Open source ESPHome IR blaster?

Great to hear people are able to flash devices like this with ESPHome again using LibreTiny…just like the good old Tuya-convert days…

Thanks for sharing your code.

Can you help me getting how to get the codes for I’m different remotes?

Still haven’t figured out how to read them.

Thank you

@cikaybe Assuming your IR Blaster works and you flashed the YAML, I believe all you need to do is to start the log and then point your remote and press the button you want to replicate. The codes received will appear in the log. Without trying it again I can’t recall the exact details but I believe it gives you several different code options. If I recall correctly I picked NEC or Pronto, but I am not sure. I can look into it if you can’t figure it out.

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do you have a link to the exact product you purchased?

I’ve made my own custom ones :slight_smile:

Will make a thread when the cases are printed later on

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I bought the tasmota ir controller from athom.tech, then flashed esphome onto it. Works pretty good for 15€

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That’s cool, I like that! I forget where I saw it or read it not long ago but, it was the same topic IR range and needing a clear line of sight and the shortcomings of IR. Now this probably wouldn’t be practical for everywhere but this person made a similar device as yours but instead of IR transmitters they used an RF transmitter. So, IR signals would come in and then they’d be converted, then transmitted long range, through walls, up/down different story’s of a house, etc. and then whichever RF receiver that code went to and triggered a sensor state change, it would then be converted back to the original IR code (from upstairs) and then transmitted via IR to the desired device in the house. I thought that was pretty clever. I get that you could do that through HA automations or other possibilities but, I like keeping automations on the esp’s whenever possible and therefore very reliable.

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Thanks :slight_smile:

Here’s it sitting in the case finally ready: ESP32 IR Blaster (Transmitter/Receiver) - Long Range

Interesting about the RF relay, I was actually thinking about adding that to this unit but I already have a bunch of RF boards sitting around and just used those in the end.

Definitely easy for me to add in a future version though :wink:

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I dont know how to put this nicely but, if i was an IR remote, id hit it! I meant to ask about the case in my initial rambling post and forgot… Im curios though. It looks like its meant to sit flat like in the photos. Does pointing all the led’s vertical effect the range at all? As much as I do like it, I think if there were only minimal negative effects from the leds on the sides instead, i personally would like that more. Not that my opinion matters here, i’m just saying for the sake of feedback.

Something else im curious about. What kind of testing did you do when planning this? Did you find a meaningful difference between the final number of leds and say half as many? I guess im just wondering how you landed on that number.

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Why does one need RF if you have wifi from the esp33 already. Is it wall penetration and range that’s more important with RF?

:joy:

I actually went for vertical because it’s the same way I had my RM4 mounted/pointing… But so far in testing I’ve pointed it in all directions without missing a signal.

I was initially planning to bend the LEDs over and point them at different angles until it didn’t seem necessary in the tests :slight_smile:

Planning is over-rated :wink: I picked 9 LEDs half at random and half based on current/voltage drop calculations

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It still looks good though. I havnt spent much time looking into it, but why does it seem like the IR leds that come in something like an Arduino/esp transmitter/receiver kit are nowhere near as good as your common TV remotes?

Having done a little bit of looking into it, they basically all use very cheap LEDs. Common TV remotes always have at least one (sometimes 2) decent IR LEDs as well as some sort of cone or lens to focus the signal more

Hi, These are generally Tuya variants. The one I bought is via Amazon India, the brand name is Teqooz that costed me 10$. You can find it here

Looks like LibreTiny is opening up ESPHome takeovers for some more Tuya devices again.

Just got this one working… Code’s there in case it might help at all.
Anyone got any good ideas for improving it?
Theres a button that I havent used, and the LEDs only showing status in case of error…

You want to flash the status light after each command you send probably:

        - light.turn_on: status_light
        - delay: 60ms
        - light.turn_off: status_light

Personally I use a lazy “on” tracker, this way:

globals:
  - id: last_action
    type: int

binary_sensor:
  - platform: template
    name: "TV Tracker Internal"
    id: tv_tracker_internal
    internal: true
    on_state:
      then:
        - lambda: |-
            id(last_action) = millis()/1000ULL;
        - light.turn_on: status_light
        - delay: 60ms
        - light.turn_off: status_light

Then after each TX command I run this:

- lambda: id(tv_tracker_internal).publish_state(true);

(or false if it’s a power off command)

Thanks.
Light’s flashing with each command sent now. Probably the best use there is for the LED tbh
Added a bunch more buttons and icons for them too.

I like the idea of tracking if the TVs on or off, but the TVs own remote is used as well. I guess that’d mean it’d often end up wrong?

I like the idea of using a multidimensional array to hold the button details and their remote codes, rather than a long list of mixed code/data, but I’m still getting that working. It’d mean adding more buttons/codes would just be adding them to a ‘table’ rather than copy/pasting and then changing chunks of code for each.
It might just be complicating it unneccessarily though.

Some way to automate capturing codes would be good, but I’m not sure how to start with that yet. At least for me, capturing them is still hit-and-miss enough that it might have to stay a manual process.
I’ve settled on capturing a buttons codes maybe 5-10 times, then creating buttons for each and trying them out multiple times. The one that performs most reliably and/or fastest is kept.
There might be a way to automate that, but it’s beyond me at the moment… Learning a lot right now though, so maybe
I haven’t been able to find any existing examples of doing something like that, anyone aware of anything similar pls?

I haven’t done this myself but it might work out well to use yaml anchors for duplicating command sections actually… My templates are quite long so I should play with that :slight_smile:

Here’s what I do as far as a better way to learn commands - needs more customisation for the various protocols though, I just use pronto and sony here.

You switch the learn command switch on, fire an IR command, then the switch will turn off and you get the data in the sensor.


switch:
  - platform: template
    name: Learn Command
    id: remote_learn_switch
    optimistic: true

text_sensor:
  - platform: template
    name: Learned Command
    id: learned_command

remote_receiver:
  pin: 
    number: GPIO25
    inverted: true
  dump: all
  # on_sony:
  #   - if:
  #       condition:
  #         lambda: 'return id(remote_learn_switch).state;'
  #       then:
  #         - lambda: |-
  #             id(remote_learn_switch).publish_state(false);
  #             std::string log_output = "Sony: Data = 0x" + esphome::format_hex(x.data) + ", nbits = " + esphome::to_string(x.nbits);
  #             id(learned_command).publish_state(log_output.c_str());
  #         - delay: 80ms
  #         - light.turn_on: ir_status_light
  #         - delay: 500ms
  #         - light.turn_off: ir_status_light
  on_pronto:
    - if:
        condition:
          lambda: 'return id(remote_learn_switch).state;'
        then:
          - lambda: |-
              id(remote_learn_switch).publish_state(false);
              std::string log_output = "Pronto: Data = " + esphome::to_string(x.data);
              id(learned_command).publish_state(log_output.c_str());
          - delay: 80ms
          - light.turn_on: ir_status_light
          - delay: 500ms
          - light.turn_off: ir_status_light

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I like how that sounds, but tbh I’m not able to read thorugh that code and really understand it yet.

Is it something like this?
If remote_learn_switch is on (done using a button?),
then take the IR command (that starts with "Pronto: Data = ") from the log and put it in learned_command?
publish_state is new to me, maybe something like ‘save and make available’?
I’ve got some reading to do :smile:

and thanks… I don’t want to trample all over this thread with me getting my head around things though, better in the one I started while getting mine going?