I have a few outdoor motion detectors (HomeSeer HS-FLS100+ G2 Z-Wave Smart Floodlight Sensor | HomeSeer) which sometimes get “locked up”, and the only thing I have found that reliably returns them to normal is a re-interview.
I’d like to make an automation that just quietly re-interviews it. Is there a trick to do that? I couldn’t find any scripts that do it.
What I mean by “lock up”:
Normally, when it senses motion, it will switch to the detected state for just a few seconds, and then go back to cleared. Even if you continually dance in front of it, it will just keep toggling back and forth between detected and cleared. This is what I am calling the “normal” behavior.
But sometimes, just sometimes folks, It’ll get stuck in the “detected” state permanently. And since all of my automations trigger when it transitions to detected, they will not fire anymore. The detector is pretty much useless at that point.
I have tried pinging it but it does not help.
I have tried cutting the power to the sensor for a few minutes and turning it back on, but it does not do anything. (If I leave it unpowered for long enough, or ping it while it is powered off, it will transition to unavailable, but as soon as I turn the power back on, it goes back into the “detected” lock-up behavior.
If I re-interview it, it immediately goes back to working normally.
It’s possible that it tries to transmit detection off and the message does not go through. It’s also possible it’s a firmware bug.
Take a look in the home assistant device panel, there should be an “Idle Home Security Motion Sensor status” button under the configuration category. Pressing this will clear the state in zwavejs. If it’s a missing message then it should trigger on the next motion. If messages are missing then the mesh may not be strong enough.
The next time it locks up, I’ll try to use that button and see what happens.
I have a lot of z-wave devices that are not powered by batteries. I.e., just about every light switch in the house is Z-Wave. I would imagine that the mesh should be pretty robust (but I have no evidence to that effect!)
I have noticed that my door locks (also z-wave, but on batteries) sometimes drop off the mesh for a few minutes here and there, but always come back when pinged.
I have an automation that pings them when they show as dead. I am not sure if this is related or not…
Thanks again for calling my attention to that button.
Yep, works perfectly.
I made an automation that presses that button anytime the sensor stays in the “detected” state for 30 seconds, and it is working perfectly.