I have a safe shelter room in my apartment, which means the room is very thick concrete wall, and I plugged there a simple 18W LED Light bulb to the ceiling but it isn’t able to get any signals from my Conbee 2
The door for the safe room is wide open so signal should be able to go in…
I have another exactly the same LED Light bulb in the room next to it like 2-4 meters apart and it works just fine
I tried putting a Smartplug in the room next to it, hoping it would act as a repeater (and I was hoping the LED Light bulb will do the same)
I have a simple physical scene switch button that if I click from within that shelter room turns on/off the LED Light of the other room but has no effect on the LED Light in the actual shelter room itself
Any ideas what can I try to get a Zigbee LED Light working there?
Zigbee may not be suitable for this application. Signals are very weak (by design, so that you can run small battery-powered devices) and your safe room sounds pretty solid.
Can you get a wi-fi signal in there? If so, that might be the way to go.
I get it about Zigbee but the iron door is open and I’ve put Zigbee devices in a visual line of sight. Is it possible they’re not actually repeaters or spreading the signal through the mesh network?
I do have WIFI reception there. Thought also about just getting a wifi led light bulb but I wasn’t sure if it works directly with home assistant or whether it would be dependent on the cloud network or a phone app, which I wouldn’t want. I found this and this
Avoid Tuya wi-fi products - they can be a bit of a nightmare.
Most mains powered devices are (though there are a few exceptions). Battery-powered devices will not be.
Have you tried setting the bulb up elsewhere, then moving it into the safe room? I believe the initial connection with the coordinator needs a better signal than day-to-day usage.
I’ve already set the bulb up in my room and it works just fine but when I take it out of the bulb screw thing it loses power and when I connect it back up to the bulb screw in the room it doesn’t do anything except light up regularly, none of the commands work.
Perhaps there’s some info here that would help you with getting your zigbee mesh working better.
It’s generally not about the coordinator (conbee in this case). It’s about the mesh network. Zigbee Help in the Cookbook
Almost any smart plug or mains powered device can act as a repeater. No need to buy something that calls itself a repeater only. They are not better than others.
I know for instance that third reality smart plugs have a strong radio, I use them a lot.
Also the channel you are on might have interference, etc. All covered in the reading I linked.
I’m somewhat confused now. I was under the impression this was a Zigbee issue with the devices in the concrete shelter room (yet, door open) not receiving/sending commands but you’re saying it isn’t Zigbee hardware related…?
A Zigbee network is a mesh in which a large number of mains-powered routers pass messages backwards and forwards until they reach their destination. The paths taken by messages change all the time; the connections between routers change all the time.
Your safe room is a sealed box with only one path to the light when the door is open. The connection to the light is always going to be unstable because there is only one route for messages to take. The signal is weak, if it is interrupted the connection is lost, whereas elsewhere in the house messages would simply be diverted.
You can throw money at it if you like, but this is really not a situation that Zigbee is designed to handle.
It is also possible the iron in the concrete acts like a faraday cage, and the open door may not be enough to get a signal in. Is the smart socket switching if it is in the shelter?
How is your wifi 2.4 strength, comparing inside and outside with the door open? The frequency band is similar. Even though wifi is a much stronger signal, you might get an idea how much signal is lost.
If the light switch is outside, a dumb bulb and a smart wall switch might be the way to go.
I’m going to try the WiFi thing but I’m a bit sad doing that as a solution because it means that I’m giving up wiring the room up with other Zigbee devices…
First I would check the drop in wifi range inside, before you buy anything.
On your question: If you use an ethernet connected zigbee dongle then it does not act as a range extender but as a second coordinator. Not that it matters though if the mesh inside cannot reach the mesh outside and vice versa. But if you have ethernet inside, I would not bother with zigbee anymore.
