I am a complete novice when it comes to home automation and have set up a small mini PC with ProxMox in my basement, on which I run the Home Assistant.
Now I would like to connect my roof window roller blinds (made by Roto Frank) to my Home Assistant installation.
The manufacturer’s website says that the products are all “Smart Home” ready and they offer wiring diagrams for integration via Somfy, Busch-Jaeger, myGekko etc., for example. Unfortunately, I know next to nothing about electrical engineering and had hoped for simpler integration.
My idea now is not to hook the shutters directly into Home Assistant but only the remote control. This is a product from Becker.
This is probably possible via the Becker Centronic USB stick. This would have to be plugged into my Home Assistant computer. This would allow me to control the wireless button via Home Assistant.
Unfortunately, the Home Assistant computer is in the basement and the roof window blinds are (surprise) a few floors up. The signal from the USB stick won’t reach that far.
How can I solve the problem?
I have discussed this with an AI. She came up with the idea of using a Raspberry Pi in the attic and plugging the Centronics USB stick into it. I would then run the Home Assistant on this second computer in a minimal installation and use it as a kind of “client” for the “main” Home Assistant in the attic.
Since such an AI likes to talk nonsense from time to time, I would like to know whether this is a sensible approach before I invest money here.
Can anyone help me? Or perhaps has a completely different idea? Am I thinking too complicated?
The difficulty can be to use that with any kind of system + you will have another system running, just for this stick and to communicate with your blinds.
A much more simple solution could be to use a RF/IR bridge like a broadlink RM4 pro, which connects over Wi-Fi to your network/HA and sends the commands to your blinds.
I have used that particular device to control older HiFi devices with HA.
EDIT 2: apparently there is a custom component which can talk with the stick but still, you would need HA with the stick close to the blinds.
I was looking for a programmable universal remote control that works on 868.3 MHz. However, this seems to be a rather exotic frequency: I have not found a product.
I ordered the model you suggested as a test - but unfortunately it didn’t work as it doesn’t support this frequency either.
So I got to work and set up a slave home assistant. The plan is to plug a wireless USB stick from Becker into it, which will then control the shutters.
Unfortunately, it is not yet clear whether the Centronic USB stick from Becker is really compatible with my roller shutter motors. I will probably have no choice but to try it out.
