New aqara vibration / shock sensor

Hi all,

does someone already tried the new aqara vibration sensor?
http://s.aliexpress.com/YryInuUb

I wonder what the actual use cases can be for this sensor.

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Oh wow that’s pretty cool… some use cases I can think of off the top of my head… depending on how sensitive the device is.

  • Tamper detection (Garage roller door, ceiling manhole, car?)

  • In bed…?

  • Inside a safe/lockbox to detect motion.

  • Inside a letter box to let you know you have received mail.

  • EARTHQUAKES :rofl:

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On the back of your washer/dryer to see if it’s on?

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It will depend on what kind of sensitivity the sensor provides. I am curious to see if it reports just vibration on / off or also intermediate values. Lets see what people report. I did not order one yet though.

The sensor is also not listed in my mi home app yet.

Not anymore, now it appears.

Anyone has gotten his hands on one, to check if/how it appears in Home Assistant?

My home is packed with Aqara sensors, but I am particularly interested in these for many reasons.
The main reason though, and depending on sensitivity, is for presence detection. My home is raised and has timber floor boards. I’ve always wanted to affix vibration sensors to the underside of the floor boards to more accurately detect where movement is. The Aqara PIR sensors just aren’t good enough.
Theoretically, the more vibration sensors under the floor boards the higher the resolution of occupant positioning around the home.
I’ve ordered two for testing.

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Looking forward to see how you go!

Mine arrived today, and so far I’m a little underwhelmed. Some features like tilt and drop work well, but the vibration sensitivity is pretty bad.
Their advertising suggests being able to put it on surfaces, and have nearby interactions be picked up. Even putting it on a soft surface and tapping near it still won’t register. The sensitivity level is set on high.
I’ll do some more testing, but I’ll be keen to hear what others have found out.

You are testing with xiaomi app? Not supported by ha yet I guess?

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Correct, through the Mi app. I’m not a developer so I’ll let others smarter than I on this stuff check it out in HA.

That’s disappointing to hear, was thinking of these in couch / desk chair to detect if someone sits.

Do they not get picked up at all in HA?

Love to hear more uses for this, and if it actually works.

I like the idea for putting it on the washing machine for when it finishes… I hope that works!

So, can this be used as a tilt sensor (on the garage door to see if it open)? Does it give you an angle or just on/off? I am currently using a Monoprice tilt sensor and would like to replace it.

I did some digging into the sensor. See my reply: https://github.com/dresden-elektronik/deconz-rest-plugin/issues/748#issuecomment-419162237

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If the sensor is on the object which is moving then it doesn’t have too much trouble detecting.
Here’s a screenshot from the Mi app showing vibration, tilt, and drop.
Looks like the link which ptuk posted has a good deal of info which I’m yet to read through.

OH! That’s my next project.
But I’ll DIY an ESP8266 and a shock sensor, but thanks for the idea.

UPDATE

I built a test using a NodeMCU and an Iduino Vibration Shock module(SE053). It works pretty well. I can detect tapping on the breadboard, but my washer and dryer are just too quiet to pick up amy vibration.

Maybe it would pick up the garage door motor vibrations which would make it a candidate for a door-in-motion detector.

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This is pretty cool and I have this on my garage in lieu of a reed switch. Until there is full support I created proxy sensor by setting up the XiaoMi Home app to flip a zigbee switch on and off depending on the vibration. Then I tie the state to a template sensor to get full garage open or closed. Works well!

Can’t wait until this is fully supported!

I had another idea for this sensor using the tilt feature.
With air conditioners which are controlled via IR, the state (on/off) of the A/C cannot be retrieved. These sensors are small enough to stick to the vane of the A/C head unit. As the vane rotates up/down/left/right then it’s on, and if after a period of time no motion is detected then it is off.
Or maybe, it might be possible to detect certain angles from the sensor. Kind of like the use case of sticking it to a sectional roller door.

Has anyone gotten this to work? It is not added in the release notes for 0.80 or have I missed it?

It’s not developed yet for HA. It doesn’t work in MI Home app and if you are creative you can get it to work (sort of). I’m finding my hack isn’t reliable because MI Home isn’t reliable. Once it is developed then happy days.