I have been amazed at how many things I’ve found pre-existing integrations for, but two things I’ve not found yet are both bluetooth items. The Homedics Drift Sand art table was fairly big this past holiday season and while I imagine things like loading designs isn’t likely, controlling the light and light color and starting/stopping playlists would be an awesome thing to be able to control via Home Assistant.
The other thing that’s probably less common, but more along the lines of integraitons I’ve found is for a Chandler water systems iron filter.
It’s got a simple app (strangely named Legacy View App Legacy View App | CSI Water Treatment Systems) that connects over bluetooth and controls the unit and displays all kinds of things HA integrations usually have, but unfortunately external access isn’t possible, but Home Assistant could probably solve that.
I’ve searched and found nothing. Is there a place where you can post integration requests?
I’m interested in this as well as I have their Iron Filter and Water Softener. I just installed a bluetooth proxy as well, so I’ve been looking for devices to connect. This would provide some good information I think.
I have a CSI filtration/softening system too and haven’t found a way to go around the crappy Legacy View App. Tired to at least make the brine barrel a little smarter by placing a platform with load cells underneath. The idea was to detect when salt level goes low (by weight) and send notification. But load cells reading turned to be all over the place. Sometimes they’ll read fine, but then the readings will jump up/down by 80-150 lbs, making the whole idea impractical.
Can you tell me about your BT proxy? Does it allow you to extend BT range so that you don’t have to be close to the softener itself, to use their app?
Checking if anyone was able to make these bluetooth devices work. Have the same water softener. The app collects good metrics too on cycle time etc. An integration would be awesome!
Springwell Water uses the Chandler systems water controller heads and the legacy bluetooth app to connect. I reached out to Springwell and they gave me their phone number, so I’ll be reaching out to them to see if they have anything that they would be willing to share in regards to monitoring those signals.
I’ve been lurking on this post for awhile, so I reached out to Chandler Systems earlier this week. They responded quickly. The rep first pointed me at their DROP system—which apparently can integrate with HA—but you’d have to replace the control valve and it’s quite pricey.
I then told them I’m a software engineer and just need guidance on parsing the BLE packets. Their response was:
I’ve spoken with engineering. They agree with you that it wouldn’t take much to make this information available, but are more concerned about having another thing to keep up to date as they make changes. With us having the HA option in our DROP line its not a priority to create this documentation at the moment, but they have added it to the master project list.
I replied and told them I’m not even requesting anything official, just the knowledge of the packet format for the latest firmware (C6.11) and I’ll see if I can figure out the rest. We’ll see if they respond, but I’m guessing this might be a dead end for now :-/
I’d encourage more folks to kindly reach out via their contact form and express interest. I’ve never worked with bluetooth before, but am willing to read docs, reverse engineer, and help out however I can
I just don’t know enough about BLE or the tooling at the moment, so I’m not actually sure. I’ve been futzing around with bluetoothctl and btmon and can see the BLE advertising packets that my water filter controller is emitting. I’ve also been reading about ATT/GATT and trying to use some of the commands in bluetoothctl, but not sure what to do with it, to be honest.
