Motion Sensors and WAF

[sfhutchi]

I am sure that many of you have dealt with this...

The wife has generally tolerated most of the tinkering and programming of the lights over the past few years. In general, I tried to keep the manual controls as common as possible to 'standard' light controls, but added other functionality. The biggest challenges were the automated time-outs for lights that may have been left on. Sometimes this caused some frustration but nothing major.

 

.... Then I decided to get into motion sensors. Let me just say that it is not going as well as expected. Maybe because I decided to tackle the master bath first. I started by using the motion sensor as a method to turn the light on in the evening and also in the middle of the night (at a dim level)... and then after a period of time with no motion... turn the lights off. My wife feels helpless without having direct control because while I think that 40% at 2am may be good, she wants 100%, etc. Since the program has no way of knowing what level the light is at, it forces things back to 40% if that is what I have specified at that time.

Little by little, I am making some improvements (e.g. enabling and disabling the motion programs based on manual input), and will soon implement some flags to try to get an idea of whether the light was manually turned on.. or if it was on by motion... etc...

 

..But I figured some of you have gone through this already and have some more ideas of what may work better 'out of the box'.

 

As a side note, I clearly have some problems detecting motion while someone is in the shower and sometimes sitting at the mirror fixing hair, etc.. How have others dealt with this? I am actually considering another motion sensor over the shower for the shower situation, but I am not sure that this will do it.

 

Unfortunately, the system can't know the intentions of the person entering the bathroom. Are they simply going in for a quick walk to the closet, going to take a shower, going to the bathroom, etc..

 

Possibly the answer is good options to override the programs with one or two button presses if you are outside of the 'standard' time schedule.

[IndyMike]

sfhutchi,

 

Bathrooms are tough. This is an area where you may want to sacrifice some automation efficiency to maintain harmony.

 

As you indicated, motion sensor are going to have a tough time given the layout of most bathrooms. As you also noted, they can't know the intention of the occupant.

 

There are ways of telling your automation system what the occupants intention is. Back in the X10 days, I used 2 motion sensors and a 6 button KPL attached to the bathroom fan to instruct my X10 controller on how the bathroom was being used. The various fan buttons would trigger a automation timer (10, 20, 30 minutes) so the user could effectively select the bathroom "mode".

 

While the above worked well most of the time, I would sometimes get communication collisions between the motion sensors (being in a relatively confined area). As you well know, it only takes 1 Oh Sh$$ to erase a lot of atta-boys. That's how I would characterize this setup - 99%, but that 1% failure would really hurt.

 

When I moved to the new house, I made the decision not to automate the baths. I installed CFL lighting and a hardwired Leviton fan timer. This setup is 100% to the bosses liking.

 

IM

[TJF1960]

When the Insteon motions first came out I thought it was a blessing. After playing with them for a while I thought they were a curse. No matter how great a product there will always be some function or functions it will not or cannot do that you wish it would.

 

I agree with IndyMike, bathrooms are tough. Nothing worse than being in the shower and the lights turn off (especially when it happens to your spouse)!

 

After trial and error I finally found the perfect location to mount the motion detector in our master bath area which would provide good coverage when walking in, standing at the sinks, taking a bath or shower and coming out of the bathroom or closet. I ended up mounting it on the ceiling near one wall.

 

I at one time had probably close to 50 programs just for the master bath light, flags for current light brightness, times etc., and it all worked pretty well but not perfect. So after all that I decided to keep it simple. It seems the more complicated you make things the easier it is to foul up and I figured the whole point of automation is to make your life simpler!

 

I have the motion linked to the dimmable lights and at various times of the day I have programs which adjust the scene levels. So during the day the lights do not turn on unless manually turned on. In the evening they turn on with motion to 75%. Night time the lights come on at 30%. Early morning hours if we are up and stay up the lights will turn on at 75%, otherwise they turn on at 30% till dawn. If we need more light we can hit the switch for full bright or any other level we chose and as long as there is motion in the bathroom the lights will stay at that brightness. Once the motion turns off they resume their previously programmed levels.

 

This set up has worked very well for us especially with the motion coverage including the shower.

