Suggestions for battery powered temperature sensors?

Sensors
1

I’m looking to setup about 7 temperature sensors around the house that can run on battery so I don’t have to try and plug them into power outlets. I’m looking for something that can transmit data back to my Raspberry PI, so many options for protocol as long as it works.

I’m hoping to set this up without spending a ton of money.

The best looking option I’ve seen so far is the Aeotec TriSensor, Z-Wave Plus S2 Motion, Temperature, Light Sensor, 3-in 1: https://www.amazon.com/Aeotec-TriSensor-Temperature-Automation-Security/dp/B07GP3ZCYD
But at $45 each that adds up quickly and I don’t really need the motion and light sensor.

This post looked interesting for making my own: http://www.bntdumas.com/2015/07/23/how-to-battery-powered-temperature-and-humidity-sensors/
However, from the post, it doesn’t sound like the battery life is very good, and I don’t want to be changing batteries in them all every week.

Any suggestions for anything that you use that works well? Thanks!

2

I set one up using mysensors a couple of years ago, followed these instructions from memory https://www.mysensors.org/build/battery

I think I had them up for over 8 months running on couple of batteries before we moved and it had been pretty rock solid. Forgot to meter the batteries to see how much charged still had unfortunately.

3

Have you looked at Xiaomi ones? A lot cheaper than aeotec and I think battery lasts 1-2 years.

4

Over the last month I’ve been experimenting with a lot of the Xiaomi Aqara Zigbee gear (since doing the Sonoff Zigbee video) and I’m very impressed with them. I’ve designed a board for a Zigbee to MQTT gateway that uses Zigbee2Tasmota firmware: it’s been rock solid, so I’ll do a video about it soon.

I’ve avoided Zigbee for years and stuck with WiFi, but the power difference (and therefore battery life) is incredible.

2 Likes
5

Sounds awesome, can’t count the number of times if gone to look at that stuff and got side tracked with other projects. Need some water leak detection and it seems to be a great solution.

6

Thanks for the suggestions so far. I hadn’t seen the Xiaomi ones. Those look pretty interesting and at a good price point. I’ll give them a try.

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Confusingly there are a couple of different Xiaomi Zigbee product lines. I’ve been using the “Aqara” range, which is what seems to be recommended for compatibility with things like Zigbee2MQTT and Zigbee2Tasmota.

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i totally agree jon, the sonoff tasmota has been doing my head in, especially the switch on/off delay on the app when you use the wall switch manually and your in bed and can’t remember if you turned the light off so you go on you app and it still says "ON’ well thats with smartthings.