary controller configuration control of the Z Wave devices.
 
Al, I looked at and liked the Aeotec Multisensor 6.  I will have to look again for documentation that discusses the settings.  one advantage is that it can be powered externally as well as battery so if I can get wiring to a location, I could power it.  It also provides more functionality when externally powered.
 
 The min time spec to off and the lockout time on the GoControl 2Gig sensors is too long for my needs.  I need last motion to off delay of under 30 seconds and a lockout delay of less then 10 seconds for the high positon sensors in the bedrooms.
 
so why not use the Elk (wireless) motion sensors?  im curious why you're reinventing the wheel when you have a top-line system already in place.
 
jkmonroe said:
so why not use the Elk (wireless) motion sensors?  im curious why you're reinventing the wheel when you have a top-line system already in place.
 
I think the idea is he's got Elk in the current house and he's building a new one.  Without an Elk controller perhaps?
 
Occupancy sensing can be a bit of hassle for lighting.  There's a lot of edge cases where you don't get what you expect.  Especially when there's not a readily accessible wall switch to override the sensor's behavior.  It's either coming on when you don't want it, going off too soon, or not recovering from going off but needing to go back on again.  As in, walking by late at night and you don't want to wake someone else with the light.  Or it doesn't 'see you' standing there and leaves you in the dark.  Or you walked out 'long enough' for it to think you were gone, it turns off and locks-out for a pre-set time.  This last one conflicts with the usual early morning departure for work where, 'ooops, I forgot something' and the closet won't light back up.  A lot of this could be handled via programming conditionals but that introduces the possibility of delays and that's even less appealing.  
 
I suppose the real question here is how to perform the rules as quickly as possible to get the desired results, and have it work with a decent range of devices.
 
I appreciate all the thoughts.  Regarding the question of why not go with ELK, first, I like what they are doing but their wireless is their own standard and as such, they currently and will have for some time a limited choice of devices and I use the ELK for many things and need broad device support.  My second reason is that it is not clear that the ELK sensors would be any better for automation support.  The appear to be more oriented toward security and good security sensors do not always make good automation motion sensors.  The count down and lock times are important for versatile automation motion support.  As mentioned, I am putting this into a new house and I already have the ELK controller I need.  I have am using Insteon in my current house and decided to go to Z Wave to be able to sense door lock states and garage door states.
 
foxtail22 said:
I appreciate all the thoughts.  Regarding the question of why not go with ELK, first, I like what they are doing but their wireless is their own standard and as such, they currently and will have for some time a limited choice of devices and I use the ELK for many things and need broad device support.  My second reason is that it is not clear that the ELK sensors would be any better for automation support.  The appear to be more oriented toward security and good security sensors do not always make good automation motion sensors.  The count down and lock times are important for versatile automation motion support.  As mentioned, I am putting this into a new house and I already have the ELK controller I need.  I have am using Insteon in my current house and decided to go to Z Wave to be able to sense door lock states and garage door states.
 
 
ok, that makes sense.  can you give an example of how the timeouts are not short enough for your scenarios?  i try to force my motion sensors into making a pseudo tomography map, and haven't been hampered too much by 1 minute timeouts.  or maybe you should look at something like Xandem Home.  my wife put the smack-down on me backing this one so close to the holidays, but their demo looks really good.   :)
 
just a heads up-- most of the zwave sensors have a delay when tripping that makes them unsuitable for occupancy (in my opinion)
 
foxtail22 said:
Most of the Z Wave detectors also have lock out periods that cause them to ignore any motion triggers during the "lock out after off" delay period which is a security detector type feature and would render them unusable as occupancy sensors.  This will cause a room to be dark during the lockout unless you added to the already too long "delay to off" by using an ELK statement to even further extend the time the light stays on after last motion.
The lockout is not a security feature, its a battery saving feature. If a device transmits for every motion, battery life could be short, so devices lockout, because in most situations you don't want repeated transmissions. Also, if a detector detects motion, but you don't want the light on, and you turn it off, the delay prevents it from turning on again a second later, which is very annoying.  As others have said, controlling lights with motion detectors can be problematic if not done very carefully.
 
Currently, in my present house, I use separate motion detectors for security vs. lighting automation.  The security ones are dual technology and are set to be less sensitive to avoid false triggers and they are all wired detectors.  The lighting one are wireless and use them to automatically control lights.  Most areas are not sensitive to how long it stays on and I use a short on time to trigger an ELK statement which does the actual control of the targeted light.  The Insteon detectors say on as long as motion is happening and start the "time to off" after the last motion is sensed.  To eliminate the issue with the lockout time causing the target light to stay off even if motion exists, I use two ELK statements.  The first turns the light on as soon as the detector send and ON.  The second overrides the first ELK statement and is a "turn light on for X seconds" statement triggered by the OFF command from the detector.  That way, the light stays on during the lockout period in case someone is in the target area and will immediately turn back on if someone is still in the target area after the second ELK command times out.
 
The place where I need short time to off and short lock out time is in the master bedroom.  I use a detector mounted upside down so it only senses motion when some stands up in the room such as getting out of bed to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night.  In this location, I want a short time to off and a short lockout time to have the night lamp turn off very shortly after getting back into bed.  The short lockout time is needed to help keep the light on as long as someone is in the area even if the detector turns OFF briefly which it is inclined to do when the time to off is short because unless there is a lot of motion, the detector can often reach it OFF time because there was not enough motion to keep it ON.  The minimum time the light will stay on the sum of the detectors time to off delay and the ELK statement that triggers on the OFF from the detector to overlap the lockout time.  So if you have a detector with 15 seconds to off and 15 seconds lockout, the system will keep the light on for a minimum of 30 sec. A long lockout coupled with a short time to off does not work well when you want a short cycling detector.  I clearly understand that this will reduce battery life but it is worth the tradeoff to have the lights work automatically in this situation.
 
I just received a couple Everspring America detectors which do indeed allow adjustment of both the time to off and the lockout time across a wide time range with 5 seconds as the minimum. 
 
Question -- Has anyone configured the advanced setting in an Everspring detector using the Leviton USB stick and their app on an XP or Win7 system?  Does the Leviton Installer stick support the advanced settings in the Everspring?
 
I was just thinking about this a few weeks ago.  It struck me that someone ought to be making a line-powered networked nightlight.  As in, the kind that use the little candelabra bulbs and get plugged straight into a wall outlet and have a motion/daylight sensor.
 
For our stairway I went with several of the Mr. Beams MB532 units.  They're powered by 3 C-cell batteries, which have lasted just over 2 years now.  They're not automated, of course, but do the job nicely.  Especially since there's no convenient power in that stairwell thanks to an inattentive electrician...
 
Homeseer makes an indicator light, the HSM200, but I don't think it casts enough light to be suitable for night time path lighting.  Would its motion sensing features be useful?  Of course there'd be the placement and aiming problem, but at least you'd be out from under the battery life issue.
 
I'd be tempted to use a sensor and a controlled outlet with a regular nightlight instead.  But it just smacks of overkill/Rube Goldberg to use an outlet that way.
 
So what about other line-powered sensors, anything else out there that might work?
 
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