Help with Byron Doorbell via RFXTrx

lolouk44 · September 7, 2017, 11:14am

Hi,

I have a Byron SX-20T doorbell that communicates via 433MHz frequency to an RFXTrx Transceiver.
with automatic_add: True the doorbell gets added when I press the doorbell.

I used the address to try and save it permanently into my config under the name Doorbell

the entity is then strangely listed as sensor.doorbell_sound, not just doorbell as saved
when entering {{ states.sensor.doorbell_sound }} in templates, the entity attributes are these:
<template state sensor.doorbell_sound=5; Rssi numeric=6, Battery numeric=0, Sound=5, unit_of_measurement=, friendly_name=Doorbell Sound @ 2017-09-07T11:10:26.610412+01:00>
I want to run automations when I press the doorbell, but as the status and attributes never change, the automation doesn’t run.

if I manually reset any of the attributes, they get automatically overwritten back to their previous status even without me pressing the doorbell button

Any ideas on how I would go about catching the button press?
HA log does show that it receives a message, but does nothing with it as al the attributes are the same

Danielhiversen · September 7, 2017, 1:10pm

Have you tried listen for the fired event?
https://github.com/Danielhiversen/home-assistant_config/blob/master/automation/do_gang.yaml#L3

Enable debug logging for the rfxtrx component and sensor, and check the log after pressing the doorbell

lolouk44 · September 7, 2017, 1:43pm

Thanks for your help.
This is what I get in the debug:

2017-09-07 14:40:31 DEBUG (Thread-13) [homeassistant.components.rfxtrx] Receive RFXCOM event from (Device_id: 00b7 Class: RFXtrxDevice Sub: 0, Pkt_id: 0716000200b70560)

How would I use that info?

seanb-uk · September 9, 2017, 10:06am

You need to set fire_event to true in the sensor configuration - use automatic_add to get the ID, then create a manual entry in your configuration:

sensor:
  platform: rfxtrx
  devices: 
    XXXXXXXXXXX:
     name: doorbell
     data_type:
       - Sound
     fire_event: true

This will ensure you get an event every time you press the doorbell. Your event_type should then be signal_received in your trigger:

- alias: 'Doorbell pushed'
  trigger:
    - platform: event
      event_type: signal_received
      event_data:
        entity_id: sensor.doorbell_sound

I have a longer writeup on my blog.

lolouk44 · September 11, 2017, 7:15am

Thanks @seanb-uk that’s exactly what I needed.

Klagio · November 13, 2018, 1:05pm

Hi, are you happy with your installation. Looking also for a solution like yours, but in doubt to how/which 433 Receiver to use

lolouk44 · November 13, 2018, 2:13pm

Yes I’m happy with it. Only “drawback” I think it my physical setup. Early this year I redid the porch and the bell now sits flush against a new door that’s constructed of metal and partially blocks /weakens the signal.
AS a result I’m having to change the battery quite often (4-6 months). I’m actually thinking of bringing always on power to the doorbell to fix this.
That said the doorbell works perfectly fine otherwise.
I use it for “regular” doorbell announcement and to notify me by email and including pictures from my CCTV so I see who actually rang the bell.
It’s no Ring doorbell but it’s good enough for my needs, at a fraction of the cost.

mrmaceurope · June 30, 2021, 9:08pm

Hi @lolouk44 @seanb-uk and everyone,

Since the new RFXCOM integration I haven’t been able to make the Byron Doorbell to work. I’ve added the doorbell using automatic discovery and the eventid matches the old, so everything should be fine, then I have configured the entity so that Device Event are enabled.

DEVICE/INTEGRATION
Byron Devices in the Integration/Device overview

AUTOMATION
As you can see, I have tried all three combination of triggering the automation, but nothing happens, looking at the history log, it seems that the integration never pickup the push on the doorbell… what to do?

# AUTOMATION - DOORBELL
#              ACTIVATING THE DOORBELL WHEN BUTTON ARE BEING PRESSED
- alias: house_doorbell_pushed
  initial_state: true
  trigger:
    # - platform: state
    #   entity_id: binary_sensor.rfxcom_doorbell_1
    #   from: "off"
    #   to: "on"
    # platform: state
    # entity_id: binary_sensor.rfxcom_doorbell_1
    # to: "on"
    platform: event
    event_type: signal_received
    event_data:
      entity_id: binary_sensor.rfxcom_doorbell_1
  action:

…and I have really tried to read the documentation – and tried all sorts of combination of the example provided - with excatly the Byron doorbell push, which are identical with mine.

