Update: even after rolling back the Tasmota version to 9.3.0, the device disconnections continue.
I guess I have to conclude that this instability isn’t the fault of the Tasmota firmware version.
Maybe some recent change to HA core or the HA supervisor has made the Zigbee system less stable…maybe changes in zigpy or bellows?
The HA logs show daily trouble with bellows…
CRC error in frame b’26aced5f7a7e’ (b’5f7a’ != b’8c6a’)
11:14:59 AM – /usr/local/lib/python3.8/site-packages/bellows/uart.py (ERROR) - message first occurred at March 5, 2021, 12:01:13 PM and shows up 2 times
NCP entered failed state. Requesting APP controller restart
10:08:57 AM – /usr/local/lib/python3.8/site-packages/bellows/ezsp/init.py (ERROR) - message first occurred at March 4, 2021, 2:10:52 PM and shows up 40 times
Error doing job: Task was destroyed but it is pending!
2:59:20 AM – runner.py (ERROR) - message first occurred at March 4, 2021, 11:58:17 PM and shows up 12 times
Lost serial connection: read failed: [Errno 104] Connection reset by peer
March 5, 2021, 11:17:47 PM – /usr/local/lib/python3.8/site-packages/bellows/uart.py (ERROR) - message first occurred at March 4, 2021, 2:40:12 PM and shows up 7 times
Watchdog heartbeat timeout:
March 5, 2021, 11:17:44 PM – /usr/local/lib/python3.8/site-packages/bellows/zigbee/application.py (WARNING) - message first occurred at March 5, 2021, 9:12:45 PM and shows up 2 times
Over the last 2 weeks, the IKEA TRADFRI Zigbee repeaters have been the devices that drop out of the Zigbee network. Then, all contact with their paired devices is lost. Simply re-pairing the TRADFRI repeaters with the Sonoff Zigbee Bridge brings all the devices back, but we should not have to intervene once a week!
same problem here with 9.3.1, but after upgrading to 9.3.1.1 it works. some sensors have to be re-paired. shall I wait for the upcoming update and then pair them?
craciunbogdan.mbogdanx
some sensors have to be re-paired. shall I wait for the upcoming update and then pair them?
I’d re-pair them now. I don’t think waiting for a future firmware fix is realistic.
Unfortunately, you’re going to be re-pairing them several times per month or week.
From what I’m reading, Zigbee devices come unpaired because data packets get lost or missed in the wifi-to-zigbee link, inside the Sonoff Zigbee Bridge. It sounds like a fundamental architecture flaw, which could mean it’s not fixable without a new version of the Sonoff Zigbee Bridge hardware.
Note the warning in the brown box on this page:
This week, I removed the Sonoff Zigbee Bridge and moved on to using a CC2531 USB stick coordinator. Thus far there have been zero instances of Zigbee devices coming unpaired.
I’m still running the 8.5.1 from when i first flashed it, been 100% rock solid from day 1, loads better than the cc2531 I was using. What are you hoping to gain from updating?
@ Bobby_Nobble
I’m running ZHA.
I was updating Tasmota firmware because something connected with the Sonoff Zigbee Bridge is broken. My hope was that the broken behavior would be fixed in “the next version”.
After nearly 6 months of it not working properly, I’ve ditched the Sonoff Zigbee Bridge.
I’ve been running for a week with a CC2531 USB coordinator and its been solid - no Zigbee devices becoming un-paired, etc. I have no regrets from switching.
@Bobby_Nobble I started with Tasmota zbridge 8.5.1 on October 2, 2020.
I was already seeing Sonoff temperature sensors stop communicating with the Zibgee Bridge, so the system was already broken with 8.5.1. Since the system was already broken, there wasn’t a reason to stay with the 8.5.1 firmware, and updating to 9.x.x firmware offered the possibility of a fix.
The Tasmota 9.x.x firmware updates had bug fixes and feature additions,
see Tasmota/CHANGELOG.md at c2f8730b1e2d93f3d78aa877014dd482b49ca5c9 · arendst/Tasmota · GitHub
so I updated to see if it would fix the Zigbee device disconnection problem.
The disconnection problems persisted.
For 2 months, I did a lot of Zigbee research and experiments (such as changing my wifi to a channel on the other end of the spectrum) to try and fix the disconnection problem. In early December, I saw forum posts that other people were experiencing the same disconnections. It wasn’t just my system.
Further reading led me to the realization that there could be no fix from Tasmota firmware, because the Sonoff Zigbee Bridge hardware had a architecture shortcoming.
Since changing to a CC2531 USB coordinator, the ZHA system has become stable, and no Zigbee devices have disconnected from the network.
