I moved my z-wave controller and now all my nodes are dead

Configuration Z-Wave
1

I think I’ve really screwed things up and hope someone can help me out. Earlier today, I moved my Home Assistant (which runs on Raspberry Pi4) from the 3rd floor to the 1st floor (I live in a row house). Then all of my z-wave devices were showing up as dead nodes in the Z-Wave JS control panel. In case it helps, my z-wave controllers is a Zooz ZST10 with firmware v2.3 and SDK v6.81.3.

I thought I could remove the dead nodes and re-include the devices but I can get that to work. Can someone please help me figure this out. I have a mix of z-wave devices from light switches and outlets to contact sensor and temperature/humidity sensors.

I think I’ve really screwed this up.

2

It sounds like your Z-wave dongle is too far from the first node. How are they spread about the house? Did you put the dongle inside a metal cabinet?

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3

Have you actually removed them? It was likely a range issue that could be solved with a few extra repeaters. What’s still on the network? (dead or not)

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Hi @stevemann and @NathanCu – The only device showing up in the Z-Wave JS control panel is the Zooz ZST10 (i.e., the zwave usb dongle). All the nodes for the other z-wave devices were removed because they were dead.

There is a Zooz motion sensor which also works as a z-wave repeater that is about 18 inches away from the z-wave dongle. I can’t get it to be included anymore. I tried a factory reset on the motion sensor and try to included. But the controller can’t find it.

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I don’t have any devices listed under Z-Wave JS other than the controller. I figure the reason why I am unable to re-include the devices is that I didn’t exclude the devices before I removed the nodes from Z-Wave JS.

How do I fix what I’ve done???

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Correct.

Im trying to think of a way out without exclude/reset re-add every device and im not finding one. Sorry.

ZWave (non plus) devices don’t necessarily automatically exclude themselves on factory reset so it’s very likely… I have to both reset and exclude my schlage locks to get them to join again…

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@NathanCu I believe most, in not all, of my devices are Z-Wave Plus. So I’ll do a factory reset on each device and then try to include them again. All the devices are still provisioned on my z-wave dongle so I think I should be okay on that front. I guess I know how I’ll be spending my Saturday.

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Keep in mind: any zwave controller can EXCLUDE any zwave device.

Eg. Another controller in EXCLUDE mode can exclude any included device in your network.
And any device (eg. Bought on ebay) can be excluded on your controller prior to inclusion.

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So I can use my existing zwave controller to exclude my devices even though I’ve deleted the nodes for these devices?

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Yes indeed

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@NathanCu I have reset most of my devices and they are starting to show up in Z-Wave JS. Some of the device details/attributes do not seem right. For example, I have several Ring contact sensors (gen2). These are z-wave plus, but the Z-Wave JS UI shows that one is not. Similarly, I have several Enbrighten wall outlets and the Z-Wave JS UI shows that one has no security, but the device is identical to others that are shown as having S2 Authenticated security.

Is there anything I can do to fix this? I’ve tried re-interviewing the devices and healing their nodes.

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Re include the ones that are not right.

I also strongly suggest that if a device does not need security and only supports S0_legacy then don’t include it with security. (unless of course it’s a lock or door control etc.)

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Thank you @NathanCu I will give it a try!

Do you know if the Home Assistant will try to re-optimize the z-wave mesh network on its own? Or do I need to heal nodes manually?

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Once it’s solid. Leave it alone unless you have an issue.

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NEVER heal the entire network. It does not really harm if you heal “a node”.

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