Bali Autoview (Zwave) Shades - Remote Batteries Draining Quickly

[slackner]

In the past few months, I installed all new Bali Autoview (z-wave) motorized shades. I’ve got the shades (and remotes) successfully integrated into my Vera ecosystem and everything has been working fine. However, the batteries in the individual shade remotes are draining at an incredible rate. These batteries are supposed to last 6-12 months, depending on use, and I’m seeing them drain in 1-2 months. I’ve replaced the batteries in all seven remotes twice in the past six months. And, it’s important to note, I rarely use the remotes, as I’m typically opening/closing the shades using Alexa voice commands.

So, I started wondering if perhaps something with Vera’s polling or wake-up intervals for battery devices might be draining these things. I’ve also never completely understood why the remotes, in addition to the shade motors themselves, needed to be added to Vera (but that is beside the point, I suppose).

Anyone out there using Bali Autoview shades with Vera? Have you experienced this rapid draining of your shade remote batteries? Am I on to something with the wake-up interval setting (which seems to be set at 1800 seconds for all the remotes) and/or the device polling (currently blank, meaning default, whatever that is)? Is there any reason I couldn’t set the wake-up interval to 0 (never wake up) and/or the polling interval to 0 (don’t poll)? I can’t see why I would need Vera to know the status of my shade remotes. They just sit there doing nothing until/unless I press a button.

Any guidance/thoughts appreciated.

[Pabla]

I don’t have direct experience with these shades, but in general for battery operated devices you should set polling to 0 and you can also set wake up interval to 0 as well or maybe set it it once every 24 hours. These settings can be found under the device and settings. Once you update those you’re going to have to manually wake up each device so they new configuration can be sent to it from the Vera.

[slackner]

@alexsunny123, perhaps you posted to the wrong topic?

@Pabla, thanks. I did set polling to 0 and the wake-up interval to 24 hours. At this point, I guess I’ll just have to keep an eye on the battery levels in the remotes to determine if my changes have made a difference.

It does still seem odd to me, however, that “default” polling and 30-minute wake-up intervals would account for batteries draining this quickly. Granted, I don’t really use any other battery-powered z-wave devices in my network any more, so maybe this is, in fact, expected behavior. Does a “wake up” use that much power from the battery device?

[Pabla]

Its a weird Vera quirk where it doesnt always read the device’s default wake-up time and comes up with its own. Granted you will never need to wake the device up unless you change a setting on it. Wake-ups do waste a decent bit of battery since they check the device config every time on wake-up even though nothing has changed to the devices config. Polling is also unnecessary since the battery device sends a command when a state changes, so theres nothing to really poll.

[slackner]

Ah, ok. Well, then I guess that would explain a significant battery drain. I’ll hope that my changes have solved the problem. Sounds like I may even want to change the settings to never wake up - there’s nothing to “configure” with these shade remotes. They simply open/close the shades.

Thanks for the response.

[Pabla]

Have a look at this thread it has some very good info on the z wave network and how to optimize it. Those modifications extended my battery powered z waves life by a lot.

[slackner]

Thanks @Pabla.

I’ve made the polling and wake-up interval changes, as previously mentioned. From the thread to which you referred me, I went ahead and executed the command to disable the NNUs, but I didn’t execute the command to disable the nightly heals. My network is otherwise very stable, performs very well and I don’t have lots of the other issues attributed to that particular process, so I figured I’d leave well-enough alone. If these few changes improve the battery life in my shade remotes, I’m good to go.

[slackner]

Bumping this thread…

I am continuing to see the remotes for my Bali Autoview shades lose battery power at a ridiculous rate. I have confirmed that, for every remote, I’ve set polling to 0 (never poll) and the wake-up interval to 86400 seconds (24 hours). These batteries are supposed to last 6-12 months - I’m seeing then drain by 50% in a month. Per @pabla 's suggestion, I also followed most of the suggestions in that other thread, including disabling the nightly neighbor update. I have not disabled the nightly heal, but I’m finding it hard to believe that this is what is draining those remote batteries. I also don’t use the remotes very often - I’m typically controlling my shades through Vera (or through Alexa via Vera).

If anyone out there is using Bali Autoview z-wave shades with Vera, I’d appreciate hearing about your experience with battery life in the shade remotes. At this point, I may just let all the remote batteries die. While the remotes must be included in the network for the shades to work with Vera, apparently the remotes do not require a charged battery - I was able to continue controlling a couple shades through Vera while their individual remotes were completely dead.

#baffled

[qwp]

I’m experiencing the same with Autoview remotes. I’ve got 4 blinds, each paired with its own single channel remote (2-button, Somfy VCZ1). All the remotes have abysmal battery life, not more than 6-8 weeks, even when rarely if ever used. The blinds themselves have been paired with Smartthings for about 2 years and work well. Initially I thought the buttons were being drained by over-communicating/polling, but I’ve tried a few setups–from the original default out-of-the-box not even paired to my SmartThings hub; tried pairing and unpairing the buttons from Smartthings, reset them and re-paired them only with its blind. The result is the same. I’ve also tried different battery brands. Also no difference. For the first year I chewed through a lot of batteries. It’s absurd.

[BenjaminB]

Hey, I am trying to get in touch with Bali blinds technical service and learn more about their battery draining issue. I will write back here once I get some updates.

[slackner]

Thank you @BenjaminB . Since my last post in April, I’ve replaced another three batteries. I do find it interesting that @qwp experienced this problem even without the remotes being paired to a hub - that would point to it being a Bali/Somfy issue and not a Zwave hub/comms issue. With that information, I may try to contact Somfy tech support myself as well, just so we’re attacking it from two angles.

[BenjaminB]

hey, @slackner I just got the shades and I will try to add them into my gateway this Monday and also I found a contact person from Bali Autoview, and let’s see what will happen next week So I will be the 3rd attacker

[BenjaminB]

I just wanted to share with those who want to get support from Springs Window Fashions. their contact phone number is 1-800-221-6352 and select the prompt for the motorization team.

this is the link for additional installation instructions, video tutorials, troubleshooting tips, and more!

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