Hello Guys,
Im new Here and im thrilled to learn more about Home Assistant and DIY sensors.
I just finished build a small house. Now I want to make some “simple” light or scene switches" with traditional 2 or 3 gang Wall switches.
I know, many people will say “buy this and that…you can already get it cheap”, I know, but where is the fun?
I have HA up and running and a lot of ESP based sensors around my house.
But I want to get rid of wifi and I want to change to ESP NOW. The internet / google - is not really helpful to find a proper solution. because mostly it will end up in weird - unhelpful discussions.
My goal is, to utilize ESP32 + available hardware over ESPNOW, MQTT and Homeassistant. I want to use the ESPNOW to lower the traffic, and utilize the lower energy consumption to be able to use battery powered devices like switches, sensors or whatever.
Does anyone has a system like this already working and can give me some advice ?
Would be very happy.
I have some soil moisture sensors I have made into ESP-Now devices and it sort of work.
MQTT or anything else in HA does not speak ESP-Now, so you need a hub/gateway for making the transition into MQTT or HA or whatever you want to do with the data.
The hub is the issue here, because it will be the central point in a star network constellation and finding the right spot for that can be quite tricky.
If you have a blocked signal between the hub and an end device, like a light switch, then the hub is often the easiest part to move, but that then affect all the other end devices and another can then end up being blocked.
Moving the end devices instead means you need to design your rooms according to how ESP-Now devices can be placed and that is not the right way.
Another issue is that ESP-Now features are often hardcoded, which means if you want to make a “group” where a switch talk directly to lights, then you need to put that information into the firmware and that means upgrading it.
Upgrading can be an issue too, unless you can easily move the devices for a serial/USB upgrade, unless you can find an OTA code for it.
Hello Wally, Thanks for your message.
This sounds still interesting to me and I would love if you can share some more details which hardware you use. I Just want to have this in a specific area in I thought the range of ESPNOW is way higher than wifi. I have for example one water level sensor 2,5m in a water tank but the wifi signal (eventho repeater right next to it) is super weak. Would you mind to share some details and maybe if you dont mind some code?
I bought a stack of these and did not want ESPHome on it, because the WiFi eats the battery fast.
ESP-Now is lightweight compared to WiFi, but the range is really not that much better. You will just be more lucky to get a signal through at longer ranger than WiFi, because the transmit time is shorter, so less chance of interference.
I use a ESP32H2 today as a bridge from ESP-Now to MQTT.
I have dropped developing it further, due to the issue I listed above, so my IDE and code is packed up somewhere in a backup and not readily available. Sorry.
With RF signals you will have bounces of some materials, like metal and you will have absorption of other materials, especially liquids, like water.
If the device is in the water, then only way to really get around it is to get a device with external antenna and move that outside of the water and also outside the water tank, if it of metal.