Beta Testers Needed For New Air Quality Sensor! The Apollo Automation AIR-1!

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41

Hi!

When trying to overwrite our firmware in ESPHome add-on you’ll want to use the !extend functionality: How To Change The Upda... | Apollo Wiki

So in your case this looks like it’d be right:

sensor:
  - platform: sen5x
    voc:
      id: !extend sen55_voc
      algorithm_tuning:
        learning_time_offset_hours: 72
        learning_time_gain_hours: 72

I’ve also just updated this in our official firmware thanks to the suggestion. So you should be able to update to that within a couple days.

Thanks for the suggestions!!

-Trevor

42

Thanks, I appreciate that perspective. We’ll take a look at updating it.

Also thanks for the nice words! We don’t know everything and are learning a lot from the diverse backgrounds and perspectives in the community. We are long time HA users so it is nice to have so much feedback and input from the community.

-Trevor

43

I’ve had my sensor up for about 24 hours now and threw together a quick dashboard so I can start analyzing the data. Everything so far works great and I’m so pleased, I bought two more.

Before I get into controlling exhaust fans, ceiling fans, air purifiers, etc off this data, I started with something much simpler. My soon to be former alexa air quality monitors change led color depending on air quality. I already set up a few automations to do just that.

This is the only request I have so far and I know how dumb this is. Can we slow down the Slow Pulse effect or get a 3rd effect that’s even slower? I’d like to use Slow Pulse when the air quality improves but the slow pulse is still so fast and jarring, I know others in my house won’t be able to tell the difference between a fast pulse (air quality worsening) vs slow pulse (air quality improving).

44

Trevor, thanks. I did check the Apollo Wiki, but I think I didn’t look at that specific page. I’ve installed the new firmware 12 hours ago and will report in a few days, when the 72 hours learning time should start to make a difference.

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45

@ApolloAutomation: Do the configuration options for the AIR-1 have any effect on the fan used to cool the sensor? Even though the fan is pretty quiet, I did notice it last night during quiet scenes in the movie. We bought the version with the CO2 and chemical sensors. Curious if that choice impacts the dB level emitted by the sensor’s fans.

46

Good thought, I don’t typically use the pulse so didn’t notice haha. It is only 100ms difference between slow/fast. I’ll get a revision and see what 1s pulse looks like.

-Trevor

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47

The fan inside is actually inside the SEN55 module to get the PM/VOC levels and not for cooling. Was it just audible for a minute (possibly it was doing an auto clean it does once per week) or was it audible multiple times?

-Trevor

48

It’s persistently audible if you’re close enough. Pretty sure the fan in my unit is running 24/7. Is that normal?

49

Do you have any templates or anything for an AQI calculation? I have two AIR-1’s installed now, would just love to get an AQI reading to output on a dashboard and create automations based on.

50

Best I’ve found is this: PM2.5 to AQI Conversion / Mike Bostock | Observable

51

We’ve found this nice one and have considered adding a AQI entity to the AIR-1 firmware based on it. Page 8 shows how to factor in PMs.

We’d really like to come up with some standard for CO2, Ozone, PM, VOC of good/bad to help people but I haven’t found a good study incorporating them all.

Thanks!
-Trevor

52

In Europe it is quite hard to find a supplier that has got the Air 1 in stock. Can anyone tell me what make model main board the Air 1 is using? Need to go the DIY road and cannot find the exact ESP board it is using (it is a ESP32-C3 mini, but which one?)

53

Hi Frank. The ESP chip is the ESP32-C3 mini but it is on a custom PCB we’ve designed. Not a typical development board which is how we can get the size down so far.

I believe OpenCircuit should hopefully have stock of the AIR-1 within a month, our site also ships to Europe but the shipping fees and customs can be a little high.

Thanks,
Trevor

54

Ok. In that case I will wait, impatiently :smiley:, until OC has got them in stock…

55

Finally received it :smiley: challenge I am now facing is that it keeps on crashing and also reading the logs does not work. Below is the output after waiting several minutes.

I can reach the device via its IP in a browser and get meaningful readings (so guess issue is with hassio)

INFO ESPHome 2024.5.5
INFO Reading configuration /config/esphome/apollo-air-1-2d9b64.yaml…
WARNING GPIO9 is a strapping PIN and should only be used for I/O with care.
Attaching external pullup/down resistors to strapping pins can cause unexpected failures.
See Frequently Asked Questions — ESPHome
INFO Starting log output from 192.168.1.75 using esphome API

56

I see the same warning, it doesn’t seem to matter.
Logging is disabled in the default configuration.

57

Yeah we just had the logging turned off to try and save size. There was a version of ESPHome earlier this year that was larger for some reason so we removed everything we could. It could be added back.

Is it connected to HA for you now?

Thanks,
Trevor

58

Connection is still a bit finicky which is weird as the distance to the router is about 3 meters (or 18 feet)

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59

There is an entity for “Uptime” you might want to check that. That will tell you if the device is actually restarting or if the connection is just dropping.

You could check the “RSSI” entity as well which will show connection strength.

Thanks,
Trevor

60

Thanks to your tip it became apparent that it was the connection. After binding the AIR-1 to 1 specific AP of my mesh network the problem went away.

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