So does anyone have some hints here

seanb-uk · July 1, 2021, 5:08pm

The signal_received method stopped working when the integration was updated to use the UI. I had to change my config. I now have a sensor named doorbell_sound:

If I recall correctly (it was while ago), that’s just a renaming of one the discovered Byron sensors. My automation then just reacts to any state change for that sensor:

alias: Doorbell rung
trigger:
  - entity_id: sensor.doorbell_sound
    platform: state
action:

mrmaceurope · July 17, 2021, 2:53pm

Hi @seanb-uk,

Thank you for helping me out here – I was concern that the new RFXrtx RFXCOM integration didn’t work at all with my Byron Doorbell Push, but you confirmed that it indeed would/should work.

So for everyone else searching on this topic, I will now share the steps I did for integrating the Byron Doorbell Push, using RFXcom antenna with Home Assistant with the RFXcom integration.

If you are new here, you would need to be aware that you will not be able to see a state change anywhere in Home Assistant, as I guess it happens so quickly. So as mentioned by Sean, you would need to have the doorbell automation to trigger on “any” state change (back to that a little later).

ADD BYRON DOORBELL PUSH
Within HA under Integrations - under the RFXTRX integration. Click CONFIGURE and then enable ‘Enable automatix add’. Then push the bottom on the Byron Doorbell push and then see if you can find it under the RFXTRX integration, under devices. Look for any new device added, mine ‘Model’= Select Plus 3.

Once the doorbell as been added, quickly, turn off the ‘Enable automatic add’ under Configure, otherwise your list of devices will grow quickly.

DEBUG
If you need to debug, to see whether the doorbell are actually received by HA, you can add the following lines to your 'configuration.yaml’ and restart HA. Then using a terminal you can look for the following string in the homeassistant log file.

logger:
  logs:
    RFXtrx: debug

tail -f home-assistant.log | grep homeassistant.components.rfxtrx.sensor

When I push the doorbell, I get the below entries in the HA log, so you should see something similar

2021-07-17 16:03:58 DEBUG (MainThread) [homeassistant.components.rfxtrx.sensor] Sensor update (Device ID: f6:29 Class: ChimeDevice Sub: 3)
2021-07-17 16:03:58 DEBUG (MainThread) [homeassistant.components.rfxtrx.sensor] Sensor update (Device ID: f6:29 Class: ChimeDevice Sub: 3)
2021-07-17 16:04:05 DEBUG (MainThread) [homeassistant.components.rfxtrx.sensor] Sensor update (Device ID: f6:29 Class: ChimeDevice Sub: 3)
2021-07-17 16:04:05 DEBUG (MainThread) [homeassistant.components.rfxtrx.sensor] Sensor update (Device ID: f6:29 Class: ChimeDevice Sub: 3)

AUTOMATION
Now you simply need to write your automation for triggering your automation, when the doorbell has been pushed. My automation below, sends a snapshot from the outdoor security camera, sends a notification to phones and plays a tone on my SONOS speakers.

# AUTOMATION - DOORBELL
#              ACTIVATING THE DOORBELL WHEN BUTTON ARE BEING PRESSED
- alias: house_doorbell_pushed
  initial_state: true
  trigger:
    - platform: state
      entity_id: binary_sensor.rfxcom_doorbell_1
  action:
    - service: camera.snapshot
      data:
        entity_id: camera.ubnt_outdoor1_generic
        filename: "/config/www/doorbell.jpg"
    - service: persistent_notification.create
      data:
        message: "DØRKLOKKE: Nogen har ringet på døren!"
        title: "Dørklokke"
    - service: notify.ios_notify_all
      data:
        message: "DØRKLOKKE: Nogen har ringet på døren!"
        data:
          image: "https://(TOKEN).ui.nabu.casa/local/doorbell.jpg"
          attachment:
            content-type: jpeg
          push:
            category: camera
          entity_id: camera.ubnt_outdoor1_generic
    - service: notify.google_notify_all
      data:
        message: "DØRKLOKKE: Nogen har ringet på døren!"
        data:
          image: "https://(TOKEN).ui.nabu.casa/local/doorbell.jpg"
          clickAction: /lovelace/sikkerhed
    - service: media_player.volume_set
      entity_id: media_player.spisekokken
      data:
        volume_level: 0.14000000000000000
    - service: media_player.play_media
      data:
        entity_id: media_player.spisekokken
        media_content_id: http://192.168.1.xx:8123/local/Ding-dong-doorbell-rings.mp3
        media_content_type: music
    - service: notify.email_notification_doorbell
      data:
        title: "HOME ASSISTANT: Dørklokke alarm"
        message: "DØRKLOKKE: Nogen har ringet på døren!"
        data:
          images:
            - "/config/www/doorbell.jpg"