I managed to connect to the device and list attributes:
[C2_04]# list-attributes
Primary Service (Handle 0x0000)
/org/bluez/hci0/dev_E4_93_2F_59_C7_D9/service0001
00001801-0000-1000-8000-00805f9b34fb
Generic Attribute Profile
Characteristic (Handle 0x0000)
/org/bluez/hci0/dev_E4_93_2F_59_C7_D9/service0001/char0002
00002a05-0000-1000-8000-00805f9b34fb
Service Changed
Descriptor (Handle 0x0000)
/org/bluez/hci0/dev_E4_93_2F_59_C7_D9/service0001/char0002/desc0004
00002902-0000-1000-8000-00805f9b34fb
Client Characteristic Configuration
Characteristic (Handle 0x0000)
/org/bluez/hci0/dev_E4_93_2F_59_C7_D9/service0001/char0005
00002b29-0000-1000-8000-00805f9b34fb
Client Supported Features
Characteristic (Handle 0x0000)
/org/bluez/hci0/dev_E4_93_2F_59_C7_D9/service0001/char0007
00002b2a-0000-1000-8000-00805f9b34fb
Database Hash
Primary Service (Handle 0x0000)
/org/bluez/hci0/dev_E4_93_2F_59_C7_D9/service0010
a725458c-bee1-4d2e-9555-edf5a8082303
Vendor specific
Characteristic (Handle 0x0000)
/org/bluez/hci0/dev_E4_93_2F_59_C7_D9/service0010/char0011
a725458c-bee3-4d2e-9555-edf5a8082303
Vendor specific
Characteristic (Handle 0x0000)
/org/bluez/hci0/dev_E4_93_2F_59_C7_D9/service0010/char0013
a725458c-bee2-4d2e-9555-edf5a8082303
Vendor specific
Descriptor (Handle 0x0000)
/org/bluez/hci0/dev_E4_93_2F_59_C7_D9/service0010/char0013/desc0015
00002902-0000-1000-8000-00805f9b34fb
Client Characteristic Configuration
Primary Service (Handle 0x0000)
/org/bluez/hci0/dev_E4_93_2F_59_C7_D9/service0016
0483dadd-6c9d-6ca9-5d41-03ad4fff4abb
Vendor specific
Characteristic (Handle 0x0000)
/org/bluez/hci0/dev_E4_93_2F_59_C7_D9/service0016/char0017
00001524-0000-1000-8000-00805f9b34fb
Unknown
Primary Service (Handle 0x0000)
/org/bluez/hci0/dev_E4_93_2F_59_C7_D9/service0019
8d53dc1d-1db7-4cd3-868b-8a527460aa84
Vendor specific
Characteristic (Handle 0x0000)
/org/bluez/hci0/dev_E4_93_2F_59_C7_D9/service0019/char001a
da2e7828-fbce-4e01-ae9e-261174997c48
Vendor specific
Descriptor (Handle 0x0000)
/org/bluez/hci0/dev_E4_93_2F_59_C7_D9/service0019/char001a/desc001c
00002902-0000-1000-8000-00805f9b34fb
Client Characteristic Configuration
I can read some of them, like the “database hash” characteristic:
[C2_04:/service0010/char0013]# read
Attempting to read /org/bluez/hci0/dev_E4_93_2F_59_C7_D9/service0010/char0013
Failed to read: org.bluez.Error.NotPermitted
I’m guessing we need to figure out how to parse/decode the these attribute values into something useful (also not sure what it means to get a ‘not permitted’ error trying to read others)?
I am one of the Engineers at Chandler Systems, Inc. and I’m the Engineer responsible for Legacy View (I wrote the Legacy View app almost 10 years ago and I wrote the firmware for the new C6.00 series boards). Our initial consensus at first was to direct everyone to use our other product, DROP, as that has HA functionality already built in. However, we have been seeing your emails and we are taking this into consideration for our Signature product as well. It won’t have HA functionality, but we are discussing releasing the Bluetooth specification for those of you that want to be able to control it through HA. The reason we have not done this yet is because we don’t want to release the specifications on how the security works to help protect other users. As much as we hate to say it, or admit it, there are people out there with malicious intentions.
Current Plan
This plan will only include newer valves that have the C6.00 series firmware. Earlier versions are essentially feature locked, meaning that they will no longer receive new features. The C4.00 series firmware will only be updated now if there is a bug that has been reported. The C2.00 and C3.00 series firmware are not slated to receive any updates at all. Just wanted to throw that out there.
With that being said, our current plan is to introduce functionality into the mobile app that will allow you to generate a security token. This security token will be stored on the valve and it can be used to bypass the authentication. Of course, you will be able to rotate the security tokens (aka generate a new one), delete the token, etc. Once that is done, we will document all Bluetooth packets and make it available to everyone.
Mobile App @n6ham, I’m sorry you think the app is “crappy”… I like to just call it “dated”. The mobile app has done its job for almost 10 years. We have been talking about a refresh project for several years and it’s finally happening. I’m literally in the middle of designing a brand-new app from the ground up. I can’t provide too many details, but it will be much better.
