ESP Haier: Haier Air Conditioner + ESP Home + Wemos D1 mini

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I would like to share how finally I was able to make it work with below project from : paveldn → GitHub - paveldn/haier-esphome: Haier ac integration for ESPHome
and Haier AC’s (2 different types).

Initially I was using cheap esp8266 board from aliexpress. I had some old board: WeMos D1 Mini Pro V3.0 NodeMcu 4MB
and I was trying to upload soft there.
For this board i used below yaml config:

esphome:
name: ac-sypialnia
name_add_mac_suffix: true # optional, adds MAC to device name
friendly_name: AC_SYPIALNIA

esp8266:
board: d1_mini

Wi-Fi with fallback AP

wifi:
ssid: !secret wifi_ssid
password: !secret wifi_password

ap:
ssid: “ESP8266_Fallback”
password: “fallbackpassword”

Enable UART logging for debug

logger:
baud_rate: 0
level: DEBUG

OTA for future updates

ota:

  • platform: esphome

API for Home Assistant

api:

Web server for testing

web_server:

UART for Haier AC communication

uart:

  • id: ac_port
    tx_pin: 1 # GPIO1 (hardware TX)
    rx_pin: 3 # GPIO3 (hardware RX)
    baud_rate: 9600

climate:

  • platform: haier
    id: haier_ac
    protocol: hOn
    name: Haier AC
    uart_id: ac_port
    wifi_signal: true
    display: true
    visual:
    min_temperature: 16 °C
    max_temperature: 30 °C
    temperature_step: 1 °C
    supported_modes:
    • ‘OFF’
    • HEAT_COOL
    • COOL
    • HEAT
    • DRY
    • FAN_ONLY
      supported_swing_modes:
    • ‘OFF’
    • VERTICAL
    • HORIZONTAL
    • BOTH
      supported_presets:
    • AWAY
    • BOOST
    • SLEEP
      on_alarm_start:
      then:
      • logger.log:
        level: WARN
        format: “Alarm activated. Code: %d. Message: "%s"”
        args: [ code, message ]
        on_alarm_end:
        then:
      • logger.log:
        level: INFO
        format: “Alarm deactivated. Code: %d. Message: "%s"”
        args: [ code, message ]
        on_status_message:
        then:
      • logger.log:
        level: INFO
        format: “New status message received, size=%d, subcmd=%02X%02X”
        args: [ ‘data_size’, ‘data[0]’, ‘data[1]’ ]

Include local Haier component

packages:
local_haier: !include configs/external_components/local_haier.yaml

it worked like charm. When I was excited that it worked, I decided to equip the remaining air conditioning units with similar ESPs. However, for some reason, I bought slightly different ones this time — a newer model, version 4: WEMOS D1 Mini V4.0.0 TYPE-C.

…and that’s where the problems began. I couldn’t get any response from the AC at all.

[14:36:49.146][I][haier.climate:096]: Answer timeout for command 61, phase SENDING_INIT_1
[14:36:53.578][I][haier.climate:096]: Answer timeout for command 01, phase SENDING_FIRST_STATUS_REQUEST

It’s worth noting here that at that time, my pin configuration in the YAML file was identical to the previous board — I was trying to use RX/TX.
I spent a lot of time experimenting, trying different pins, e.g. tx_pin: 15 and rx_pin: 13.
Sometimes it would start working, but only in certain situations. I had to perform a kind of “startup procedure.”

When I connected only the ESP board to the computer via USB (without any AC wires), it powered up and connected to the router.
Only then could I connect the green and white wires from the air conditioner to pins 15 and 13. In that case, everything worked fine, and two-way communication was possible.

The problem appeared when I turned off the main power (circuit breakers), and the AC lost power. After turning it back on, the board wouldn’t start in that configuration — it couldn’t connect to the home network. I didn’t understand why.
When I disconnected the wires from pins 13/15 and restarted it, it connected to Wi-Fi without any issue.

That’s when I came across this article:

Restrictions for the use of some pins
Some pins have special functions, so there are certain restrictions for them:

  • D0 (GPIO 16): Needed to wake up from DeepSleep. It also outputs a short HIGH signal on boot.
  • D3 (GPIO 0): If pulled LOW during boot, the ESP8266 enters firmware programming mode.
  • D4 (GPIO 2): Must not be pulled LOW during boot.
  • D8 (GPIO 15): Must not be pulled HIGH during boot.

And that turned out to be the reason why the board wouldn’t start after power cycling when everything was connected.

So I reassigned the UART pins to D1 (GPIO5) and D2 (GPIO4):

# UART for Haier AC communication
uart:
  - id: ac_port
    tx_pin: 4
    rx_pin: 5
    baud_rate: 9600

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…and it started working 100% perfectly.