Home Assistant Add-on: rtl_433 with MQTT auto discovery

deviantintegral · June 24, 2024, 1:44am

Yes! It’s been in the next branch for a while with no issues, and I rolled a new stable tag today.

Fayrewood · August 14, 2024, 9:32am

I am running into difficulty specifying a specific decoder from within the config file.

I successfully capture the packets, but the raw data is returned non-decoded. The instructions for the specific project state the following for RTL_433 on the command line, but I’m not sure I’ve formatted it correctly in the HA Add On config file.

rtl_433 -R 0 -f 868.298M -X 'n=Marlec,m=FSK_PCM,s=10,l=10,g=1000,r=2000,preamble=aad391d391'

My HA RTL_433 config file is:

output mqtt://${host}:${port},user=${username},pass=${password},retain=${retain}
report_meta time:iso:usec:tz

frequency 868.3M
output kv

decoder n=Marlec,m=FSK_PCM,s=10,l=10,g=1000,r=2000,preamble=aad391d391
protocol 188

Can anyone see what I am doing wrong?
Thanks for any pointers!

deviantintegral · August 28, 2024, 7:52pm

Are you implementing a brand new protocol, or one that is already supported? If it’s one that rtl_433 knows about, you just need the protocol number. If you are implementing a new decoder, you need the decoder line.

It’s a lot faster to test and debug new decoders outside of home assistant, so I’d suggest installing rtl_433 on your normal computer and working there until you get a working decoder line.

github.com

merbanan/rtl_433/blob/f0ba1538213a2fcb7487862fa1cfe7a1969a174a/conf/rtl_433.example.conf#L494


      
            protocol 255 # Mueller Hot Rod water meter
            protocol 256 # ThermoPro TP28b Super Long Range Wireless Meat Thermometer for Smoker BBQ Grill
            protocol 257 # BMW Gen3 TPMS
            protocol 258 # Chamberlain CWPIRC PIR Sensor
            protocol 259 # ThermoPro TP829b Meat Thermometer 4 coated probes
          # protocol 260 # Arad/Master Meter Dialog3G water utility meter
            protocol 261 # Geevon TX16-3 outdoor sensor
            protocol 262 # Fine Offset Electronics WH46 air quality sensor
            protocol 263 # Vevor Wireless Weather Station 7-in-1
          
          ## Flex devices (command line option "-X")
          
          # Some general decoder definitions for various devices, enable as needed.
          #
          # For details about decoder definition run "rtl_433 -X help"
          #
          
          # If you enable these decoders you'll likely want to add ",match=<YOUR-DEVICE-ID>"
          
          # Elro DB270 - wireless doorbell
          #

Emphyrio · September 21, 2024, 2:43pm

Pulling my hair out, please help to save my good looks

6-12 months ago Home Assistant / RTL_433 stopped picking up my Bresser 7in1 weather station. Today I tried to troubleshoot the issue.

On my Pop_OS desktop PC, everything is fine:

When I then connect the radio to Home Assistant OS (NUC) again, the logs of the RTL_433 add-on do not show anything being detected:

This is the config:

frequency   868M
protocol    173
# pulse_detect   auto
# sample_rate    1M
# gain    25

convert     si
report_meta time:iso:tz:local

output kv
# output json

How can I troubleshoot this further? I am at a loss right now.

deviantintegral · September 21, 2024, 5:54pm

Is there any chance the protocol number somehow changed? I see it in your HA config file but not in the command line on your desktop.

Also, rtl_433 on your desktop is quite old (2021!), so it’s possible there’s been a regression since then. Could you try 23.11 or newer on your PC, to match what’s in Home Assistant?

It may also be worth browsing through the issues upstream at https://github.com/search?q=repo%3Amerbanan%2Frtl_433+bresser&type=issues in case others have noticed anything.

Emphyrio · September 22, 2024, 11:54am

Thanks for the advice! I verified some more, unfortunately not a fix yet.

I tried the newer rtl_433 version 23.11 on my desktop with the same result: the Bresser weather station is getting picked on the desktop perfectly.
Confirmed there that protocol 173 is still the correct one.
Checked out the issues upstream, but found nothing relevant.

I think I should now focus on the difference between PC (with PopOS/Ubuntu) and NUC (with HA-OS). Do you have any advice how I could further pinpoint the issue? Thanks in advance!

DominikW · September 22, 2024, 12:50pm

I’ve tried to get a friends Bresser 7 in 1 station to pick up with the Fitipower FC0012 tuner, but even if I got a some reading the tuner would stop reporting after couple of hours. The tuner worked fine with 433 signal, but with 868 it had troubles. The we tried a different tuner the Nooelec RTL-SDR v5 SDR and it worked great with this set up:

frequency 868.3M
verbose 7
gain 0
protocol 173 # Bresser Weather Center 7-in-1
convert si
output kv
report_meta level
#report_meta noise
report_meta stats
report_meta time:usec
report_meta protocol
pulse_detect minlevel=-36
pulse_detect magest
sample_rate 250k

There is also an option to set up the station to send data to your own web server (this depends on the firmware, the newer station do not have this option), you can try this to send data to NodeRED and then to HA. If you want I can help you with this. It is all local and uses your local wifi to get data from the station to Home Assistant.

Emphyrio · September 23, 2024, 5:38pm

Thanks @DominikW for your suggestions.

For now, I will try to connect the Fitipower to a Raspberry Pi 3 I have lying around. Perhaps that works.

Sending data to my own webserver/NodeRed is not really a preferred option because I would like to not use the Bresser display/server. RTL-433 has served me well for several years. If RPI3 doesn´t work out, I will check out the RTL-SDR v5. Thanks!

Snash · September 29, 2024, 5:48pm

I am using the rtl_433 add on in home assistant. Something weird and I am hoping someone can answer

If I have the hop interval specified like the below then the device which is on 319.5 gets detected

# Uncomment the following line to also enable the default "table" output to the
# addon logs.
output kv
hop_interval 60
frequency 433.92M
frequency 319.5M

However if I remove the hop interval no device gets detected

# Uncomment the following line to also enable the default "table" output to the
# addon logs.
output kv
frequency 319.5M

Any help would be appreciated

Yonu · September 30, 2024, 11:30pm

not sure what i am doing wrong but I am having no luck getting to discovery to find my Acurite-5n1 but it shows in the log for rtl433 any tips on what I might be missing?