All Tado X devices disconnected
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@cardella , I believe my wifi is operating as a mesh, from EE Smart Hub Plus, WiFi 5 mode, together with two EE Smart WiFi Plus (WiFi repeaters) to help with range.
@TheBubble , good to hear your heating came back online (by itself overnight). I'm intrigued how that happened, but I suspect we might never know.
@philjohn , I added Tado Wireless Receiver X in order to use the (relay) connection to trigger our heating system from the Tado thermostats. (prior to that I used a Homey Pro 2023 as the thread WiFi router for the Tado thermostats to connect to). Do you have a way to trigger your heating system (e.g. boiler/heatpump etc) from Tado thermostats? … I'm wondering if I am missing a trick here
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I, too, am haunted by such issues, more rarely I see TRVs offline in the Tado app, more frequently the Wireless Receiver goes offline in either Thread network, WiFi network, or both, and subsequently the TRVs look "ok" but heating doesn't work as the boiler isn't switched on. It's been over three months this happens and a few FWs have gone through. Major regret post upgrading from V3+ which provided both solid stability and also Worcester's non-so-open OpenThread compatibility that the receiver doesn't have for the same unit.
My configuration sees three TRBR, one is Home Assistant Connect ZBT-1, the other is Google Nest Hub Max. When issues arise, the receiver goes offline, TRVs don't in the Home Assistant and likewise they stay available in the Tado app (NAT64 is active so Tado must connect to Home Assistant to communicate) - either way the weak device is the Wireless Receiver X that goes awal until a manual reboot and so disallows heating to function as expected. Several Thread bulbs from Nanoleaf act as router/repeater and TRVs keep very much always connected.
@Emcee I was signalling this also in another similar thread, reinforcing that if there's anything I can help with, happy to do so.0 -
Sorry for going off topic but @ErMejoo are you saying that you can use the home assistant usb dongle as a TBR for the Tado Thread network? How do you connect the TRV to that Thread network? This is just a curiousity of mine because at the beginning I was wondering if I could have saved some money by buying 2 home assistant usb dongles rather than two Tado X bridges.0
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Our entire system has gone offline again at 10am today, trying to contact tado support - says response time is 2 days.
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Do you have any heating?
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Hi @tulloch - Yes - luckily it seems to be stuck on rather than off.
Support have replied asking if I have other Thread border router like apple tv/home pods - which I do, and they had said that the devices "secretly" connect to the other Thread border routers.
There are a few things I'm unclear on what's happening here though.
I have since discovered that I do have a few Thread Border routers - they are all in the same network/home though - even the Tado Receiver Thread Border Router and both of the Tado Bridge Thread Border Routers and the Apply Home one and there is also an Aqara one - they are all in the same network - and therefore they should all be meshing.
I added all of the Tado devices directly in to the Tado app, as I understand that's the only way to get them in there - you can add them to home kit and then add in to the Tado app, but I've not test that so I don't know - I just added all via Tado app.
So Tado does know it all exists, and they are all connected in the same network. But the Tado app and website app all just show the devices as offline.
And they are still offline, although when I originally set it up I did add a couple of device to apple home using the share matter within the Tado app - these still show up as working in Apple Homekit, but I only setup 3 out of the 16 devices there.
My biggest question here is - while it's all showing as offline in the Tado App - I wonder if there is still some sort of connection, as the Tado Receiver is what drives the boiler when there is a heating demand - and the heating is working via manually controller the thermostats. But I'm unsure if it is responding to demand - or just running 100% of the time.
Big old ramble there - but it's still not working.
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Hi @tulloch Sorry - I have replied, twice - but neither of my posts are here?
I do have heating, I don't know if it is stuck in a on position, so the boiler is constantly working and therefore when we manually change the TRVs they heat up - or if there is still something in the background working and telling the Tado Receiver there is a heating demand, and it is turning on the boiler.
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One of the things Tado support have mentioned is multiple Thread Border Routers, and that the Thermostats could "secretly" connect to the other Thread Border Router.
