Install volkszähler and home assistant on same device

Installation
1

Hello,

I’m using HomeAssistant on a Raspberry 4 what works very well. I’ve set up the raspberry using an image.

Now I like to use an IR sensor with USB support to track power consumption based on the IR interface of my electric meter. There is a tutorial which describes, how to use this sensor with volkszähler but no one for direct use in home assistant.

I’ve seen, that volkszähler is supported by home assistant but I don’t want to run volkszähler on a second raspberry. Does some one has experience with installing volkszähler on a running home assistant image without damaging it?

Best regards!

2

If possible, you can use an esp8266 microcontroller with an or sensor and for software esphome for sure with a pulse counter sensor or raynor’s, what I’m unsure about.
How did you install HA? With a premade image with everything already setup? Then I think there’s an add-on for that. Else there might be a docker container for it as well. But I would prefer the esp way, because it’s independent from the raspi and still reasonable priced. The parts on Amazon are like 10 euros, if you count the microcontroller, ir sensor and some dupont wires if don’t have any. For the psu an old cellphone charger with 5v will do the job, you could never use an usb port of the raspi, but I don’t recommend it.

3

Thank you for your response. I’ve set-up HA using a premade image. I’m also using HA for several other sensors (IoT).

I’ve bought two of this sensors “ELV Bausatz Lesekopf mit USB-Schnittstelle für digitale Zähler USB-IEC” (https://de.elv.com/elv-bausatz-lesekopf-mit-usb-schnittstelle-fuer-digitale-zaehler-usb-iec-155523) since I don’t wont to build a custom sensor.

Do I have a chance to directly access this USB device via HA?

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4

Basically, you can install the ssh addon and ssh into the pi and then can install volkszähler via docker.
https://github.com/volkszaehler/docker The instruction with docker-compose seems to be the easiest way of doing it for you, since you only need one simply command instead of a few ones. But im not sure if this would work with the premade home assistant images, since they are a very minimal linux distro without package manegement and so on.
Oh, about the direct acces in HA im not not sure. If its a serial connection, that could be easy, but i dont know a HA integration to do it. Atleast im unsure, but i think that it could work.

1 Like
5

Hi there, I am looking for the same solution so far.What is the status about this Projekt?Is anybody there who can help or has made this run?!
Best wishes Marc

6

Hi,

Sorry, I’ve given up with this since my sensors has to be assembled from scratch…

Best regards…