I have plus remotes, no premium remotes; I never use the home button - basic would have been fine. I have the Decora mount for the remotes, and keep the remote on the wall next to the room’s light switch.
Some people automate their blinds to open / close based on sun position / solar energy for heating / cooling. I only automate the blinds in the kids room to close automatically at bedtime - blackouts, it’s difficult to convince them to go to sleep when still bright outside.
I have a blueprint for mine to prevent the blinds from being closed over an open window. If the down remote button is pressed, or the blind notifies it’s in a down position, HA checks if the window sensor is closed, and opens the blind if the window is open.
I had no issues adding the blinds to HA when far away from the controller, but I did have issues with the remotes; I just carried the remotes within a few feet of the controller and added there.
The main issue I had with the blinds was random z-wave freezing requiring power cycle; this issue was fixed by updating the blind firmware using the Bali app (only works for the newer Bluetooth enabled blinds).
This was actually easier than I thought it would be, thanks to everyone’s help/confidence. The new ZWA-2 worked great, identified all 8 of my blinds in different rooms and whether far or near the response time on programming was almost immediate. I took barely 30 minutes to get them all ID’d by HA and logged. Also got the remotes reprogrammed, again all went well.
Toiok almost 90 minutes to get groups, helpers, and automations built. The longest most difficult part was Alexa integration. Have integration with Nabu Casa but with 2 groups of shades, and routines needed for open/close/stop it just took time (with Copilot’s help setting up triggers). Am spoiled being able to voice commands to open/close/stop each group ad lib. Not ready for HA’s voice assistant yet. Also setup a close at sunset automation as well. Installed a battery monitor into HA for good measure.
Overall, not nearly as difficult as I predicted beforehand. Thanks greatly to you two as well.
First of all, thanks for providing such detailed instructions and contributions to the code base. I’m a newbie HA enthusiast who is just discovering the potential to add Bali blinds to it. Questions for you:
My setup: Bali plus remote, tied to Bali gateway, which controls 3 double cellular (top-bottom) motorized AC-based blinds. I bought the gateway before I learned about HA.
Since then I have started with HA Green with ZWA-2 antenna. Is this the ZWA-2 radio you mention?
Is your Bali Plus remote part of your z-wave network? If so, does it have to connect to the z wave network or can it still control directly the blinds using bluetooth? I fear having a lag in up/down commands through HA.
My Plus remote is currently paired with the Bali Gateway (at least I think it is since it made me do similar routine to what you describe above). Is there a way to add the Bali gateway to HA? I feel less buyer’s remorse re-using it…
I have currently the app automation of opening the shades using the sunrise/sunset. Does the app still work after adding blinds to the HA z-wave network?
It was painful to set the shades with Alexa. @generik do you’ve steps to re-add it with HA + ZWA-2?
caerus, I am far from a HA expert but will try to answer your questions:
Speaking for myself there were two things I feared/realized through this process. First, the setup into HA was really pretty effortless as I remembered the original Bali setup and how much work it seemed to be to get right. Second, the HA controls and response time are better than the original Bali system. Just as GrizzlyAK and dlodge so expertly explain above, the installation routine is the same as you used for the Bali installation. I REALLY didn’t want to reset all of the devices and start over but it truly went cleanly into HA.
Yes, the ZWA-2 is the antenna and works perfectly in my home with excellent coverage.
The Plus remote, after being reset and then paired into the HA instance, becomes a device and will locally control any shades you pair with it.
The gateway turns into an unnecessary device after HA integration and is now sitting in a drawer. It never worked for me nearly as well as the ZWA-2.
You no longer need to Bali app after HA integration. The “automations” in HA are so rich that you won’t want to use the app. And, as stated, the responsiveness of the shades in HA is amazing.
Alexa – make sure you have the Home Assistant skill installed in your Alexa and when you add a shade or controller, it will instantly recognize the device and add it to the Alexa world as well. It is then pretty simple to build/add any routines into Alexa you might need. As a matter of fact, the HA/Alexa integration is MUCH better than the Spring Windows skill in Alexa and has worked without fail.
Take the Bali gateway and put it into a drawer/box. Reset all of you Bali shade devices. Get the ZWA-2 setup in HA. Make sure to setup the HA skill into Alexa. Start with the shades and integrate them individually into HA. Then add your controllers into HA and set them up as Bali instructs for local control. Setup any Alexa routines you want and you’re done!
Great response, along with some excellent advice. I don’t use Alexa nor did I get the Bali Controller (as I anticipated using HA from the outset), so this is an extremely valuable contribution to the knowledge base on integrating Bali shades with HA. Thanks @generik.
I, too, use the ZWA-2 controller, and after some initial pains (fixed by forcing ZW to recreates routes manually one at a time, nearest to far, as was recommended), my network seems to be very robust now. Many fewer 2- and 3-hops connections (mostly only one), and speeds are generally faster between those nodes and the controller now.
Even with that, when I use HA to control the shades, the delay with which they respond can vary from immediately to 10-15 seconds, depending on what else is going on. Mostly, they start moving immediately. But note that I typically control 3 or 4 shades at a time with one button using a Group, so that’s a LOT of commands being sent to different devices all at once by HA. Understanding that, I feel that response times are very good. Also note that if I use my premium remote, which I programmed to control the same groups, all the shades move instantaneously at the same time. So it is definitely faster in the respect, but they are directly connected to each other, so… I reserve that to impress our neighbors with synchronized movement.
I find I rarely use the Bali remote anymore tho. HA is just so much more convenient, and you can do so much more with your automations and grouping.
Thank you @generik and @GrizzlyAK for the encouragement and the valuable info! I plan to implement the advice this weekend and report back.
I’m very impressed by HA but more than that, the community. Looking forward to contributing to it as well.
