@CeeCee thanks for the tips. I would like to keep this project as simple as possible; avoid any extra work that I don’t have to do. It looks like the US-100 emulates an HC-SR04; and, doesn’t need a logic shifter… just connects the jump wires wires directly; utilizing only 3.3v.
UPDATE: Man, I’m so bummed out. I just opened up the light/fan cover in the ceiling of my bathroom. There’s definitely not enough space for a light socket adapter splitter and a USB power adapter. Not even close.
My only choice is to use an efficient battery powered OIT device.
Is it possible to use an existing off-the-shelf wireless low-resolution camera into a binary sensor for HA?
just my two cents, and please excuse my personal opinion at this point, but as a guest in your house, I would feel quite uncomfortable with a camera pointed on me while doing private business.
Apart from that, from my experience cameras are quite energy hungry (in a way that you will have to charge quite often).
If it is still about presence detection, maybe I can suggest another route. Recently (?) China is flooding the market with zigbee sensors that are energy effcient and “easy to install”. See Dr. Zzzzs video:
So there is this Xiaomi device f.ex.
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/4000151421805.html?spm=a2g0o.productlist.0.0.47fe32afDHdmk2&algo_pvid=e6c75bc3-b966-48b6-a33f-a4a0fe807997&algo_expid=e6c75bc3-b966-48b6-a33f-a4a0fe807997-1&btsid=0b0a119a15979888170377157e2989&ws_ab_test=searchweb0_0,searchweb201602_,searchweb201603_
That will do battery operated presence detection and will last a good while on the batteries.
Hope that helps,
Christian
Maybe you can try using a different sensor like HFS-DC06. Video for reference.
Does it have to look good? I made a crude battery powered temp sensor.
Thanks for the video. I like that the HFS-DC06’s sensitivity can be adjusted with it’s builtin potentiometer. The video shows that it draws a wopping 14mA @3.3v (as opposed to typical PIR sensors at <1mA @3.3v). The other sensors in the video draw around 3mA; however, they have other sensitivity-related limitations that the HFS-DC06 doesnt have.
What kind of battery would I need to make it last at least 2-3 months? It might not be feasible to use a battery source.
With most reasonably modern motion sensors, the current drawn by the esp while wifi communicates, will be the design driver for battery life. So the main question to answer when doing anything esp+battery is, how often will it need to send data? I think tom_i gave similar advice above.
I have designed some custom battery powered esp motion devices that last years between charges if only tripped like once a day. Same things might last a few months if they hey activated a few times a day… burn out in weeks if I tried using them in a heavy traffic area. So the big driver of battery life, no matter how elegant the circuit design is, will be simply how often it waked every day where it will be used.
Answer that, and any decent nerd can run the calcs to determine battery size for X hour life.
[Edit: Also, if you can modify the cover/housing of the fan safely, you may have room to wire up something that has a mains powered supply (sonoff or similar). The problem I forsee with that is the power up there is likely not constant, but switched at the wall). There may be another way to get this done though… may have to break down and get a nice zwave motion that hits the potty area.
Radar motion sensors like the rcwl0510 are nice when you need to ‘see through’ a wall. However that can be an issue if seeing through certain walls is not desired, since those things have little directional control.
@CeeCee, This project wasn’t intended for any of the bathrooms in my home, except for my personal bathroom attached to my bedroom. But, yeah, the camera idea was a bad idea in more ways than one.
Isn’t the Xiaomi device just another PIR sensor? If it is, I already have a bunch of those (zwave/zha).
Yes, just a PIR.
Guys… based on my current options, I’ve decided to just add a second PIR sensor dedicated to the the toilet area. It’s not perfect; but, it would be a little better than what I have now. I’ve already spent way too much time on this. If I was able to add an ultrasonic sensor (or radar sensor with attenuated sensitively) in the existing light/fan enclosure relatively easily, I would probably do that. Thanks for all your responses!
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