So I am new to automation but am quite tech savvy.
I am currently working on automating our fire station using z-wave enabled products. I will be using a vera lite.
So what I want to do is set the roller doors on our firestation to close automatically after the trucks have left on a call. I am currently using the vera lite to activate the lights in the rooms and turn on the pa system to give the radio voice over all driven by a relay imput from a tone controller.
My issue is that we have 8 bays so I am trying to find a way to have the system check all the doors after say 30 5 minutes and if any are open to close the doors. I also need a way to have the doors stay open aka a bypass for when we are cleaning the bays etc, some way of bypassing the the 5 minute check.
So there are a number of solutions, but most involve installing a relay system to activate the door and a sensor to tell the current status.
For my purposes, I went with an insteon kit that had both the low-volt relay and a magnetic break sensor. You can roll your own too – the kit just bundles a bunch of commonly used items.
I had this setup with Altseon (which is worth the effort) and it worked fine (I’ve since added an ISY994i for my Insteon control as I’m adding a lot of lights, but for just managing these switches, Altsteon is more than fine).
There is a virtual garage door plugin/app that ties the sensor device and the relay device into one single controllable device that takes care of them and exposes a lock (closed) and unlocked (open) status/control.
You can add as many of these sensors/relays and virtual devices as you need.
Then create a scene that is activated when they leave the station (or whenever you want) that contains a delay timer and then sets all the virtual garage doors to closed. The virtual garage door will consult the sensor status and close the door if needed (and skip it if not).
I’m sure there is a Zwave solution too, but I found this less expensive and nicely packaged up/easy.
Create a scene that runs when a truck leaves (I’m assuming each truck has it’s own bay?)
Create a delay in that scene to check the status of the sensor on that door. If tripped (door still open) fire the device that closes the door.
Repeat for each truck/bay combo.
Providing Vera has a way of determining the truck is in the bay, you should be able to have the doors open anytime. The thing is to be able to detect the presence of that truck. Is there something always connected to the truck when it’s in the bay?
You could use a door/window sensor that allows a secondary magnetic contact and make sure that is always connected to the truck when it is in the bay. So if that sensor trips, it would start the ‘check the door’ scene. As that sensor would fall of the truck when it left. Or even simpler a pressure switch as that secondary contact. Right under one of the wheels.
Vera is an excellent home automation solution. But I sure would not trust it with a “Mission Critical” function in a fire station! To much chance of Vera/Zwave malfunctioning, especially when lives could be at stake.
Closing the door after trucks have left I don’t consider mission critical. Doors still operate on their own the old fashion way.
As far as closing the doors after trucks have left, you need some inputs. Like said before you need to know if the trucks left, or if all the fireman left or something to that extent. This can be down with geofencing, or with ping sensor and some wifi device on the truck. So for example if you had a small router or wifi like device (thinking tp-link 702) that was in each truck and each truck was in a certain bay. You would have VERA ping that router and if it wasn’t found for 5 min. then close the door to that trucks bay. So even if that truck was pulled out of the bay for washing or what not or if the door was open but truck was there it would not close the door.
If all the doors were open and only one truck left with everyone in it, then you have another problem.
At home this is done with geofence on both me and my wifes cell phones. ( turn off lights and lock up when both our phones say we are gone) In your case with many workers, and some that might not want you running geofence on their phone this might not be an option for you.
Skipping all the above if all you want is a physical kill switch, any certain light switch in the place or if you install a wireless door contact and wire it to a normal open/closed switch, you could manually trip that switch for a bypass. So in VERA you would say close door in 5 min only if door is open more then 5 min and this switch (contact) is not tripped.
Closing the door after trucks have left I don't consider mission critical. Doors still operate on their own the old fashion way.
Agreed. As long as zwave is not used to open those garage doors initially.
I am currently using the vera lite to activate the lights in the rooms and turn on the pa system to give the radio voice over all driven by a relay imput from a tone controller.
This is what concerned me. If they are relying on a zwave operation in order to hear dispatch, could be a problem.
I should have included that the Vera controller only operates the turning on of the lights for the station when we get dispatched. I have a secondary relay not connected to the Vera that operates the PA system when we get dispatched. So if one fails the other should work. I read an article recently about detroit fire department using a can filled with coins that falls off the printer when their dispatch information is printed, scary stuff.
Thank you all for your help. I will figure out how I am going to put it all together and let you know what I come up with. Please let me know if you have any other suggestions.
