The first thing would be to reverse engineer the board to find out if the Tx,Rx, IO0, GND and 3.3V pins are available on either the header pins or the row of pads at the side of the board.
Then all you have to do is find where all the GPIOs connect to (switches, relays and LEDs).
You can use Shelly relays combined with the original fan speed capacitor to create a fan controller. You would need 3 relay contacts for a 3 speed fan setup, so it would cost a bitā¦ I used this method (but using my own relay and ESP setup) to create a fan controller for some high powered fans where there were no off-the-shelf products available.
Or you could replace the fans and buy this ESP based controller for full local control with no need to flash or anything.
I have a pinout and will probe the board this evening,
Should I try OTA with Tuya convert or just connect directly to the ESP and attempt to go straight to ESPHome ?
I havenāt had any experience with these yet. But I have flashed a fair few ESPās via serial.
Iāve used it with different DC fans from different brands (Brilliant and Claro) that come with RF remote controls in the 433MHz range.
Yep, great question, and thatās what I am currently working on. Those Claro fans come with 5 speeds and a built-in LED light, so that may require some thinking how to distinguish āLED on / Fan offā from āLED off / Fan speed 5ā.
This is the current state of using the Sonoff RF bridge with a DC ceiling fan without the Shelly, and I am planning to post an update on my blog as soon as the Shelly based synchronisation is in a reasonable state: RF Bridge the Gap to make another Ceiling Fan smart ā neon.ninja
You should be able to flash it serially by direct connection to the ESP.
This sounds awesome, but unfortunately Iām not nearly handy enough to try it myself, and wouldnāt necessarily want to get an electrician to do it and waste their time. Also as much as going with that local option would be good, we canāt justify changing them out just to automate, especially since they work so well
I might have to keep an eye out and see how it goes with the Shelly relays then! It sounds very promising! Iāll also keep an eye out for the sonoff bridge and see what I can find, but it sounds like it could potentially solve some issues for us with the rf remote at least.
Are there any heat pump hot water systems in Australia that integrate with Home Assistant?
The reclaim hws has a dry contact option. They have just released wifi in their latest version but not sure if an api yet.
I use ESPHome on an ESP32 with a bunch of DS18B20 temperature sensors and a Shelly 1PM fory my Sanden system.
I have it automated to switch on in the middle of the day when I am likely to be generating solar power. It switches off when the heatpump inlet to outlet differential reaches 25Ā° to maintain efficiency. Except for Fridayās where it does a full tank heat to kill legionella.
Nice. I do a similar thing for my Sanden. Shelly 1PM and three DS18B20 sensors connected to an EmonPi which sends temperature data on to HA.
Question: Do you control On/OFF via Shelly and not make use of Sanden āblock-outā time?
I ujust run every day (mid-day) to run mostly on Solar.
In my situation, the Sanden does a few frost cycles during winter.
Is turning power off to a heat pump HW system wise? Iād have though youād just use the in-built timer control to safely manage power down of the compressor and for system maintenance/protection functions to be able to run as required.
I do use the Shelly for power control rather than the block timer.
I spoke with the installer about it and the sales rep. They both indicated there would be no issue doing it this way and had installed a few zigbee relays at other sites.
I control my Reclaim Heat Pump HW via Fronius load management, which cuts the power when not enough solar. I asked the installer if that was OKā¦ He gave a confident yes answer. No problems evident after about 9 months.
Intriguing. Does that mean you have a single ESP32 outdoors with a bunch of individual DS18B20 probes to all those locations?
And does that mean you drilled holes (!) or fix the probes on the outside of the pipes?
And if itās not straying too far off topic what do people think of Sanden vs Reclaim vs other heat pump HWS?
My cylinder is under the floor and the heat pump is on the other side of the wall outside. So all the electronics are under the house. No holes! Just under the copper pipe and cylinder insulation.
I want to measure the power consumption of a few things around the house like a sump pump, pool pump, and pool heat pump. I have a few spare shelly 2.5s that would do the job, but as the pumps are plugged into weatherproof power outlets, the shellys donāt fit in them.
Short of using a CT, are there any non contact power sensors available, e.g. that might work with ESPHome? I donāt need highly accurate numbers, just enough to know when the pumps are on or off, and in the case of the pool pump, to know low/med/high (100W / 600W / 1000W).
I came across this battery operated device that does the job for the whole house (part of a solar import/export power sensor), Iām assuming theyāre using a hall effect sensor to measure the magnetic field in the mains switch wire. I didnāt realise this would work as I know with CTs you have to pass the wire through the centre of the coil. I realise they are pairing this thing to a bluetooth hub, Iām not interested in that part, just interested in the actual AC power sensing technology.
Interesting. Given they donāt draw much power I canāt imagine itās that big of a deal for most PV systems to be able to cover consumption in the middle part of the day.
I still think I would prefer to send a signal to the heat pump for it to manage the shut down and start up process rather than just cut power to a working compressor. Heat pumps also generally need to run maintenance cycles in between their working duty cycles.
If I had a heat pump HW system I would just let the systemās own timer controls manage when it starts and set a maximum duration for the duty cycle (which is an option with the Reclaim controller). If it requires a little supplemental energy from the grid then so be it. They donāt consume a lot of energy.
Thanks, that sounds very practical, appreciate your advice.
I have had the Sanden for about 7-8 years. Depends on a lot of things and your own research/analysis is best. Your climate, how/where the system is installed, tank placement, compressor exposed to elements, frost area?, solar?, controlled load?, etc
My Sanden uses 3 watts in standby, and during the course of winter I will see it do a handful of defrost cycles in the early hours of the morning (short duration). The daily heat cycle duration (set for midday via blockout timer on Sanden) depends on how much HWater we use and the season. Right now in summer a cycle will be about 60-90 mins. In Winter it is more like 120 mins, a few times it would be a little more, never seen it go for 3 Hours. During a heat cycle it uses between 900-1000 watts.
