How are you using Wireless tag poly?

[Blackbird]

I have the tags and now the Polisy but cant really think a a use yet.  How are you using the wireless tag poly?

[gviliunas]

I have 5 day-to-day uses for the Wireless Tags:

1. Monitor outside light levels to turn on some auto-lighting in the house. This was my first use.

2. As an alternate temperature monitoring source for my family room. The TV is mounted just in front of the thermostat. When the TV is on, the thermostat sees the warmth and the room gets cooler and cooler. To prevent this, I sense when  the TV is on and shift the monitoring of room temperature to the wireless tag. If the tag is too cold, set the thermostat to 28 degrees C. If too hot, set thermostat to 18 degrees C.

3. As a backup to bathroom occupancy. If the lights time out and wife is still in the shower, one touch to the shower curtain jiggles the wireless tag triggering motion and turns the lights back on. This saved my hobby once or twice

4. To monitor the freezer temperature. Yes, the batteries deplete quickly but this did help me discover how horribly inaccurate a GE freezer thermostat is. Hopefully this will catch a failing freezer or door blocked open before food is spoiled.

5. As a backup entryway PIR sensor. This one trigger Alexa to speak several messages.

For these use-cases, the tags are reliable.

[larryllix]

I do not use the NS but rather KumoApps to populate state variables. I have seven units.

- monitor garage door position and alert me if left open while gone or too long, announcing open and close via Alexa vocals
- monitor temperatures, humidity and luminance on north and south side of house, predicting early HVAC setback times via differences
- monitor wine cellar humidity for ventilation control
- monitor fridge door open too long via light level, temperature and door position
- monitor vehicle proximity for garage door open and home detection via loss of comm signal
- thermostats calibration and main floor stat verification while away, ISY independent
- monitor router temperature curve after some random failures
 

[GlowingHair]

Like @larryllix, I still use KumoApps. My first use for these tags was to install them in my trash and recycle bins so I know when the trucks have emptied the bins, saving navigating a steep, sometimes slippery, driveway for no reason. The second use is carrying one in my handbag so the system knows if I'm home or not. The remaining tags just provide information that I haven't used yet.

[Bumbershoot]

I use the nodeserver.  I have and continue to use them in the following ways:

• Temperature  monitoring in freezers, wine fridge, my humidor, equipment cabinet, the attic and crawl space
• Humidity monitoring and control in bathrooms
• Occupancy monitoring in locations where a motion sensors form factor is inappropriate (bathrooms) -- used to turn off lights that are left on
• Monitor door openings and closings in freezers, wine fridge, liquor cabinet and humidor
• Measure soil moisture in dry areas in my garden to supplement irrigation (summer use only, in conjunction with NodeLink and Rainmachine)

I like the small form factor of these devices, as well as the multiple and diverse data points they provide.  You have to be willing to change batteries every so often if you query them frequently, but the batteries are cheap and they otherwise last for many months, if not years (I got three years out of moisture sensors).  I use the tag nodeserver in conjunction with the Push nodeserver to get almost instant notification of events on my Apple Watch.  Works like a charm.

[dbwarner5]

12 hours ago, gviliunas said:

I have 5 day-to-day uses for the Wireless Tags:

1. Monitor outside light levels to turn on some auto-lighting in the house. This was my first use.

2. As an alternate temperature monitoring source for my family room. The TV is mounted just in front of the thermostat. When the TV is on, the thermostat sees the warmth and the room gets cooler and cooler. To prevent this, I sense when  the TV is on and shift the monitoring of room temperature to the wireless tag. If the tag is too cold, set the thermostat to 28 degrees C. If too hot, set thermostat to 18 degrees C.

3. As a backup to bathroom occupancy. If the lights time out and wife is still in the shower, one touch to the shower curtain jiggles the wireless tag triggering motion and turns the lights back on. This saved my hobby once or twice

4. To monitor the freezer temperature. Yes, the batteries deplete quickly but this did help me discover how horribly inaccurate a GE freezer thermostat is. Hopefully this will catch a failing freezer or door blocked open before food is spoiled.

5. As a backup entryway PIR sensor. This one trigger Alexa to speak several messages.

For these use-cases, the tags are reliable.

Regarding number 3... I too found my hobby at risk.. lol. My solution was based on the following: Bathroom has motion detectors which turn on the lights to various settings and time delays based on time of day.There are 6 different lights in our bath.  Our shower has its own light switch. All are part of the scenes. So when taking a shower, we manually turn on that light switch (even if the light is on as part of the scene) and that disables the occupancy turn off program for 20 minutes, ample time to shower and get back out to where the Motion sensor will pick us up again. 

