So, I’ve got a bit of a mess on my hands. I had to replace one of my Schlage Z-Wave locks. That started out simple enough and I was able to get the old lock removed and the new lock added. However, the new device was showing an association error and wasn’t completely responding. I contacted Vera support and enabled remote access…here’s where the fun started.
Initially I was told the lock wasn’t connected to my Vera and they thought it might be too far away. It was in the same location as the old lock had been for 4 years working perfectly and was within 20 feet of an Aeotec range extender. After a bit of back and forth, the Vera tech somehow managed to mangle not only the lock, but 6 of my Z-wave switches.
I logged on one morning and noticed my “Garage Door Lock” was now showing up as “_Door Lock” in an unassigned room with a red message “Unable to get any information on node”. That would have been fine, but I also noticed 6 instances of “_Appliance Module” with the same red message. I thought this was weird but wasn’t sure what was going on at first. Then I noticed that my three newest Inovelli Black / Red switches were missing from Vera. I guess they somehow reverted to “_Appliance Module”. I was able to factory reset the Inovelli switches and get them added back to Vera and setup in my scenes again.
It was then that I noticed that 3 of my GE/Jasco Switches were also missing. Here’s where I’m struggling…I can’t find any documentation on how to factory reset these switches so they can be re-added to Vera. Can I unpair the “_Appliance Module” devices and will that exclude my GE/Jasco switches to they can be re-paired?
Pretty frustrated right now and wife approval factor is hovering right above zero!
Thanks!
Did you make a backup before letting them touch anything? Any time before? Always a good idea… maybe too late now, as you’ve already started “recovering”…
Exclusion mode will exclude any device, not just the device you started exclusion on, so any device that is activated while exclusion is running will be excluded. That would be the path to hitting your Jasco devices.
Dear Jamie,
From our technical support team, we would like to apologize for any misunderstandings or further inconveniences that could’ve been caused to your network. We have assigned one of our Tier 2 engineers to assist you in the existing ticket that you have created with us. Please remain attentive to their response throughout the day.
Regards.
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So backup…lesson learned. I didn’t make a backup before allowing remote access. As I’ve already got half the devices added back, hopefully it will be straight forward getting the other half back.
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So familiar! Sorry to say but I have only 1 out of around 40 good experiences with supoort… the only thing that gets out always: exclude - include… and restore backup. One of the worst I documented here:
Know what? Excluded from vera, included in OZW and works well since then.
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Things I’ve learned mostly the hard way as a Vera consumer past 6+ years:
- dont rely on Vera’s automatic backup. Always take a local (downloaded manual) back up before changing ANYTHING
- If you are going to do anything with apps, know where the logging functions live and turn off log uploads otherwise you may not have any locally to look at
- learn how to connect to your Vera using SSH and how to get around the important directories
- Learn what LuaUPnP is and stuff in logs to worry about vs what’s “normal” (for Vera)
- Plan on at least one firmware meltdown every 1-2 years. Since the updates are much slower now, and stability has improved, i fear others will fail to learn from this history
- Plan on at least one complete factory reset and reload of all your devices (sans restore), scenes every 5 years. Some have had more, others less. I’ve had one partial, it’s as bad as it sounds when you can’t trust your backup not to reintroduce bugs or a fault and a clean load is all that’s possible.
Generally I’ve found Vera support to be pretty good once you get to Tier 2. I don’t suggest letting the first person to touch your ticket to recommend or perform major changes. You have to be blunt about this up front - no changes without your express approval, otherwise you can get these random results. I haven’t needed support for a while and I worry about brain drain due to the Ezlo shift over time. Hence the urgency you read elsewhere for a low impact migration path to Ezlo, lest those of us with significant Vera automation investments get left holding the bag.
Yep, HA+OZW+ZStick = no more problems. This was the push I needed.
One other thing to note… Schlage Z-wave locks are notorious for not liking having any nodes between them on the controller when you first include them. I don’t think they actually have their security handshake quite right, and Vera is not great about handling it (but my alarm.com z-wave didn’t like Schlage locks that had a repeating node on first join either). That is why you need the Vera close by when first including a Schlage lock, so you ensure the join doesn’t try to go through other near by nodes and goober it.