Need some advice on automating my garage doors with Garageio

Hello all,

I currently have a Garageio system to automate the opening and closing of my garage doors. Garageio is integrated with IFTTT, but unfortunately there is not a lot of integration - the only trigger is notification of an open or close event (but only if door was open/closed using their app), and an action to close or open the door.

I would like to use a motion sensor in my garage to have HA close the garage door once no motion has been detected for x minutes. The problem is that I have no idea whether or not the garage door is actually open or not - not a big deal since I can fire an event through IFTTT to close the door even if it is already closed.

I’m thinking I need to create a variable that will get armed once motion has been detected in the garage and then fire the event to close the garage once motion has ceased for x minutes. Since I seem to restart HA a lot (because of testing) it would be nice if the state of this variable could survive a restart of HA.

Does this make sense - or am I over thinking this one :grin: ?

Thanks for any advise you can offer!

P.S. I would prefer not to add another door type sensor to the the garage doors if possible!

You mentioned not needing another door sensor… but … You will need another sensor of some type. It can be a reed or magnet sensor, a tilt sensor, an ultrasound - something to tell you when the door is closed. This will give you the on/off (open/closed) info you need to automate against.

Thanks for your reply. Any advice on a cheap simple door sensor to send an event into HA?

Depends on what you already have in your system. If you have 433mhz devices you can get a door switch using it and the OpenMQTTGateway… Or if you have zwave, or mqtt… or even mysensors.

This forum was helpful: Options for Garage Door Opener?

I have three protocols (433 zwave and mqtt) and and building this: http://automatedhome.party/2017/01/06/wifi-garage-door-controller-using-a-wemos-d1-mini/

I have a Chamberlain (which is controlled by alarm.com using the MyQ device) … so your asking why I need more automation? Well, in their infinite stupidity alarm.com will not allow Alexa (the skill) to open my garage door by voice command (I can only close it). I can only do both by using my alarm.com phone app…

I bought another remote and removed the cover. Figured out the button can be triggered when I ground (set low) the button using the Wemos D1 mini… However when there is a power outage and the Wemos starts up, like all arduinos, it will short some pins as part of the startup. Which means my garage will go up when power is restored. To counter that, I’m putting it on an arduino battery backup. Yes, don’t tell the wife, but I’m spending more than the cost of the myq unit all over just to voice command open my garage door with HA…

The door sensor should be the easy part.
Good Luck.

I thought Garageio has a door sensor of some kind. If it does not, it would be easier to find something that has sensors and expandability for what you are looking for.

I eneded up with a Sonoff SV flashed with ESPHome, a magentic reed switch as well as a neopixel ring and a PIR sensor. I do not use the PIR for any automation, but I do have automation for notifications if the door is left open and no one is home or if the door is open past a certain time (late at night)

The best automation is turning on the garage lights when the door is open and then turning them off with a 2 mins delay when the door is closed.