Thanks. Sounds like you are not depending on Vera for anything critical. Good. (However, can the firefighters put on their boots in the dark?)
If you are interested in LUUP programming, I have a routine I use for my garage light. Push the scene button, my garage light goes on for x minutes. Press it before x minutes occur, then the timer resets back to a further x minutes. (Double pressing (rapidly) the scene button could disable the timer.) I presented the code here on this forum - I can give you a pointer to the thread if you are interested in that course of action.
I assume each of these Doors have the typical commercial 3 button setup (Open Close Stop).
I also assume they have safety lockouts if someone is parked in the door (Light sensor and maybe a pressure sensor)
Do you also have some simple Single Button Wireless remote controls for this ? (Like a home garage door opener ?)
I have the two commercial 3 button door setups for my shop.
I use the Garage Door plugin witch allows the Doors to look like a lock.
I have a Z-Wave door sensor on each door that senses the Open/Close status (Actually I converted this to an DSC alarm system sensor that is accessible from Vera).
I also use a Single Global Cache Relay to trigger the Push Button Garage Door opener…
My concern is that an 8 bay station is pretty big … I am not sure Z-Wave coverage would work at that far bays … Most door sensors are battery operated … so they do not act as Z-Wave repeaters. The Global Cache Relays above use Wifi … and would work if mounted near the middle of the station. You might have to WIRE your door sensors back to a common place that is close to the living area, which I assume is where the Vera is located. Then interface use the door sensors that have external sensors, which are connected to these wires.
One Global Cache Relay can trigger 3 doors … So you would need 3 of them.
Assuming your doors use the same Wireless door opener technology (which is fairly generic) you should be able to find a 3 door garage door remote control and use one Global Cache and one remote control to control 3 doors. You will still need the Garage Door Sensor for each door. I found my 2 button Garage Door Remote controls on the Internet.
Then I would use the PLEG plugin to automate you Auto Closing of doors and Lockouts.
If you provide an input to PLEG when you get a call (have it trigger a door sensor) You can use the fact that you had a call to control the automation to close the doors.
Also you can then use a Smart Phone to control these remotely … i.e. have the door open when you return to the Station.
Interesting you mention that type of relay, I had looked at them in the past. How would I intigrate them into vera not being a zwave product?
[quote=“RichardTSchaefer, post:10, topic:182967”]I assume each of these Doors have the typical commercial 3 button setup (Open Close Stop).
I also assume they have safety lockouts if someone is parked in the door (Light sensor and maybe a pressure sensor)
Do you also have some simple Single Button Wireless remote controls for this ? (Like a home garage door opener ?)
I have the two commercial 3 button door setups for my shop.
I use the Garage Door plugin witch allows the Doors to look like a lock.
I have a Z-Wave door sensor on each door that senses the Open/Close status (Actually I converted this to an DSC alarm system sensor that is accessible from Vera).
I also use a Single Global Cache Relay to trigger the Push Button Garage Door opener…
My concern is that an 8 bay station is pretty big … I am not sure Z-Wave coverage would work at that far bays … Most door sensors are battery operated … so they do not act as Z-Wave repeaters. The Global Cache Relays above use Wifi … and would work if mounted near the middle of the station. You might have to WIRE your door sensors back to a common place that is close to the living area, which I assume is where the Vera is located. Then interface use the door sensors that have external sensors, which are connected to these wires.
One Global Cache Relay can trigger 3 doors … So you would need 3 of them.
Assuming your doors use the same Wireless door opener technology (which is fairly generic) you should be able to find a 3 door garage door remote control and use one Global Cache and one remote control to control 3 doors. You will still need the Garage Door Sensor for each door. I found my 2 button Garage Door Remote controls on the Internet.
Then I would use the PLEG plugin to automate you Auto Closing of doors and Lockouts.
If you provide an input to PLEG when you get a call (have it trigger a door sensor) You can use the fact that you had a call to control the automation to close the doors.
Also you can then use a Smart Phone to control these remotely … i.e. have the door open when you return to the Station.[/quote]
There is a GC100 plugin that makes each relay (3 for this device) look like a Switch on Vera. I have a patch for the GC100 plugin that fixes a serious bug in it … Just contact me if you want to got this way.
So I’m thinking of using a laser sensor to trip the doors as the truck drives out, Ill have the sensor up high so that only the truck will trip the sensor. Does anyone have any suggestions on what sensor to use? I want to set it so that the sensor trips a timer that closes the door after x amount of time.
