Like any technology or wireless communications protocol, Z-Wave devices may become unresponsive. In these cases, Alloy Install provides a few basic Z-Wave troubleshooting tools to help resolve some issues you may encounter.
This article discusses what Z-Wave tools are available and what they do. For instructions on how to access the Z-Wave troubleshooting tools, refer to our How Do I Access the Z-Wave Troubleshooting Tools in Alloy Install? article.
Troubleshooting Tools For Z-Wave:
Reboot Hub:
The Reboot Hub tool sends a remote command to the hub to reboot. If multiple Z-Wave devices are responding slowly or are not responding at all, a hub reboot is a great tool to help re-establish the network and should be the first step when troubleshooting a problematic Z-Wave network. While the Hub Reboot may refresh the Z-Wave network, it will not heal it in the same manner as the Heal Network tool. The Reboot Hub tool can also be used if Heal Network is taking too long or gets stuck.
Heal Network:
The Heal Network tool is used to re-establish connections to slow-responding or inactive Z-Wave devices. Because Z-Wave uses mesh networking, devices may route and repeat data (i.e., commands) through other smart devices rather than communicate with the hub directly. For example, Device B may be communicating with the hub by way of Device A. If that routing path is or becomes inefficient, using Heal Network could re-route Device B’s communication path to something more reliable.
Box Sync:
During a device install, it is possible that SmartRent may fail to grab attributes (or status updates) from the Z-Wave device. If a device is responsive to commands being sent to it, but the attributes are not being updated (i.e., changing from orange to green), we recommend running the Box Sync tool. After running the Box Sync, tap back into the Device Install Task and tap Search for Attributes to force SmartRent to try retrieving attribute status updates.
Reset Z-Wave:
Reset Z-Wave will set the Z-Wave radio back to factory defaults. Because this is a full reset, the process will remove all devices currently paired to the hub, meaning those devices will need to be excluded then re-included. It is recommended to use the Z-Wave Reset tool as a last resort troubleshooting step.
*Note: The Z-Wave hub must be be ONLINE in order to use the tools listed above