SonOff Low Cost Wifi Switches for Home Automation

corkscott · 19-01-2018 03:16PM

I am having problems with my sonoff going offline it only reconnects to my wifi if I power it off and on again but only stays connected for 5 minutes then goes offline again. Anyone else having this issue or do I have a faulty unit only installed it last weekend.

air · 19-01-2018 03:32PM

Could be an issue with WiFi reception where you have installed it. Try it elsewhere and see if it's any better. If not it could be faulty.

corkscott · 19-01-2018 03:46PM

its only about 5m from my router on top of my kitchen units controlling a couple of LED's

air · 19-01-2018 04:14PM

Could be faulty so, try connecting something else to it on the off chance that the LED drivers are noisy and causing interference.

Mylow · 20-01-2018 10:33PM

davegilly wrote: »

Has anyone used the Sonoff Dual to control their immersion? It looks like it is perfect as the 2 gang option is 16A. Power in and one gang to the sink element and the other gang to the bath element. T
There is no earth feethru though like there is on the TH16 which only has one gang unfortunately. What do you think? Could it work? How would I wire the earth, I suppose I could use a separate connection outside the Sonoff?

I would verify each channel is 16A. Also the bath element current, I know it's supposed to be 3kw, but just to be on the safe side verify it.

air · 20-01-2018 11:09PM

I don't think the dual is rated for 16A per channel but the bigger issue is that there is no interlocking on the dual so you could easily turn on both sink and bath elements.
You'll need to use external contactors if you want to use the dual.

Jakey Rolling · 21-01-2018 12:53AM

GryKyo wrote: »

For reliability wired is miles ahead of any WiFi I always plug my devices in to the router or a switch, just my experience.

Garry

Until you get hit by lightning!
Like yourself, I was a big fan of running wired where possible.
Then, our house took a direct lightning strike.

Lots of kit survived, and would still power up (seems that one of the mains rings directed most of the strike to ground, even fused a 100Amp changeover switch and blew the ESB meter)

However every item that was plugged into my LAN had it's ethernet controller fried and was rendered useless. Printer/scanner, Desktop PCs, Humax Sat box, Smart TV, Wireless APs, Main Router, VoiP handset... luckily all laptops were on wireless at the time.

I now run much more stuff over wireless :-)
Just sayin' ...

Jakey Rolling · 21-01-2018 12:58AM

Anyhow, what I came here to ask...

Has anyone used one of these wifi relays to control an electric gate?
My understanding is that some gate controllers need a momentary latch closure to start the open/closing sequence.
The wifi relay would just be hooked up in parallel with the existing actuator. May need 2 x relays, one for open one for close?

Do some of these Sonos switches have that capability?

Looking to install gates this year and want to be sure that whatever I go for has this option, once the installer has done his bit.

Stoner · 21-01-2018 03:29AM

Not on SONOFF that I've seen

I've added a latching relay at low voltage to my gate.

https://lightwaverf.com/power/8409990151

wexfordman2 · 21-01-2018 01:18PM

Jakey Rolling wrote: »

Until you get hit by lightning!
Like yourself, I was a big fan of running wired where possible.
Then, our house took a direct lightning strike.

Lots of kit survived, and would still power up (seems that one of the mains rings directed most of the strike to ground, even fused a 100Amp changeover switch and blew the ESB meter)

However every item that was plugged into my LAN had it's ethernet controller fried and was rendered useless. Printer/scanner, Desktop PCs, Humax Sat box, Smart TV, Wireless APs, Main Router, VoiP handset... luckily all laptops were on wireless at the time.

I now run much more stuff over wireless :-)
Just sayin' ...

Got hit with lightening myself about 15 years ago, came in the phone line, blew a multi room music system, phones, alarm system and some automation stuff.

The lesson I took from it was surge protection tbh

air · 21-01-2018 02:46PM

Jakey Rolling wrote: »

Anyhow, what I came here to ask...

Has anyone used one of these wifi relays to control an electric gate?
My understanding is that some gate controllers need a momentary latch closure to start the open/closing sequence.
The wifi relay would just be hooked up in parallel with the existing actuator. May need 2 x relays, one for open one for close?

Do some of these Sonos switches have that capability?

Looking to install gates this year and want to be sure that whatever I go for has this option, once the installer has done his bit.

The 4 way Sonoff Pros include inching and interlocking, should do what you want for manual control of the gates at the very worst.

