Homematic battery drain with many inactive/unreacheable devices

English Forums Hardware
1

Hello,

I have about 20 Homematic devices connected to a Homegear controller. I have always been puzzled, why a dead battery in one device (Thermostat) is followed shortly after by dead batteries in the connected device (Valve drive) but this is explained here:
https://homegear.eu/index.php/BidCoS_Packet_-_General_Information
even though I don’t know if HM-TC-IT-WM-W-EU and HM-CC-RT-DN behaves the same as the old controller valve combination. The window contacts are not drained.
What I not understand is why the smoke detectors which are not paired to heating are also drained terribly fast (1 week from new batteries). Does the central unit go into panic mode trying to reach the devices with dead batteries waking up everybody else?

Any explanations are welcome.

Cheers,
Torsten

2

Hey @tsadowski,

all mentioned devices use a mode called wake on radio (WOR) or “burst”. It works by listening for a long (about 360 ms) preamble signal. If such signal occurs the device wakes up. The advantage is that a battery powered device can respond immediately to a sent packet. But it comes with in my opinion huge disadvantage: The wake up is not specific. All devices having this mode enabled wake up even if they are not addressed. For some devices (e. g. HM-TC-IT-WM-W-EU and HM-CC-RT-DN) WOR can be (partly) disabled. I. e. Homegear doesn’t use WOR any more to contact these devices then but they still wake up from WOR packets. Still that might help a lot.

Cheers,

Sathya

3

Hi Sathya,

I thank you very much for the information. Is WOR only sent by the central unit or could any device send a WOR? Does the WOR turn up in the log on the central unit?

In any case I will make sure that all devices can reach all paired devices at all times, which means another central unit because of too much reinforced concrete.

Cheers,
Torsten

4

Hi Sathya,

I should have checked the log earlier. It seems every 10 minutes the central unit tries to reach each peer:

08/01/17 20:20:38.418 Module HomeMatic BidCoS: COC "My-COC": Info: Sending (My-COC): 0B18B001FD032E388E550006
08/01/17 20:20:38.422 Module HomeMatic BidCoS: COC "My-COC": Info: Sending (My-COC): 0B1BB001FD032E3574B00006
08/01/17 20:20:38.434 Module HomeMatic BidCoS: COC "My-COC": Info: Sending (My-COC): 0B18B001FD032E4E934E0006
08/01/17 20:20:38.474 Module HomeMatic BidCoS: COC "My-COC": Info: Sending (My-COC): 0B1BB001FD032E2E98990006
08/01/17 20:20:38.490 Module HomeMatic BidCoS: COC "My-COC": Info: Sending (My-COC): 0B18B001FD032E388E410006
08/01/17 20:20:38.542 Module HomeMatic BidCoS: COC "My-COC": Info: Sending (My-COC): 0B1BB001FD032E3574B00006
08/01/17 20:20:38.669 Module HomeMatic BidCoS: COC "My-COC": Info: Sending (My-COC): 0B18B001FD032E35DF320006
08/01/17 20:20:38.788 Module HomeMatic BidCoS: COC "My-COC": Info: Sending (My-COC): 0B18B001FD032E35DF320006
08/01/17 20:20:38.792 Module HomeMatic BidCoS: COC "My-COC": Info: Sending (My-COC): 0B1BB001FD032E2E9A990006
08/01/17 20:20:38.859 Module HomeMatic BidCoS: COC "My-COC": Info: Sending (My-COC): 0B18B001FD032E388E550006
08/01/17 20:20:38.875 Module HomeMatic BidCoS: COC "My-COC": Info: Sending (My-COC): 0B18B001FD032E4E934E0006
08/01/17 20:20:38.911 Module HomeMatic BidCoS: COC "My-COC": Info: Sending (My-COC): 0B1BB001FD032E2E9A990006
08/01/17 20:20:38.915 Module HomeMatic BidCoS: COC "My-COC": Info: Sending (My-COC): 0B1BB001FD032E2E98990006
08/01/17 20:20:38.930 Module HomeMatic BidCoS: COC "My-COC": Info: Sending (My-COC): 0B18B001FD032E388E410006
08/01/17 20:20:38.982 Module HomeMatic BidCoS: COC "My-COC": Info: Sending (My-COC): 0B1BB001FD032E3574B00006
08/01/17 20:20:39.034 Module HomeMatic BidCoS: COC "My-COC": Info: Sending (My-COC): 0B1BB001FD032E2E98990006
08/01/17 20:20:39.050 Module HomeMatic BidCoS: COC "My-COC": Info: Sending (My-COC): 0B18B001FD032E388E410006

I am not sure if this also wakes up the smoke detectors each time, but empty batteries in a number of devices could be a problem for the rest.

Cheers,
Torsten

5

Hi @tsadowski,

it’s the same problem as in the German forum here: Batterien von HomeMatic-Wandthermostaten sind zu schnell leer

It seems for some reason “POLLING” is enabled. Could you send me the output of:

homegear -e rc '$devices = $hg->listDevices(false, array("ID"));foreach($devices as $device){print($device["ID"].": ".(int)$hg->getParamset($device["ID"], -1, "MASTER")["POLLING"].PHP_EOL);}'

As a workaround I now disabled polling for WOR devices.

Cheers,

Sathya

6

Hi Sathya,

I had also polling disabled on all devices. So it seems to have been the same problem. The latest nightly is installed. Now I have only to get some fresh batteries.

Thank you very much!
Torsten