Is anyone using a device (I’m thinking ESP8266 ish) that has 6 dry contacts I can present to HA - I have two roller (not segment/tilt) doors that have headers for either ‘Activate’, or ‘Up’+‘Stop’+‘Down’.
Ideally I’d like /something/ that can run 6 relays and report position (perhaps external magnetic sensor?). Was thinking if it could be done with just GPIO but got myself confused.
I should clarify that I’m happy (and lazy enough) to just grab another zConnect box, but if someone’s been down this path before I’d be interested to see how…
That plus a couple of magnetic or mechanical endswitches, or even a tilt switch for each door and you should be able to get completely full functionality. Plus of course the total price should land comfortably in the 8-10$ region. The only caveat is you’ll have to arrange for some sort of reasonable mounting for the boards.
Cheers - had looked at those kinds of relay boards but wasn’t sure whether they’d work as ‘dry’ contacts or needed to have power (eg for lights/appliances) to work.
Am just tinkering with ESPHome and a Wemos D1 Mini for another purpose so might order some of those and have play. Thanks mate!
It isn’t 100% clear to me what exactly are the inputs and outputs you are trying to control on these doors. They have 3 inputs, 1 for open, 1 for close, and one for on/off? Or is it 3 outputs… or combo of both? What is the open and close sequence of events? (Ie, to open first activate relay closed, then open relay close, then when endstop triggers, deactivate)
Also helpful for a more generic discussion… what voltages are the inputs and outputs. You say dry contact, but that clouds up my thinking. I like to think of things as in “I am switching a 110vac load here”, “I am sensing an open/close circuit there”, or “I am sensing low impedance voltage here”… etc.
Terminals at #10 are where I have options of either a single button (bottom two terminals) to just activate the door with a single button.
If it’s closed, it opens it. If it’s open, it closes it. If it’s opening, it stops. If it’s closing, it reverses to open.
The other option is the top three terminals (with a common ground), this provides individual buttons for open/stop/close.
I can close the terminals with a bit of jumper wire, and they work just fine - so I assumed this is what a ‘dry contact’ was - no voltage needed (when compared to say a relay that’s switching/powering lights or an appliance).
It’s also got an “External Door Position Signal Connector” but I can’t find any further details as to what/how they work. I suspect it’s a magnetic switch but no idea how it affects the operation of the door - so likely look to integrate a position sensor into my external device. It will more than likely need to be a magentic window/door sensor as it’s a roller not a tilt panel so the usual tilt sensor won’t work easily.
Likewise it has connections for an internal photo sensor, which if it’s like the ones we have at work, will stop/reopen if the beam is broken. I’m not sure whether I’ll use this on the controller board but as a failsafe if the remotes get screwy I might find out how much their sensors cost.
All of the roller shutter controllers I have found appear to actually control the motor itself by switching voltage, whereas the solution here seems to just be emulating a button press.
As mentioned of course an esp module with relays will work if you like that route. Yes relays will still work on those ‘dry contact’ inputs. Most roll up doors I’ve seen use a mag/reed switch for endstops. That position sensor you mention… I bet that is a rotary decoder that will measure real time position (like of you want to be able to open just a bit for air flow). That would be a very nice addition… probably a rotary decoder so you would need to use interrupts to read it (or additional hardware to transcode). Yeah I would do safety photocells…
but I am a safety nut. Those are probably best handled by the door opener itself (eliminate failures with zwave stuff for safety).
Have you looked at the gocontrol/linear zwave controller? I am considering that for my door… supposed to replace the usual wall button. I could just make an esp with relays for it. I already have the parts, but the gocontrol is a done deal (ie labor free) and looks clean. Comes with a tilt sensor but that can be used for Halloween animatronics or something.
My opener has integrated end stops (typical modern homeowner unit), but I use a ecolink zwave magnetic window sensor for alarm & text notifications… not sure why pricey and less reliable tilt sensors are so popular when most doors are built where you can fit a normal window sensor along the side tracks (and stick the magnet on the edge of a door panel).
On a side note, I have a pipe dream of fully replacing my opener wall panel (has lock/unlock, open/close, lights on/off, and a motion sensor) with a DIY mqtt device. To that end I plan on looking at the waves on the wires with my scope to see what can be done.