OldMrBrennan83 · 21-01-2018 05:41PM

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lochdara · 21-01-2018 08:15PM

Patww79 wrote: »

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Using which ones, I have amazon echo and find the units grand.

OldMrBrennan83 · 21-01-2018 08:23PM

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lochdara · 21-01-2018 08:27PM

Patww79 wrote: »

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Thats a strange one. i dont have google home so can't help you. I have 3 of those units working great and a light switch

OldMrBrennan83 · 21-01-2018 08:37PM

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Stoner · 21-01-2018 08:53PM

wexfordman2 wrote:

The lesson I took from it was surge protection tbh

Yes a hagar unit on the distribution board.

But it's a good point if its a low voltage cable travelling in and out of the house

Stoner · 21-01-2018 09:16PM

Patww79 wrote:

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I've had.no issues, in fact they were as easy to use as any.

Again it's just a small sample size

OldMrBrennan83 · 21-01-2018 09:24PM

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lochdara · 21-01-2018 09:26PM

Patww79 wrote: »

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try in 3g internet, not on your wifi

OldMrBrennan83 · 21-01-2018 09:30PM

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lochdara · 21-01-2018 09:33PM

Patww79 wrote: »

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sounds like a router issue.

OldMrBrennan83 · 21-01-2018 09:35PM

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lochdara · 21-01-2018 09:44PM

Patww79 wrote: »

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delete the first device and try add the second.. maybe its faulty.
ensure they are not names the same

OldMrBrennan83 · 21-01-2018 09:47PM

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lochdara · 21-01-2018 09:50PM

Patww79 wrote: »

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send some feedback to ewelink, and explain that. Someone here with google home maybe able to help

wexfordman2 · 21-01-2018 11:28PM

Stoner wrote: »

Yes a hagar unit on the distribution board.

But it's a good point if its a low voltage cable travelling in and out of the house

Yep, but what caught me out, was it came in the phone line, and at the time, I had a lot of stuff working via the phone line (pre fixed bb days :-) ).

I had phoneline comming in, which was hooked up to the alarm system, which was my ha controller, that was also hooked up to a secondary controller called homevision, and then I had a Kustom 6 zone centralised music system.

Blew pretty much everything, the alarm system and the homevision controller were replaced without too much expense, the Kustom unit though was going to cost thousands. It was one of those things that I bought online from the states when building the house, so at the time, was able to justify the cost as it was smaller relative to the build cost (think I paid about 3k for it, but tthey wanted 9k for a new/replacement one).

End of the day, worked out very well for me, insurance covered it and I got a 6 zone Sonos as a reolacmeent, far superirir and much cheaper.

Jakey Rolling · 22-01-2018 09:24AM

wexfordman2 wrote:

The lesson I took from it was surge protection tbh

Unfortunately would have done us no good, we took a direct strike to the roof that then jumped onto our mains internally. Now have a surge arrester at the incoming mains to try and catch any spikes from the ESB side. Luckily (?), we don't have a landline. ESB also added an arrester to our transformer when they replaced it.

Looked at lightning conductor protection for the roof, but cost vs. risk not worth it. We would have to run heavy duty copper to all susceptible points, and we have lots of pointy dormers. Might consider it if we ever get hit again!

FWIW, many of these surge protection products built in to power strips etc can give a false sense of security. They will protect once, but fail silently so won't protect when there's a further spike.

Apologies for going OT. Lots of useful info on this thread, can't wait to get stuck in.

tweek84 · 22-01-2018 09:43AM

wexfordman2 wrote: »

Got hit with lightening myself about 15 years ago, came in the phone line, blew a multi room music system, phones, alarm system and some automation stuff.

The lesson I took from it was surge protection tbh

Just out of interest what surge protection are you using? I am thinking of installing some myself. I know when most think of surge protection they just focus on the mains cable not the telephone lines.

Gulliver · 22-01-2018 10:18AM

Patww79 wrote: »

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This seems to be a known issue, there are a couple of threads about it out there.
It happened to me over the weekend when I added a new device. Removed the account from Assistant and couldn't add it again. I almost gave up and then tried adding via my tablet instead of the phone- worked!

Having to remove and re-register the account to refresh the devices is just bad design, but I have to say, I'm enjoying the Sonoff stuff.

SonOff Low Cost Wifi Switches for Home Automation

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