Now, I have found I do have a number of other Thread Border Routers - but they are all in the same Thread Network - so they are all working as a Thread mesh, and part of that mesh is the three Tado Border Routers.
I have tried factory resetting and re-adding via the Tado app, and while that was successful in adding - it remains offline in the Tado app.
@philjohn mentioned another way of adding these, which I'm going to try later - as he explains how to add something in to the Tado app after you've already added it elsewhere, as the Tado app doesn't letter you add shared matter devices in the standard matter way with the share code/QR code (note that is a sharing QR code, not the QR code that is on the device)
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My support case got to an end after they asked me 3 times about distances between my devices. Im definitely not living in a castle, maybe they designed this system for single room apartments
Anyway, the last reply I got from them is this one:
Thanks for the reply.
I can see that connection was lost, maybe the internet did not work at that time.
We are aware of this kind of issues and we are working on fixing it.
Please leave your feature request in the tado° Community, so it can be discussed and voted on by our Community members. Your feedback helps us determine what we should change, and which features we should develop further.
To use the forum:
Create an account and become a tado° Community member.
Once you’re logged in, check that there isn’t already a request for this feature in the Suggestions, Ideas and Improvements section (you can also search for keywords in the search bar).
Upvote and comment on existing feature requests.
If your feature request doesn't exist yet, create a New Idea.
Please let me know if there is anything else I can help with.
Kind regards,
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I'm ignoring the first sentence and I assume the last part is an standard reply. At least they acknowledge they know about some issues they need to fix but more details and transparency would make the customers happier, also because I bet we are all here to help debugging these issues and help them. Probably that should be the feature I need to suggest in the forum0 -
Thanks for the suggestions about wifi/thread config @TheBubble, and best wishes with your issues.
I realised I wasn't confident in how my Tado X devices were really connected … I believed they were now via the Tado X Wireless Receiver, but I hadn't checked since installation.
Tado devices directly visible on my home WiFi
I first looked through my Broadband WiFi Router (EE) browser-based hub manager, in its WiFi connected devices list, and saw only 1 Tado device listed, which is called "Tado Smart Thermostat" but I interpret must be the Tado X Wireless Receiver as the aggregator/portal (or more properly Thread Border Router) for the whole Tado system.
So I tried on linux terminal of my Mac computer using: (address resolution, for all entries, searching case-insensitive for 'tado')
arp -a | grep -i tado
It also found only 1 Tado device, so was consistent with my manual look through the Broadband Router connections list.
So in short, I interpret this is consistent with Tado X Wireless Receiver being connected to my WiFi and serving as the Thread Border Router for the rest of my Tado X devices to be connected on their own thread mesh network.
Tado devices and Thread
I was hoping to be able to specifically list the devices on the Tado Thread mesh, but I haven't yet found anything beyond the device connection status (yes/no) within the Tado app.
I happen to have a Homey Pro 2023 (smart home hub), on which I have installed a TadoZones app to access my Tado system. Through the Homey App I can see my Tado devices in a compact list, which feels to me a little neater than in the Tado app, though I don't think it actually gives me any more information about their network connection.
Alternative Thread network options
I think I have two other (non-Tado) Thread Border Router options in my house, Homey Pro 2023, or Apple HomePod Mini.
Therefore I could add the Tado devices via either Homey app (as 'Matter over Thread'), or Apple Home app. In either case I believe it needs the QR code from the Tado device cardboard box (though I seem to remember there is a fall-back option if the box isn't to-hand). I suspect others here can correct me if necessary.
So I assume I could add at least all the Tado X radiator & separate thermostats via a 3rd party Thread Border Router. I haven't done anything to test if the Tado X Wireless Receiver is happy to talk to the Tado thermostats in this way (when it isn't the Thread Border Router), and I don't currently feel like re-configuring my Tado system to find out. Does anyone here know?
How to debug Thread connections? … if problem recurred
I can see that currently my Tado system presents itself as a single device on my home WiFi, i.e. only the Tado X Wireless Receiver as Thread Border Router.