 

Tim

[sfhutchi]

.. So during the day the lights do not turn on unless manually turned on. In the evening they turn on with motion to 75%. Night time the lights come on at 30%. Early morning hours if we are up and stay up the lights will turn on at 75%, otherwise they turn on at 30% till dawn. If we need more light we can hit the switch for full bright or any other level we chose and as long as there is motion in the bathroom the lights will stay at that brightness. Once the motion turns off they resume their previously programmed levels.

 

Tim

 

Thanks for the pointers.... Couple questions. You said that if you are up and stay up, the lights turn on at 75%, otherwise they turn on at 30%. Are you saying that if the light is already on or are you saying that it turns on at 75% because you have some other logic to determine that you were already up?

 

You also state that once motion turns off you resume the previously programmed levels. Are you stating that you are somehow recording the manually set level or are you simply returning to a programmed state that you had for that time of day?

[sfhutchi]

After trial and error I finally found the perfect location to mount the motion detector in our master bath area which would provide good coverage when walking in, standing at the sinks, taking a bath or shower and coming out of the bathroom or closet. I ended up mounting it on the ceiling near one wall.

 

Tim

 

Probably a dumb question... but how did you complete this trial and error? Did you have one person on a ladder holding it while testing... or did you find a way to temporarily mount the sensor?

[sfhutchi]

When I moved to the new house, I made the decision not to automate the baths. I installed CFL lighting and a hardwired Leviton fan timer. This setup is 100% to the bosses liking.

 

IM

 

This is probably good advice. I still need to have dimmable lights, so I likely won't go with CFLs, but I may have to back off on some of the motion sensing activity. The occupancy sensing is just too unreliable.

[TJF1960]

 

Thanks for the pointers.... Couple questions. You said that if you are up and stay up, the lights turn on at 75%, otherwise they turn on at 30%. Are you saying that if the light is already on or are you saying that it turns on at 75% because you have some other logic to determine that you were already up?

 

I have 1 program which looks for the bathroom switch to be manually turned on or faded up between 3:00AM and sunrise at which time the ISY will write to the switch to program the 75% on level to it, after which the motion will turn the light on to 75% with each detection. Another program looks for the switch to be manually turned off or faded down during the same time period which means the ISY will then write to the switch programming the 30% on level back in. At one time I did have other variables which would automatically determine whether we were up early for good such as the coffee pot running and other motion sensor trips thru out the house but I settled on the more simplistic approach of just looking for the bathroom light switch manually being operated.

 

You also state that once motion turns off you resume the previously programmed levels. Are you stating that you are somehow recording the manually set level or are you simply returning to a programmed state that you had for that time of day?

At one time I did have a number of programs monitoring the level the switch was faded to which controlled flags, it worked pretty well but ultimately I scrapped them in favor of the more simplistic approach I use now. Say its daytime, the ISY has written to the SL so that the turn on level from the motion activation is 0%. I walk into the bathroom and the motion sends an on signal to the SL but because the on level is set for 0% the lights do not turn on. If I hit the switch for light it will turn on, I have of course complete manual control of the light. After I leave the motion sensor times out and sends an off which turns the SL off. The next time someone enters the bathroom, because the SL is still programmed for 0% on level, the SL will not turn on, so it has resumed its normal on level settings. The same situation occurs whether it is programmed for day, evening or night settings.

 

After trial and error I finally found the perfect location to mount the motion detector in our master bath area which would provide good coverage when walking in, standing at the sinks, taking a bath or shower and coming out of the bathroom or closet. I ended up mounting it on the ceiling near one wall.

 

Tim

 

Probably a dumb question... but how did you complete this trial and error? Did you have one person on a ladder holding it while testing... or did you find a way to temporarily mount the sensor?

 

No, sadly I had no help. I used 1 small screw to mount the MS and test its position. It took about 5 tries and a small amount of spackle and touch up paint to find the right spot.

 

Tim

[MarkJames]

I too have had the same problem with bathrooms. I almost swallowed my tongue laughing when I read IndyMike's statement that 'it only takes 1 Oh Sh$$ to erase a lot of atta-boys.' My wife - despite all the other seemingly magical things the ISY does for her - has been on my case something fierce over the motion sensor in the bathroom.

