ZigBee Arrival Sensor For Car

That’s easy!

I templated my sensor.last_alexa this way:
sensor:

  - name: Last Alexa
    unique_id: last_alexa
    state: "{{ states.media_player|selectattr('attributes.last_called','eq',true)|map(attribute='entity_id')|join }}"

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@dbrunt, Thanks for the tip with Alexa.

I have put in an order to a contract Manufacturer to build a small batch. They are in the process of collecting all the component. It will be really fast for them to assemble it once they have all the components. I will be able to provide ETA once they have the sensor built. I will definitely update everyone here.

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I can’t use anything like this but it’s still amazing!!! Great job!!!

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I am also interested in the sensor.

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@mihan, I will update you and everyone here when I have them available. The last email from the manufacture is they are still collecting components to build the sensor.

Looking good. I’ve been looking for a replacement for the ST arrival sensor for some time with no luck. You said they are battery powered also but didn’t see it in any of the pics. What battery size are you using and how long will your device run on just battery power? I had a ST arrival sensor in my motorcycle also and it made it nice having the proper garage door open when I got home so I could ride straight in without having to get off to open the garage.

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@mebaddog2002,

Thanks for letting me know. The sensor use 1 cell rechargeable lipo battery with jst ph 2.0 connector. This is commonly known as rc toy battery. I look for capacity of 300 to 600 mhA. Below is an example,

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07L9P4CZL/ref=cm_sw_r_apan_i_6BVNQNWCS7VV0928H8HX

Please watch the battery size if you are going to get a case with the sensor.

The battery should last 1 month at minimum.

Please do not operate it with a battery and charge the sensor once a month. The sensor is designed to take advantage the knowledge of state of power supply. It is not purely running on a battery like the ST sensor.

I just want to update everyone that I am expecting the a batch of the Arrival Sensor. All components needed to make the sensor has been allocated. It is being assembled at the moment. I expect to received them in matter of weeks now versus months.

Meanwhile, here is another aspect of the Arrival Sensor that I am very excited about. I did start this project with the motivation to automate the garage door. As the time goes, I am also happy to have the additional sensor setup for my cars parked on my drive way. I started to integrate the motion and shock sensor event to my home lighting. The part where it can help securing my car in the driveway becomes very important.

My Youtube feed pop this to my attention. Here is a Canadian reporting on car theft. It is not as sexy as “Gone in 60 seconds”. But, it is quite eye opening. Many car is stolen under the watch of our camera. One of the comments that stick to me is that they find out the car is gone in the morning. It is a long video. I link it to the part that is interesting.

My sensor may not be able to prevent the theft. But, I hope that with the help of my house lighting I can set up something to scare the thieve. If the car is stolen any way, I am notified as soon as possible (not the morning after). I hope I am giving my car and myself a fighting chance.

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Everyone,

I have received a batch of released version of the Arrival Sensor. I am very happy how it come out. The manufacture assemble the sensor better than what I can do.








I know that some of you have reach out to me to try out the Arrival Sensor in PM. I should be able to accommodate you with one or more sensors. I also have availability with antenna and radar motion sensor. I will try to go through my list from your requests. However, please do help with sending me another reminder if you happen to come across this post.

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Just an update. I have shipped the sensor for those who requested it. You should received them real soon. Please feel free to reach out to me if you have any questions.

It seems that I have not mentioned possible cases for the Arrival Sensor. I just want to add some information for possible cases here.

  1. For all of use who own 3D printer, I have a couple box choices here. I recommend this case if you will be using the radar motion sensors.
  1. There is an off the shelve aluminum case that will fit. The case is not compatible with motion radar sensor since aluminum will block the radar signal. You can purchase it from Aliexpress. This link is an example only. The vendor sometime run out of stock. There are plenty other vendor selling maroon colored aluminum box with size of 23x44x60mm.

I just want post update here that the Zigbee2MQTT converter has been merged to the Zigbee2MQTT trunk. It is a good news for us who use he arrival sensor user. The time to copy the external converter will shortly be over once the addon pick up this change.

In case someone need to perform factory reset. Here are the steps.

  1. remove all power (battery and dc)
  2. press the button on the back of the board.
  3. plug the dc power and count to 4 to 5 seconds (not more).
  4. release the button. At this point, the module is in pairing mode.

I tested each sensor before I shipped them at this point with my hub. I removed the sensor after testing. The sensor will be automatically in pairing mode removal. This process may not went through cleanly during my test. Therefore, if your sensor does not paired on your first try, please perform the factory reset.

I just want to update here that the arrival sensor converter for Zigbee2MQTT is now included with Zigbee2MQTT installation. It is part of Zigbee2MQTT release 1.25.2.

It meant is that there is no need of manually copying the converters. You can just start ZigBee paring/joining process as soon as you received the sensor.

BTW, I still have some modules available if you are interested. Please PM me for detail.

@iharyadi any plans for a matching custom Zigbee device handler (a.k.a. quirk) for the ZHA integration via the ZHA Device Handlers library for Home Assistant (a.k.a. zha-quirk) to ship in repo as standard?

https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/zha#zha-exception-and-deviation-handling

https://github.com/zigpy/zha-device-handlers

https://pypi.org/project/zha-quirks/

If you do a pull request for it then support for it will be included with Home Assistant core as standard.

Hi @Hedda, I would love to develop ZHA quirk for the Arrival Sensor. I am aware one of community member is working on creating a quirk for it. As soon as I heard about the progress, I will update everyone here.

I personally looked at the ST Arrival sensor quirk. I used it to learn how the quirk is implemented to support ST Arrival sensor. The quirk use zha device tracker mechanism for device presence state. My Arrival Sensor has a little bit different twist. I would like the have different timeout when the Arrival Sensor is on DC or Battery power. My Arrival Sensor may have to implement its own tracking mechanism to support that. The reason I would love the time out is dynamic depending on the state of the power is that I can configure much shorter timeout when the arrival sensor detect the car is powered up. This will make detection of “not present” faster.

I am not very proficient in python. With my other works, it may take some time for me to get this done. Just in case @Hedda or Anyone who are proficient with writing ZHA quirk and willing to help, I will be open to provide you with one Arrival Sensor for free to develop the quirk. Just PM me. We will work out the logistic.

@iharyadi Maybe you can contact + ship one directly to @dmulcahey as the main ZHA quirks dev

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@Hedda,. Thanks for the recommendation. I will definitely reach out to dmulcahey as soon as I back from my vacation.

Alternatively, you could try asking @puddly or better yet ask both as that might yeald best result.

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Loving your sensors but have been having a few problems. The battery percentage never changes and in one of my cars that the cig lighter turns off when the key is off the battery is only lasting just over a week and then the sensor dies with the battery still at 100%. I was just watching this sensor and it is sending updates every few seconds and shows the power state as off.

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