If the "all devices disconnected" problem on this thread was due to devices incorrectly disconnecting from Tado Thread network and connecting to a different Thread network then I think I would have difficulty proving it since I don't know how to interrogate devices on a Thread network.
I could certainly check if any more Tado devices show directly on my home WiFi network, either via my Broadband Router or terminal using 'arp' command.
And I could look in my Homey Pro devices list to see how many Tado devices are shown, and their status. Presumably I could also try looking in Apple Home app.
But I don't know if I could find out if Tado devices were on a different Thread network?
… trying to think ahead to what to look at if the 'all devices disconnected' problem re-occurred
Any other suggestions?
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I believe what you are seeing in your tests is as expected. All thread Tado devices do not connect to the home wifi network so they can't appear in your router client list.
If I understood from other posts, you could connect the TRVs/thermostats through matter to a third party "controller" bypassing completely the Tado app. For example as you mentioned you could use your Homey pro. Or people with Home assistant could do the same. In that case I don't really know if you would still be affected by the disconnection problem. It could be a good test to do but it's also quite annoying having to reconfigure the whole system.
There is also another consideration to make which is about how the app gets the information to display: my guess is that the app connects to the Tado servers to fetch the information from the overall system. I don't think it's a direct connection between your phone and the wireless receiver (I might be wrong of course). This should be easy to test simply by disconnecting our router from the WAN cable and see what happens in the app. Assuming that's true, then the problem we are having here is most likely related with the Receiver not sending data to the server for whatever reason, or the servers not sending data to your phone. A validation of this is that when the problem happens, the devices still show good connection to the thread network from their display (i.e. they don't show the blinking bars symbol).
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Hey @cardella that's correct, basically there's a key prerequisite, which is that your phone (Android here) first and default thread network is Home Assistant's preferred network, which can also be the case if you, for example, first have any Google TBR that naturally form a network and you then join Google's thread network from the home assistant's dongles that act as TBR on their own, too. You can do this from the Home Assistant app after syncing your phone thread credentials with it and opening the device & services (integrations), then thread, configure, send credentials, and then joining the Google nest's network and marking it as preferred. I believe you can do the same with an Apple device and a relevant TBR, too. Tado's app will then source the default thread network credentials from your phone's Google Play Services API and load just that same network in your Tado devices (including the receiver X). This way, you still do add devices from Tado's app, but as well you do enable them to communicate through the same existing thread network, router devices, and existing TBR. For me in fact, this was the main selling point when I upgraded from V3+ as I already have two TBR and the existing router powered devices (thread lights from Nanoleaf) would be excellent repeaters to connect TRVs in every room and stop the occasional disconnections and common battery replacements. On top of that, you can also see and control the same TRVs already connected to Tado in Home Assistant by clicking on the "Matter Device Linking" under the TRVs settings in the Tado app, this is called Multi Admin feature or the like. Tado's receiver X would also appear under Home Assistant's TBR list on the same network and support it with enhanced connectivity for any other devices connected, too. Extra benefit (if these weren't enough) I noticed is that many times when receiver X was disappearing from the WiFi network and getting in it's common "hanging" state, Tado would be still able to reach it through the thread network and including all TRVs passing through Home Assistant's Open Thread TBR, if you enable its NAT64 functionality, which translates the thread IPv6 into reachable IPv4 (oversimplifying a bit). You do this in Home Assistant's Open Thread Border router app configuration, enabling the advanced/unused settings, and then you'll see NAT64.
Last comment to add, if your primary thread network in HA and phone are different, then it's a little tricky as you need to venture in deleting Google Play Services "app" data, which has undesired effects such as deleting all your wallet content, then syncing home assistant credentials to your phone, and only then basically opening the Google home app and Tado for the first setup.
There is a Google developer app to tell you what's your default thread network (and its credentials) and get/set/clear them (yet with the hiccups), too, here https://developers.home.google.com/samples/matter-app - you do that from settings - developer utilities - thread network.
After all, the limitation on the phone default network is actually a Tado app limitation but also a common one, I have only seen Nanoleaf app allowing to select the thread network and relevant credentials from the full list of those available and saved on your phone.
