I’m using HA quite a while, but now i wanted to get rid of my IKEA Zigbee Gateway and connect my zigbee devices directly to HA over ZHA.
This works pretty well, except for one thing.
I want to control my bulbs and outlets (Ikea tradfri zigbee white e27 light bulbs, ikea tradfri zigbee led driver for ikea skydrag leds) via the ikea remotes (ikea tradfri zigbee 2 button remote).
Directly, so without ZHA in between (so it works when my server is down).
But this seems impossible for me to do right now, but i think i’m just doing something in the procedure wrong.
Home Assistant 2023.3.6 on an x86 quadcore cpu with 8 gb ram (running as docker container)
Sonoff ZBDongle-P, Zigbee 3.0
Auto Update for Ikea devices enabled via zigpy
Goal:
Controlling the bulb directly with the 2 button remote (without ZHA in between)
Controlling the bulb via ZHA as well
bulb should report it’s state to ZHA when changed by the remote
What I’ve tried:
Resetting bulb and remote, connecting bulb to ZHA, connecting remote to ZHA, press a button on the remote a few times to wake it up and then use the binding feature in HA to bind the remote to the bulb . Result: the loading circle keeps spinning for hours, no interesting lines in the log, nothing happens. No success or error message. Bulb cannot be controlled by the remote after waiting for several hours (and pressing buttons on the remote every few minutes to keep it awake)
Resetting bulb and remote, connecting bulb to ZHA (controlling via ZHA works fine), connecting the remote directly to the bulb. Result: Bulb can be controlled by the remote, BUT the bulb has been “stolen” from ZHA. Controlling of the bulb via ZHA is not possible anymore. “Reconfigure device” in HA is unsuccessful.
I tried it in various several variations i cannot remember now, but i found no way to do it successfully.
Is there any guide available how to do it properly or does it simply not work and i have to use my ikea gateway instead?
(Yes i’ve used the search function, i found some topics in this direction, but no solution)
My experience is a 5-button TRÅDFRI remote can pair EITHER to a Zigbee coordinator OR directly with an IKEA bulb. Both is simply not possible, likely as IKEA added extensions to the Zigbee protocol that HASS has been working around every since (e.g. via updates to the quirks file).
I use an automation to control Zigbee bulbs from the TRÅDFRI remote via HASS.
Thank you for your answer. This would be the worst scenario for me.
But as with the IKEA GW this works i think there must be any way to get it working with ZHA as well.
I found this reddit post, where it sounds like it worked for some people? But unfortunately even with group binding instead of direct devices and reconfigure the bulb after the bind, it does not work in my case. (https://www.reddit.com/r/homeassistant/comments/o488j2/comment/h2gmzdq/)
Any news? I’ve had this working before with SmartThings, so I don’t understand why it didn’t work with Zigbee2mqtt. When I pair the remote, there’s a popup in z2m saying the bulb left my network. Very frustrating.
I have though managed to do this with a non -Ikea remote and the tradfri LED drivers. Wonder how they work differently…
Follow up: after performing some tests I found out that the bulb only leaves the z2m network when I pair it with the ikea remote. This is true for both the old two button on/off remote and the new 4 button remote for color bulbs.
But I don’t have any issues with the namron switches. On the contrary, this works as expected. The ikea switches are problematic to me, as they kick out the tradfri bulbs from HA/z2m when pairing to the bulb.
Can you explain in more detail? I don’t understand. I see from your screenshot you have added a namron light switch in home assistant. Are you suggesting I should bind the ikea switch with home assistant? What is then the procedure to directly pair the switch to the bulb?
Sure. You can configure binding through Z2M, which allows you to directly bind devices together. They will still report the states to Z2M, so you won’t “feel” any difference. The big benefit is that you can use your device controls even if HA / Z2M is down. It’s explained here.
Great, that sounds exactly as what I want! Thanks for explaining. And if I ever remove the bulb and switch from my z2m network, they are still bound directly to each other?
This is getting a bit Tradfri specific but maybe there’s help to have…
The z2m docs state this about one of my Ikea remotes:
below 2.3.075: suppports binding to groups only.
2.3.075 and greater: supports binding to devices only
My remote has fw version 2.2.010 and therefore belongs in the first description, only binding to groups. But is this some z2m restriction? Because certainly this remote was bought as a kit with a bulb and they were directly paired.
I did successfully pair the remote in z2m and tried the bind options as you suggested. But I’m confused to why there are already two “bindings” where I can’t change the Endpoints or Destination. There’s a third input where I can input my own Destination, but unsure if I need to choose any other clusters than OnOff and LvlCtrl because those are the only features I use?
Most IKEA devices support OTA firmware updates, you could do that if you’re missing functionality supported in later firmware versions than the one you are running. Can’t help you with the rest, I’m not familiar with the IKEA stuff only use a couple of bulbs from them.
Hi, can you explain your stepts in detail? I tried this approach in April and it hasn’t worked for me.
In the meantime I’ve switched back to the Tradfri Gateway and use HA Zigbee only for other stuff, but not light.
But i might give it another shot if you got it workin!
Do you experience a fast battery draining in the remotes connected to HA zigbee? This was another reason i switched back to the ikea gateway, i had to change the batteries every few weeks. With the ikea gateway they last years.
Have you found the menu in the screenshots, and what are your trying when you do a falling attempt? I realized that the last endpoint config fields are there too make new entries…
Just for the record, I had problem binding a E2201 to a zigbee group (with 2 LED lights in it).
The problem was that before clicking the “bind” button, I had to wake the remote by repeatedly clicking a remote button until he got all binding commands.
With this trick, I could:
Have both bulbs known by z2m and placed in a zigbee group.
Have the E2201 remote known by z2m
E2201 bond to the zigbee group (LevelCtrl OnOff)
The remote can control the lights even with HA down.
HA can control the lights (with the Adaptive Lighting integration).