If anyone has any ideas, feature requests, etc. that they would like to see in the new app, then let me know.
Timeline
Now comes the bummer part. I am going to have to be the one to implement the new functionality and I’m in the middle developing the new mobile app as mentioned. I also have other projects as well coming up (new C6.00 series commercial boards need developed, I develop the DROP web app and it needs updated, etc.). So, there’s a lot on my plate at the moment. I don’t think the security token update would take long to implement. The time-consuming part is documenting all of it. I will talk to the other Engineers and the owner to see what they say, but I may be able to squeeze it in. We’ll see.
On a side note, the owner sees all of the feedback messages that come in, so the more everyone provides that feedback the quicker it may get implemented.
Just thought I would drop you a note since you put some time into looking at the Bluetooth data. This can be easily seen and it’s nothing “secret”, so I’ll share with you.
The 8d53dc1d-1db7-4cd3-868b-8a527460aa84 service is a Simple Management Protocol (SMP) service that we use with MCUmgr for firmware updates. The other services that have “bee” in them (a725458c-bee1-4d2e-9555-edf5a8082303, a725458c-bee2-4d2e-9555-edf5a8082303, &a725458c-bee3-4d2e-9555-edf5a8082303) are the actual services that the apps use to communicate with the valve.
You may get better clarity if you use Nordics nRF Connect app. That app will make that data easier to understand.
Like I said though, I will release something official soon.
@JamesDougherty thank you so much for chiming in! Awesome to hear from you
A plan for documenting the bluetooth packets is great news, very much appreciated! And totally understand the security concerns. Also, thank you for the recommendation and additional context on the service key format, I’ll keep playing around!
For what it’s worth, I’d be happy to sign an NDA to help out with (and speed up) documentation or anything else that’s within my capacity, especially if the timeline is unknown/long anyway!
Thank you for the update, what is the value in migrating from the Bluetooth valves to the Wi-Fi system? Last time I emailed for a quote to convert from BLE to the Wi-Fi setup it was 650$. Trying to figure out the value for that cost to convert ?
I think most of us just want to see it and grab the stats from the unit.
Once again outstanding job letting us know the current state of things, and know our wants are being heard!
@toekneestuck You’re more than welcome! I appreciate the offer and I’ll keep that in mind!
@lampshade29 You’re more than welcome too. There are no plans for Wi-Fi on the Signature series. We have other things in mind, but not Wi-Fi. The upgrade you’re referring to was most likely an offer to upgrade to the DROP ecosystem (I assume since that’s our only product with Wi-Fi). It all depends on your needs and how much data you need. For instance, the DROP ecosystem can run with or without Wi-Fi as it has it’s own proprietary network that it uses to communicate with the other devices. The Wi-Fi, however, allows you to enable remote access and to connect over your home network easily. When you have remote access enabled you can access your system from anywhere in the world, you can enable automatic firmware updates, remote tech support / assistance, etc. You also have more options as to what devices you need in your home (we have the DROP home protection valve, leak detectors, RO filters, whole house filters, pump controllers, etc.). On a side note, the leak detectors are kind of neat in that they have temperature sensors built in too. I keep one in my chest freezer just to make sure the temperature stays below zero. If it goes above zero, I get an email, text message, etc. letting me know that a high temperature was detected. If you have a device that has a pressure sensor built into it, like the home protection valve, then the system will perform slow leak tests too. Those tests can reveal things like a leaky toilet. So there’s functionality along those lines that make it more than just a softener or a filter. The DROP system also has the web app that I mentioned in a previous post as well (DROP Web App). Anyway, since it has HA built in, you can get access to a lot of the data as well. If there’s data that you would like added, that’s already not there, then you can simply request it and we can add it in.
We value everyone’s feedback and take it very seriously. It’s easy a lot of times to come up with ideas, but it may not necessarily be something useful for most people. Hence, one of the reasons we love feedback, good or bad. We can take your feedback / ideas and help shape the product to your needs. The bad feedback, on the other hand, shows us areas we can improve on. I mean we are human and not perfect by any means. A lot of the features we’ve added over the years came from feedback.
