Range extender desperately needed.

[The EVOHOME Shop]

How long before insulation regulations for new build homes stipulate the use of foil backed and insulated plasterboard throughout and render the evohome useless in even modest size properties without a range extender?

We actually did this in our house 'against' building regulations and I wish we hadn't as each room transmitts noise to the next a lot easier. Believe it or not, our evohome system works fine in this situation and we are circa 128m2 per floor. I appreciate sometimes it is hard to do exactly what you want when it comes to positioning of the evohome Controller, but I have personally done some pretty large houses and careful planning an positioning of the equipment including full and detailed RF testing pays dividends.

[Kevin]

I'm nearly there...

Is this still looking promising Paul ? If it works I'll be buying into EvoHome.

[paulockenden]

Sorry, been busy with other things. Should get some time soon.

[Cchris]

Had a catch up with my installer the other day and he too is amazed that Honeywell don't do this as a plug in item.

If this project you are working on can be modified relatively easily to work with other systems that also don't have such an extender available, there could be a commercial market for it. Though I'll guess that would be a minefield getting it past all the regs regarding rf signals etc.

[paulockenden]

I'm using an HGI80 and a Raspberry Pi, so approvals won't be an issue, but (if I can get it working) it'll be Evohome specific.

P.

[top brake]

In my experience it is always possible to solve range issues by moving devices. There are no possibilities for factory supported range extenders.

[paulockenden]

In the world of Z-Wave and Zigbee, you'll usually find that devices with permanent power (i.e. not battery powered) will act as repeaters. Even if they aren't currently part of the network.

It's a shame that BDR91s don't act the same way.

P.

[top brake]

In the world of Z-Wave and Zigbee, you'll usually find that devices with permanent power (i.e. not battery powered) will act as repeaters. Even if they aren't currently part of the network.

It's a shame that BDR91s don't act the same way.

P.

Rameses is a closed protocol, point to point 2 way, sensor or actuator device to controller hence why repeaters not available.

[paulockenden]

But without ACKs and NAKs (as far as I can tell), which makes repeaters a possibility.

Anyway, my HGI80 experiments continue...

P.

[Cchris]

In my experience it is always possible to solve range issues by moving devices. There are no possibilities for factory supported range extenders.

Unfortunately when the boiler control is at one end of the house, and a radiator at the other, with a few solid or cavity walls in between, sometimes it just isn't possible.

Mine works 'most' of the time, but there are a couple of areas that just won't behave. I can see the only solution at present being another (third) controller to deal with part of the upstairs.