Need help with roller shutter controller Fibaro FGR221 and Merten

Other Devices & Integrations Garage & Window Covering Control
#1

Hi all,

currently I am not using a Z-Wave gateway because some of my equipment is not yet supported by Vera. Instead I use 4-gang radio transmitters Merten 506004 as controller to switch or dim my lamps. Now I bought some Fibaro FGR221 to control my roller shutters too. After installation with mono-stable switches and inclusion into my network using Merten CONNECT USB dongle and configurator I am able to remotely control my roller shutter. Unfortunately roller shutter moves up or down for only 2.5 seconds. The same occurs when locally pressing the switches and even if I replace the motor for testing purposes with lamps. Regarding to support of Fibaro this is because I am using roller shutter motors with electronic limit switches, which is correct. They recommend to disable positioning (set parameter 10 of each roller shutter to OFF). Merten software does not allow to change such parameters.

Are there any users of Vera which are sucessfully using a combination of FGR221 and roller shutter motors with electronic switches? Did you noticed a similiar behaviour before disabling positioning? Is there an alternative method to position the roller shutter, e.g. by time?

If this is possible I have to decide to buy Vera and use the cumbersome method to configure my network with Merten connect software and transfer it to Vera (using option Z-Wave Settings/Advanced/Copy Z-Wave network from master controller). Fibaro HC2 does not fit my budget and it is not yet proved to support all the Merten stuff correctly.

Thank you for your responses,
Sebastian.

[Merten CONNECT radio USB data interface with CONNECT radio configurator, Merten 4-gang radio transmitter 506004, Merten universal dimmer 507900, Merten radio receiver, 2-channel switch 507502, Fibaro roller shutter controller FGR221]

#2

IIUC, you’re using a 506004 to control a FGR221.

You could try to change the function associated with input 1-4 (set Z-Wave parameters 0-3 to 0, 4, 44, 54, 52, 55; see attachment).

Please note that MiOS doesn’t support the 506004; search the forum for 506004 …

#3

@Ap15e - thank you for your answer.

Yes, I know Merten 506004 is not yet supported by Vera. Thats why currently I do not own one. I watch this forum since 2010 and I have not abandoned to hope that there will be Merten support added soon.

“Unfortunately” I have bought some FGR221 to control my roller shutters. Even if I associated this controllers sucessfully to my 506004 switches (using Merten radio configurator) I can not use it because Fibaro does not support motors with electronic limit switches by default.

So before buying a Vera here are my questions again:
Does any user of Vera sucessfully uses Fibaro FGR221 in combination with motors with electronic limit switches? Did you had to disable positioning (parameter 10) and is there an alternative methd of positioning possible (e.g. by time)?

Regarding Merten 506004 I hope I can use a procedure like described here:
http://forum.micasaverde.com/index.php/topic,8646.msg59944.html#msg59944
When following this procedure do Vera has full access to parameters of FGR221 and can I include both Merten switch and Fibaro controller into Vera scenes?

Many thanks in advance,
Sebastian.

[maybe Vera 3 soon, Merten CONNECT radio USB data interface with CONNECT radio configurator, Merten 4-gang radio transmitter 506004, Merten universal dimmer 507900, Merten radio receiver, 2-channel switch 507502, Fibaro roller shutter controller FGR221]

#4

I finally managed to solve most of my problems I described above. Maybe it helps other users if I tell how I did it.

In a first step I had to built up my Z-Wave network completely by use of Merten software and transfered master function to one of my 4-gang radio transmitters as I did before I owned Vera lite.

Now I was able to control all of my Merten dimmers, switches and Fibaro roller shutter controllers. The latter ones showed a timeout of 2.5s as noticed earlier.

Afterwards I set Vera to use Z-Wave version 2.78 instead of 3.20, initiated “Copy Z-Wave network from a master controller” on Vera and pressed button 1 on my master 4-gang transmitter three times. Now Vera lite is master and able to control all Fibaro controllers, Merten dimmers and even 2-channel Merten switches 507502. After programming variable 10 of Fibaro FGR221 to value of 1, the timeout of 2.5s disappeared and I can completely open and close my roller shutters.

One of my problems was to find out how to force my Merten configured Z-Wave network move to Vera. This solution was much simpler as I supposed first.

Secondly I had problems to retransfer the Vera-mastered network to Merten again to add additional devices or connections from 4-gang transmitter to switching devices. This retransfer was incomplete. So I spent hours to to reset all devices and build my Z-Wave network from ground.

One hint for Merten users: factory reset of Merten devices is disabled by default. So one should enable it before changing a running system…

One minor problem of a direct connection between a rocker of my 4-gang transmitter to Fibaro FGR221 was pressing the top switch moves the roller shutter down and vice versa. I changed the function of 4-gang transmitter from rocker to 2 independent switches and I was able to correct the behaviour: pressing the top switch moves the roller shutter up and vice versa.

Controlling position of roller shutter to not completely close is solved by setting up a scene which stops after a definable number of seconds.

The last remaining problem is 4-gang transmitter Merten 506004 is not supported by Vera. So I can not trigger a scene with my switches and I have certain reservations to go this cumbersone way again to include additional devices.

p.s.
@Micasaverde, please do your best to add complete support for Merten 506004 soon as many european users including me are waiting for!

[Vera lite, Merten CONNECT radio USB data interface with CONNECT radio configurator, Merten 4-gang radio transmitters 506004, Merten universal dimmer 507900, Merten radio receiver, 2-channel switch 507502, Fibaro roller shutter controllers FGR221]

#5

You don’t have to do that, actually FGR 221 works pretty well once its calibrated.

To do this please refer to the manual: “2. Roller shutter?s reset procedure” and then make two full open/close cycles of blinds to calibrate the controller. After this the position control can be done also from the slider bar on the vera UI.

One note, this works only on the tubular motors which does have mechanically set up/down stop points.

#6

We deal with all type of tubular motors and I am not sure why you are having problems with motors with electronic limits as long as these are standard 4 wire motors.
FYI, we also manufacture Z-Wave native tubular motors for shades, shutters, awnings (EU,US moddels) with full bi-directional control and positioning.
contact us:
info@zwavemotors.com