Hope it helps 😊0 -
Great explanation, I don't think you can find this online anywhere so thank you!0
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Oh this is a disaster - I factory reset the receiver and re-added it to the app which worked. And now no heating at all. Factory reset some devices and re-added them to the app and while they add OK, the app says they are offline. So no heating at all now. I can add them to Apple home, and control them from there too (because there is only one thread network they all belong to) but there is no connection between the thermostats and the receiver - so it looks like it will now never switch the boiler on for heating.
If the Tado app had a button to boost heating like it does for water, atleast that would be slightly helpful, as climbing in to the loft to constantly click the heating boost button on the receiver is not good.
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@TheBubble thanks for the earlier reply, one post did indeed vanish as I got a page not found when clicking the link in the email.
From what you say, using the boost button on the WR will fire the boiler even when the devices are offline? It never occurred to me to try that. Btw, there is a boost button in the app (iOS at least) at the top of the home screen but you need to scroll the displayed buttons sideways to reveal it.
Are you getting any support?
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Hi @tulloch Thanks for the note on the boost button - It looks like that button is only visible if you have online devices - which does make sense in most instances, except for cases like this.
Since the receiver was online and it is only the thermostats that go offline, I think the boost would have worked, because the hot water was working correctly in the app and that is all directly via the receiver.
It's all come back online again now - I think the ticket has been moved to another department, but I'm unsure where now, they have noted that it has come back online though.
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Inspired by the discussion above, I went on a bit of a hunt to learn a bit more about Thread network topology and what it could mean to add a secondary Thread Border Router (TBR). Summarised in slide image:
(I get the impression from the discussion that Tado X TBR can be used as secondary TBR in at least some other vendor's Thread networks + TBRs, but I haven't listed that yet as I failed to find any further details yet; can anyone add?)
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Glad it helps @cardella - worth a like button maybe 😉🥂?
One piece I need to take away from the description above, is that actually it's not quite true that when the receiver X goes offline on the Tado app, it is necessarily responding to Thread commands so basically switching on/off the boiler. I just had the experience today that I was also lamenting in my very first post actually, so I must have mixed up with some other conditions. Basically the Receiver X for me goes randomly offline on Tado, while it's still online in the WiFi network and visible, and as it cannot be listed on Home Assistant as a device, I wouldn't know what is going on with the thread connection, yet it seems that goes offline as today I checked Tado Receiver X does disappear from the Home Assistant thread list of TBR. So basically when Receiver X goes offline on Tado app (for unclear reasons) then I'll soon know cause I'm freezing to death (currently 12 degrees everywhere 🤬), and in no other way at all, not to mention that it doesn't matter that the TRVs or thermostat all are setup to fire the heating. This is so frustrating, the receiver is WiFi-connected, TRV and thermostat is thread-connected, but yet the only thing I can do is switch on and off the Receiver X. I thought this was getting solved with the latest firmware according to another thread on this forum, but it seems that's wrong, with the second event confirming this today.
@colosb from my experience the answer is yes Tado can be a secondary TRB, but also Google devices can, contrary to the pic description, that's my current setup actually.1 -
Thanks @philjohn . I continued my journey of understanding … trying to make sense in my head of what the topologies might look like, and how to achieve and prove it.
If I understand correctly, I think that you are achieving what I show in a new slide below as "topology C", with multiple TBRs, including from non-Tado vendor (e.g. Apple HomePod, Homey Pro, Home Assistant etc).
Thanks for the clear sequence of installation. I am guessing that if adding Wireless Receiver last, then perhaps Tado installation software will re-configure the Thread network to remove non-Tado TBRs, leaving a purely Tado Thread network. Do you agree, or am I mis-understanding?
I assume that by adding the Wireless Receiver first, and then adding other Tado devices into non-Tado TBR (via Matter) before adding to Tado app, this ensures that the Tado devices retain the non-Tado TBR (e.g. HomePod, Homey Pro, Home Assistant etc) in the network.
