Broken node = broken network?

[johnz]

I thought that the Z-wave mesh network meant that a broken node would have little or no influence on the network.
From one moment to the next, I could hardly reach 2 nodes, and the other 7 could not be reached at all. Optimizing (Homeseer) had no effect (was not possible because it could not communicate with the nodes) deleting devices from Homeseer and reimporting also had no effect. I could delete devices from the controller, but I could not re-add them to the controller.

This coincided with the transfer of my Homeseer server to a Vsphere virtual machine, so I pulled some hairs trying to figure this one out.

I then noticed that one dimmer switch could not switch locally. It made the same soft humming noise as before. After I pulled out the fuse of the dimmer switch, I could re-add devices to the controller and the network was back on its feet. I replaced the fuse and the switch worked again (and so did the network). This was not a relevant node for routing, almost all devices where within 2-5 meters from the controller.

Although I am happy that it works again, I do not understand the logic of this. Is there any? Or am I misinterpreting?

John

[TANE]

Are you running optimize?

http://blog.tane.nl/?p=243

[johnz]

No, I did that manually some time ago. But when I now tried to optimize, Homeseer could not communicate with nodes within 2 meters from the controller. Could daily optimizations really prevent this kind of behaviour?

[TANE]

Not sure...

try Rescan from device configuration..(few times)
if the response is okay.

try optimize 3 X from device configuration for every device.

[mhn]

Micasaverde has/had some problems, that sound like yours.

I hope it is not that. The only solution, I know, to that is resetting the network.

http://forum.micasaverde.com/index.php?topic=5756.0

[johnz]

Thanks for the comments.

In fact, I have reset the network because I deleted nodes from the controller and rebuild from scratch (including recreating HS events). Still not sure what it was, but it works now (fingers crossed).

John