I've used these for the last year or so on my blinds. They work over Bluetooth so one at a time can be controlled despite them being in a home assistant group. This means if I close both of them, I watch one close first and then the other shortly after. Maybe another Bluetooth radio would work? Not sure. But I like the product itself because there is no other ecosystem and it's all local. Also solar powered so no cables running everywhere :-).
this post was submitted on 16 May 2024
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Home Assistant is open source home automation that puts local control and privacy first. Powered by a worldwide community of tinkerers and DIY enthusiasts. Perfect to run on a Raspberry Pi or a local server. Available for free at home-assistant.io
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There's a bunch of things you can add to normal blinds to make them smart, the problem you'll face is that most of them are battery powered.
First example: https://a.aliexpress.com/_EGSpRhZ
Second example: https://a.aliexpress.com/_EwOUwWR
The even bigger issue is that AFAIK every single one of those things is really intended more for things like roller shades, not venetian blinds, and automates the raising/lowering, not the tilt.
Speaking for myself, if I were going to settle for a solution that only automated one function instead of both, it would need to be the tilting, not the raising/lowering.
You're right and all my blinds are Venetian, so I should've thought of that.
Those are kinda what I mentioned originally. The first is for roller shades, the second for curtains. They're good at what they do, but that's not blinds.
I'm fine with them being battery powered. The nice thing about having a window right there is that it can have a small solar panel up high to recharge if needed.
I've got several sensors and even a deadbolt that run on battery, and they go for over a year before needing a replacement.
Sorry I couldn't be of more help
I grabbed one of these and attached to our largest blinds and they work phenomenally. The main issue is cost, but I really just wanted something as a proof of "how" to do it, and hope to come up with a cheaper homebrew later on.
At ~$160 each?
I’ll stick with Switchbot
Lol agreed, I'm not buying another one. I mainly wanted to get a look* at how because I'm much better at understanding things when i can hold and inspect them.
Edit: I'll add that my main requirement was not needing a new hub to control them, hence this zwave solution 🙂
I also looked for that sort of thing recently and basically came up empty.