I'm not really sure if or how the Thread network links get established to ensure that the originally added Wireless Receiver will Thread mesh with the devices later added under 3rd party TBR? Perhaps that is just something that Tado installation will ensure for us while installing?
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It's not quite like that - the TRV's are low power end devices. Only devices that have constant power (not battery) take part in routing.
I run OpenThread Border Router on my server, which has a Thread radio attached (SMLight SLZB-06p7) and I can display the network topology, which you can see here:
The green circles are end devices (16 TRV's and 1 wireless thermostat). The Purple circle is the main Border Router (HomePod), then there are two other HomePod's and the Thread radio connected to my server (teal blue circles).
So the thread border routers are connected to each other (to route traffic to and from end devices) but end devices (TRV/Wireless Thermostat/Temperature Sensor) connect to their closest router.
Edit: You don't see the Tado X Wireless Receiver (with hot water control) in my diagram as it would appear it doesn't play well with other thread networks and wants to do its own thing, so it's not formed into a single mesh running as a single network.Also, think of Thread like WiFi - it's the transport layer of the network. Matter is a protocol that sits atop it, but thread itself is just a way of bridging a low power wireless network (802.15.4) to the rest of the network via the border routers.
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Thanks @philjohn that makes absolute sense for battery devices. I'm pleased to understand better.
I interpret that your point about Tado X Wireless Receiver not playing well with other thread networks is exactly what I was trying to explore with my illustrations and questions about topologies B vs C on my diagram.
See an updated diagram below. Any other insights from anyone?
(I'm very tempted to take a closer look at OpenThread Border Router and get a Thread radio device in order to better understand my own network topology)
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Word of warning with OpenThread Border Router - it's a pain to setup and get working, especially in docker! Took me a couple of evenings of tinkering before it was going my way. HomeAssistant OS has a pre-built add-on that is meant to be easier to work with.
To expand on the Tado X Wireless Receiver not playing well with other thread networks, the devices themselves (according to the Eve home app thread explorer) seems to show some devices connecting to the Tado X thread network as well (end devices can be multi homed on multiple thread networks). But again, this was by adding to Apple Home first then to Tado.1 -
This morning at around 8.20 the problem happened again and everything looks offline from the app. Some TRVs are online from their display but still unable to request heat as their radiators are cold. I noticed in the last weeks that all TRVs have been updated to firmware 250.1. So the problem is not fixed yet0
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That’s double bad news. Hope you get prioritised support.0
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Best wishes @cardella, I hope you get support and working heating soon.
Out of interest, are your Wireless Receiver and Bridges apparently online and showing good status in the Tado app? If I remember correctly, previously you were able to restore functionality by power-cycling your Tado X Bridges? (I don't have Bridges so far, so for me it was soft-resetting the Wireless Receiver by pressing the heating boost button for 9 seconds). Did you already try those tricks?
Does anyone here know if/how we can diagnose if the error is occurring locally in the home, or out into Tado cloud land? (I tested last week and Tado X radiator thermostat was unable to trigger Tado X Wireless Receiver, even for local manual thermostat adjustment, so no fancy scheduing, if I disconnected my broadband connection on the other side of broadband/wifi router, which I find disappointing; and Tado mobile app also depends on internet)
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Yes as in the other occurrences the bridges and the receiver appears as connected in the app. I can always recover from the fault by restarting the bridges, for me no need to touch the receiver.
I let the support know again and they said to have patience until they fix the problem. So we can't do much but wait.1 -
Good that you still have a reliable recovery mechanism @cardella, even if inconvenient to keep losing heating.
From what you are saying/hearing from Tado Support, it sounds as though Tado might have localised to a specific failure mechanism on their side (whether in Tado device operation/firmware, or through to Tado cloud)? (any insights into what?)
… if so, that sounds encouraging, and we can wish them good speed to develop to develop a fix and successfully deploy …
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My system is offline for last two days, wirelees temperature sensor, 5x radiator thermostats and bridge. Only bridge is connected. Restarting, reconfiguring, nothing works. Two months without problems and now. Im disappointed.
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