 

Again - I'd run the gamut as have others - full lights on during early morning, dimmed late at night, short interval at night, long interval during AM showers - motion sensor sending on only, motion sensors with short intervals and ISY managing the delay - on and on and on. I had pretty much given up on it too. I guess, in a way, I have.

 

I restrict my bathroom lights to the following now.

 

Between midnight and 5am if there's motion the lights turn on at 30% for 4 minutes. Just enough for a mid-night pee with enough light to not miss the bowl.

 

The rest of the day I do not turn the lights on with the motion sensor - if you want them you turn them on yourself.

 

I do, however, watch for 30minutes since last movement in the bathroom at which point I turn the lights off for energy conservation. The thought here being that if you don't trip the sensor within a half hour either you've been in the tub too long and deserve to sit in the dark or you've died in which case it doesn't matter.

 

There is yet another option which I use in my guest bathroom and that's to replace your switch with a timerlinc. If you press it once it's on for 15min - twice for 30, three times for 45 etc. At least that way if the light turns off on the occupant they have noone to blame but themselves.

 

Anyways - there's my thoughts for what they're worth.

 

mark

[Quixote]

Seems like a pretty sensible setup.

 

I think what we need here is a "wife support" or "W.A.F." forum section. Then again, we may as well be discussing dice throwing methods for sure wins in a game of Craps.

[MarkJames]

I posted the thing my wife loves most about the ISY a few months back. When the temperature is below 50 outside the ISY turns her electric blanket on at 9pm so that by the time she gets into bed it's warm. She then hits a button at bedside and it stays on for an hour then turns off automagically.

 

That one was worth a lot of 'atta boys'

 

[IndyMike]

This is probably good advice. I still need to have dimmable lights, so I likely won't go with CFLs, but I may have to back off on some of the motion sensing activity. The occupancy sensing is just too unreliable.

 

Hello sfhutchi,

 

If you are interested in true "occupancy" sensing you may need to step things up a level. There are devices available that incorporate dual IR/Ultrasonic sensing that might be able to accomplish your goal. A few caveats:

 

1) I do not know of any low voltage versions of "dual" sensing devices. Most are configured to directly control a load (120 V).

2) I've never used something like this in a bathroom (conference rooms yes - worked well).

3) Most of the devices I've seen are relay type outputs (non-dimming).

 

A combined PIR/acoustic type sensor would presumably activate when motion was initially sensed. It would continue to "hold" until both the PIR and Ultrasonic sensors indicated that motion had ceased. The Ultrasonic sensor is capable of detecting motion that is not "line of sight". It uses a Doppler shift algorithm to detect hand motions and other motions that a PIR cannot see. Presumably, this would include motion within a shower from both the occupant and the shower head itself (turbulence from the water flow).

 

As I indicated, my direct experience is with conference rooms at work. My job requires late night remote conferences with our partners on the West coast (my teammate is of the opposite sex and many years my junior -I'm trying to be PC here - it doesn't come easily). On numerous occasions, our "commercial grade" motion sensing system has plunged us into darkness. I sincerely hope that this was more awkward for me than my teammate (I found it uncomfortable). After a few episodes, I recommended the Leviton OSSMT-MDW to our electrician.

 

Our electrician managed to push things through the system (Ugh) and installed these in three conference rooms. To date, we have great performance in two of the three conference rooms (no more awkward moments).

The third conference room has two doors located on a busy hallway. Once triggered on, traffic on the hallways keeps the lamps burning most of the day regardless of activity in the room.

 

I hate recommending products for applications that I do not have personal experience with (I'm breaking from tradition here). You could start slow by replacing an existing switch with the Leviton dual sensing switch. Documentation is here: Leviton OSSMT-MDW

 

A general "occupancy sensing" guide is available from Pass and Seymore here: Motion Sensing Guide

 

If you want to automate, the above have only 120V outputs. You would need a 120V capable sense sensing function (SWL with sense) to signal the ISY and other Insteon responders. If you want level control, things get further complicated...

 

IM