Motion Controlled Light

Other Devices & Integrations Lighting & Load Control
#1

I have a light in my laundry room that is turned on when motion is sensed by a Z-Wave motion sensor. I have the light turned off after a minute. This is working well as the majority of the time people are just passing through this room to get into or out of the garage.

However, for times that I’m in the laundry room longer, I’d like for the light to stay on. What happens is the light turns off after a minute. The motion sensor will sense movement and the light will turn back on.

Thanks for any help!

Mark

#2

You can look into the SmartSwitch plugin. This plugin allows you to associate the light with the motion sensor and set a “timeout” that occurs AFTER motion has stopped. It also has an option to change the timeout for when the light is turned on manually at the switch (or in Vera).

For instance, I have my back lights set to turn to 100% brightness when one of my motion sensors triggers movement. When the the motion sensor sends the “all clear”, SmartSwitch then waits 2 minutes to turn off the light.

I do the same thing in my Kitchen at night, but I have it turn the lights to 20% and then turn off after 30 seconds of no motion. Please note that motion sensors have different ways of handling the “all clear”. For instance my Aeon Labs are configurable (I have them set to give the all clear after 30 seconds of no motion), but my Schlage are set to 4 minutes from the factory. I have the Schlage in my kitchen, so if someone walks into the kitchen, the lights are on for a minimum of 4 minutes and 30 seconds.

You can also use PLEG to get the same affect with perhaps a bit more control or to allow for other special circumstances.

#3

@SirMeili - Not sure if you are aware of this, or if you even need this, but the Schlage motion sensor’s no-motion untrip(all clear) can be set to 5 seconds. There is a jumper in the sensor labled TEST that changes the default 4 minutes to 5 seconds. Configurable, like the Aeon, is more flexible though.

#4

Yeah, I knew that, but I consider 5s a bit too short for a battery operated device. I thought amount mentioning it and I probably should have just for the sake of being thorough.