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corbanmailloux / home-assistant-configuration

My configuration for Home Assistant
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ESPHome Smart Garage Parking Sensors #111

Open corbanmailloux opened 1 year ago

corbanmailloux commented 1 year ago

With the new car, I have built-in parking sensors that tell me when I'm getting close to the wall. The old car doesn't have this feature, and it'd be useful to park both in the exact right places to optimize garage space.

I could make this as a separate device, but ESPHome/Home Assistant seems like a logical choice.

Sensor

Using an ESP32 (possibly one of my new M5Stack Atom Lite modules), add a couple ultrasonic or laser range finders. Here's an example ultrasonic one that plugs right into the M5Stack, but I also can just wire raw modules directly.

Feedback/Lighting System

I've always wanted to mount a traffic light in my garage, and that would work, but another good idea is to use a pedestrian crossing sign like this one. If I could gut the insides and use LED strips to fill in the 7-segment display portions, I could even have the numbers display a countdown in inches to the ideal spot. In the simple case, just have an RGB LED or similar mounted on the wall and turn yellow when close and red when in the right spot. It could also flash or something to indicate you need to back up.

While I could have two separate complete systems, we rarely would be pulling in both vehicles at once. Use one lighting system and have it select the vehicle to use based on movement or garage door status. If one door is open, use that one.

Integrations/Conditions

In order to avoid constant polling and lighting, only run the sensor system for ~5 minutes when the garage doors are opened, and stop the system as the doors close.

corbanmailloux commented 1 year ago

For reference, I'm now using these laser ToF sensors: https://www.st.com/resource/en/datasheet/vl53l1x.pdf

corbanmailloux commented 1 year ago

I hit problems (unsurprisingly) with trying to have i2c travel over longer distances, which was needed to place the sensors further away from the sign. But I have ESP modules to spare... so I'm putting a separate ESP8266 with each sensor and connecting them through Home Assistant. I don't love that it introduces a network hop just for updating the display, but it will help simplify the hardware a bit and reduce the number of wires I'll need to run across the garage wall. Now each module will just need 5V power, and I can 3D print simple enclosures for the sensor boxes.

corbanmailloux commented 1 year ago

This is definitely worth a couple of pictures and a write-up when I have time, but it's working and installed in the garage.