 

If I ever get into Tags, I think I would just put one on the door to sense movement to accomplish the above without the need for a manual intervention. 

Thanks for the ideas!

[KSchex]

Hi all....I was reading the messages here and found myself checking out tags on the Wireless Sensor site.  I see where they communicate with a tag manager device to the cloud.  Not being a proponent of the cloud, is it possible for the ISY to communicate directly with the tag manager through Policy or Polyglot (not using the cloud)?  Thanks.

 

[mwester]

7 minutes ago, KSchex said:

...Not being a proponent of the cloud, is it possible for the ISY to communicate directly with the tag manager through Policy or Polyglot (not using the cloud)?  Thanks.

Kinda sorta mostly.

There's no way to configure or set up the tags or the tag manager locally... so you need their cloud server for that.  However, in that setup you can give the tag manager a local URL to a system of your choosing, and once that's done the tag manager device will operate locally (even if the connection to its cloud server is missing).

So, the node servers (and other things) that one uses with these devices are local, but the system as a whole is dependent on a cloud-based service.

I use a few of these for non-critical things -- I despise cloud-based services (look at what's happened with the Nest, as well as with a few of the providers that have ceased operation) but I rationalized these things based on their low price and the fact that they mostly work locally.  If the provider starts charging for their service, or go under, well, the tags are pretty much disposable at that price point.

[larryllix]

The provider has made some promise they will release the api should the above happen.

Whatever.

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[LarryCRetired]

I bought a couple a tags a couple of weeks ago and I use them as follows:

I have one in the Attic to measure temperature and dew point.

The second one I move around to check temperatures in areas that could be susceptible to freezing water pipes.

For the short time I have had them, I am happy except for a couple of things.

The battery percentage does not seem to be very accurate.  One of the tags will show a higher voltage level for the battery but a lower percentage when compared with the other tag. For example:

Attic Sensor - Voltage is 2.87 volts, 90% in a 38.5 degree F environment. Assuming a nominal voltage of 3.0 volts for the 2032 battery, the percentage should be ~96%.

Second Sensor - Voltage is 2.939 volts, 82% in a 65 degree F environment.  Assuming the same nominal voltage, the percentage should be ~98%.

When I had them sitting side by side in my office, I found the humidity was substantially different between the two.  The difference was beyond the spec tolerance.   I have a two DHT22 sensors attached to two Arduinos and the humidity reading was close for one of tags but not the other.  

I am going to contact them to see if I happen to have a faulty tag, but I plan on buying a couple more.  I would like to incorporate the moisture sensor into my irrigation programs.

I am using Polyglot on the pi to bring the data into the ISY.

 

[Bumbershoot]

7 minutes ago, LarryCRetired said:

I would like to incorporate the moisture sensor into my irrigation programs.

I've used these for quite a while, but note that they aren't made for outdoor use.  I put a desiccant pack inside a plastic bag then tie wrapped the bag around the units, and they lasted through three seasons.  As a test, I left one uncovered in the garden and it only lasted a few months before it succumbed.  I'll get some new moisture sensors in the spring, and I'll wrap them up the same.

[Blackbird]

Thanks everyone, good ideas.

[larryllix]

I bought a couple a tags a couple of weeks ago and I use them as follows:

I have one in the Attic to measure temperature and dew point.

The second one I move around to check temperatures in areas that could be susceptible to freezing water pipes.

For the short time I have had them, I am happy except for a couple of things.

The battery percentage does not seem to be very accurate.  One of the tags will show a higher voltage level for the battery but a lower percentage when compared with the other tag. For example:

Attic Sensor - Voltage is 2.87 volts, 90% in a 38.5 degree F environment. Assuming a nominal voltage of 3.0 volts for the 2032 battery, the percentage should be ~96%.

Second Sensor - Voltage is 2.939 volts, 82% in a 65 degree F environment.  Assuming the same nominal voltage, the percentage should be ~98%.

When I had them sitting side by side in my office, I found the humidity was substantially different between the two.  The difference was beyond the spec tolerance.   I have a two DHT22 sensors attached to two Arduinos and the humidity reading was close for one of tags but not the other.  

I am going to contact them to see if I happen to have a faulty tag, but I plan on buying a couple more.  I would like to incorporate the moisture sensor into my irrigation programs.

I am using Polyglot on the pi to bring the data into the ISY.

 

The battery left is based on voltage and temperature factors and possibly usage.

 

A 90 percent battery may drop to 2.7 vdc when in sub zero temperatures but will come back to say 2.95v when warmed up again.

 

I have many different humidity sensors and none of them are stable within about 20 percent RH.

 

 

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