Feel free to elaborate with an explanation of how the wifi could be the problem, and be specific with the relevant aspects.
Keep in mind, others are having problems with Zigbee devices disconnecting from the Sonoff Zigbee Bridge.
Does everyone have a wifi problem?
I doubt it.
I could, but first you elaborate with an explanation of how you came to the conclusion that the Sonoff Zigbee Bridge hardware has a architecture shortcoming
I’ve made a conclusion, on the basis of evidence, not an accusation.
If you read the previous posts in this thread, you can see the steps in the process of elimination.
A major piece of evidence is the greenish brown warning box on this page.
@tteck,
Yeah, I could tell you didn’t have any explanations of how wifi could be the problem.
Why do you post when you don’t have anything useful to communicate?
And yes, I am enjoying the lack of Zigbee device disconnection.
I’m glad you’re happy with your system now but, unless I’m wrong too, you’ve done a lot of reading but not understood much of it, especially two fundamentals.
Firstly, Zigbee and Wifi are completely different networks so not sure why you think messing with one will fix an issue with the other.
Secondly, ZHA is just using Tasmota as a relay for the Zigbee signals so the fixes you probably saw in the release notes aren’t relevant to using it in this way as that is all handled by Home Assistant.
The bonus irony in all this is you’ve moved from a fully supported solution in ZHA to one specifically flagged as experimental
Over the last 5 months I’ve done my due diligence in trying to get the Sonoff to work.
I searched the forum for fix-it information, and asked what I could do to fix the Sonoff malfunctions. There were no solutions, only reports from others of the same device disconnections.
Oh, I understand that wifi and Zigbee are different protocols, which are operating in the same 2.4GHz frequency band. Their channels overlap. You have to coordinate the channels of each so they don’t interfere with each other in the RF domain.
ZHA is not able to change the Zigbee channel used by the Sonoff Zigbee Bridge, so you have to change the wifi channel to avoid interference. You can read about that here:
One of the first things I did in trying to make the Sonoff Zigbee Bridge work better, was to move my wifi access point channel to the other end of the 2.4GHz band from the Zigbee. It didn’t help, at all. Zigbee devices kept randomly coming disconnected from the Sonoff, and had to be re-paired about once a week.
Around post 120 in this forum thread, user tube0013 explains the Zigbee network stability issues he had with the Sonoff Zigbee Bridge and how he has moved away from it, to a hardwired serial-to-Zigbee connection, and the stability that has provided.
On the CC2531 USB coordinators, there have been more than one version of Zigbee coordinator firmware released for the CC2531 in the last 5 months. There is clearly development going on. Even if someone considers it experimental, my first-hand experience suggests that the CC2531 USB stick has more stable operation than the Sonoff Zigbee Bridge.
The purpose of the forum is to share information with the community.
If you have concrete information about how to prevent the Sonoff Zigbee Bridge from disconnecting Zigbee devices, please share it.
@ cboehnkeBunk
Thanks for that info. THAT was a helpful and useful post!
I loaded the Sonoff Zigbee Bridge with ver 6.7.6, which was the latest when I loaded it 6 months ago. I never saw any alerts about the update of that ncp-uart firmware!
The README file says this fixes the bug that drains the batteries of IKEA devices.
ncp-uart-sw_6.7.6_115200.ota - original stable version for EZSP v8 compatible hosts, contains a bug that can cause battery of IKEA and Philips remotes to drain
ncp-uart-sw-6.7.8_115200.ota - NEW: recommended stable version for EZSP v8 compatible hosts.
Hi, just thought I would add my own experiences to this thread in case it might be helpful to others.
I experienced Zigbee devices dropping out and like others I downgraded from 9.3.0 back to 8.5.1 which I am still currently on. During my own testing my Tradrfi lamps were unresponsive so I restarted them and noticed that the battery powered Zigbee devices would come back some time later (the other option was to re-pair them). This made me think that the problem might be due to the lamps acting as repeaters and that the other devices being routed through them.
For my installation I came to the conclusion that the problem might not be due to the Sonoff Zigbee Bridge but more related to the Ikea devices I had added. I also have an Ikea dual button on-off switch (E1932) and the battery would keeping running down within a matter of a few days. I ended up removing this via the UI a few weeks ago and all my problems seem to have gone away. I intend to run like this for a couple more weeks and then I might try the upgrade again.
My original reason for upgrading was to move all my Tasmota devices to 9.2.x so that they could be picked up by the recent Tasmota Integration in HA although I am usure whether this would provide any benefit for the Sonoff Zigbee Bridge.
I’m done 
