My interest here is sparked by two things.

1) I recently had a timer installed. The electrician asks me if I want to have one that can be operated via WI-FI. Says he is doing a lot of these right now. I thought why not? So he fits a CBI Astute smart controller (this give some joy for a short while. I could turn a thing on and off over the internet, from the comfort of my seat. Wahay! Also whilst out exercising I could stop, pull out my phone, and watch the controller change state. How did I live without this?)

2) This recent comment on this forum "Someone should be selling "solar-aware" smart plugs specifically for fridges/freezers with this logic baked in. Surprised it's not common already"

OK... so my smart controller is a bit lonely. I had to download the CBI app, create a home, create a room in the home ("zone" is a better word, since the "room" I added is named "Driveway") and add the controller to that room.

I also swiped past something called scenarios as this time really just needs to turn on once a day and off once a day. Nothing complicated.

But AIUI (and I may be wrong) these scenarios allow me to have rules like "if it's going to be a sunny afternoon then turn the guest geyser on". Am I right?

If so then (2) above is addressed. Since the CBI range includes "smart" wall sockets and even plugs.

Also looks like the Astute home can be integrated with home assistant, which I have installed on a Pi but have not actually done anything with (I was going to use it to allow remote control of my inverter).

Anybody been down either or both of these paths?

42 minutes ago, Bobster. said:

My interest here is sparked by two things.

1) I recently had a timer installed. The electrician asks me if I want to have one that can be operated via WI-FI. Says he is doing a lot of these right now. I thought why not? So he fits a CBI Astute smart controller (this give some joy for a short while. I could turn a thing on and off over the internet, from the comfort of my seat. Wahay! Also whilst out exercising I could stop, pull out my phone, and watch the controller change state. How did I live without this?)

2) This recent comment on this forum "Someone should be selling "solar-aware" smart plugs specifically for fridges/freezers with this logic baked in. Surprised it's not common already"

OK... so my smart controller is a bit lonely. I had to download the CBI app, create a home, create a room in the home ("zone" is a better word, since the "room" I added is named "Driveway") and add the controller to that room.

I also swiped past something called scenarios as this time really just needs to turn on once a day and off once a day. Nothing complicated.

But AIUI (and I may be wrong) these scenarios allow me to have rules like "if it's going to be a sunny afternoon then turn the guest geyser on". Am I right?

If so then (2) above is addressed. Since the CBI range includes "smart" wall sockets and even plugs.

Also looks like the Astute home can be integrated with home assistant, which I have installed on a Pi but have not actually done anything with (I was going to use it to allow remote control of my inverter).

Anybody been down either or both of these paths?

Smart plugs etc have been around for a bit over a decade now and is nothing new. I use Tuya personally. Can control the kitchen, geyser etc. I want to add for the pumps outside also. Tuya has been around since 2014 selling these solutions and they do energy monitoring and all sorts of timing scenarios.

The kit is very cheap also. 110 rand gets you a 16A smart switch with energy monitoring the size of a gate remote. I have used their products for the last 3 years and no issues to date.

You can also create 'zones'. Tuya call it rooms. You do smart switching for each plug in a room you want. Lots of flexibility.

Edited November 4, 2025Nov 4 by Denns

I am pretty deep into HomeAssistant. Have many Sonoff and Shelly devices throughout my home, including light switches, breakers, temperature monitoring etc. The possibilities are almost endless - I have many automations which run my home, from consuming forecasts from Solcast to determine what should run and when it should run based on solar predictions. Automation of lights based on alarm triggers, camera automation to tell me when a vehicle or person arrives at my gate. Notifications if gates or garage doors are left open. Gas consumption and remaining gas monitoring. Automation of lights using sunset / sunrise. Adjusting of battery charge based on load shedding schedule ensuring that my batteries are full prior to load shedding starting. Its a rabbit hole, once you understand the concepts its extremely powerful. Homeassistant has matured significantly over the past ~ 2 years, although updates can be painful at times it's been fun.

I have some Tuya devices (Geyser Wise) which I run TuyaLocal for - I prefer local for all connectivity.

What inverter do you have?

Happy to try answer any questions you may have.

Edited November 4, 2025Nov 4 by spotity

Cbi astute is tuya based actually, it can be adopted into the smart life app and then incorporated into home assistant like the usual tuya stuff. Works decently.

Edited November 4, 2025Nov 4 by abd7

21 hours ago, Bobster. said:

Anybody been down either or both of these paths?

Yes, I've had one controlling my geyser (connected to the Aux port of the inverter) since September 2024. Works well, but I do have two small gripes...

I only discovered after installing it that it needs to be powered on (duhh) for the timer to work. So, no power, no timer, no switching. My old manual timers were battery operated, and still switched on and off even without power connected to their terminals. Probably not a big deal under normal use, but coupled with the Aux port that remains off until the battery SOC reaches the upper "start" threshold, this did not work well initially. Fortunately, one can learn and make changes, and I now have the Aux port set to "start" at 90% SOC instead of the originally set 99%, and to "switch off" at 60% SOC which is very rarely reached - so in practice it's the same as having "grid power always on" selected... problem solved 🙂

My second, and only real, gripe is that the switching on can sometimes fail for no apparent reason, leaving me with cold water on a bright sunny day. I discussed this with a CBI technician, and he suggested adding a second "on" time set for 5 minutes after the first "on" time. This has solved the problem about 85% successfully, and I just accept that I must monitor the app around switching-on time and just manually switch it on remotely if the timer does not do it's job... This works great for 95% of the time - the other 5% is when I forget to check, and then I just bear the Wife's wrath when I get home in the evenings 🫠

Edited November 6, 2025Nov 6 by HennieL
Fixed some typos

Thanks all. So far I have just the one, and it's feeling lonely. @HennieL 's point about no battery backup is interesting. Does this mean that the schedule is stored somewhere other than on the smart controller? I was thinking of two more of these, but they are on non-backed up circuits. At present the timer would follow the schedule but wouldn't turn anything on because there is no power.

So I have this:

1) Timer is supposed to turn on the pool at 10:00
2) Power goes down at 9:00
3) Switch turns on at 10:00
4) Power comes back at 11:00
5) Now the pool starts running

If that still happens with the smart controller, if the controller wakes up when the power is restored, realises that it's 11:00, realises/is told that now it should be in an on state and goes to on, then effectively nothing changes.

Edited November 5, 2025Nov 5 by Bobster.
clarity

I have 22 of this wonderful little smart switches, combination of Tuya on SmartLife and Sonoff on eWelink - exactly the same type of device but they use their own software/server link to the www. They don't need to be "on" to work, they must just be connected to power, ie - the device must sense the power when in standby i suppose. Been using them for a couple of years and never had a failure on anyone.... not that i am aware off 🤞

The programmed on/off times stay on the pcb of this little device, you can plug it out for a day and when you plug it back in your on/off timers is still there. Very helpful little toys that makes life easier!

Get the CBI ASPI Astute Device and install in DB Board// Then Connect S1 to Escom / GRID and S2 to Inverter Load Side or Aux

It is also a Wifi Device so then you can program the other devices based on its status

5 minutes ago, Gidsie said:

Get the CBI ASPI Astute Device and install in DB Board

I was looking at that, but me too stupid to understand what it are do. I think it might solve a problem for me.

My inverter can put out 20A. Now most of that time that is actually enough to run the whole property. We don't consume a lot. The non-backed up circuits are really the sub-db in the outbuildings. So that's washing machine, pool pump and the guest geyser. So I thought about a switch to move the sub DB over to the backed up circuits. This was very nice to have when there was load shedding because what we did do was run extension leads all over the place and the older you get the more dangerous this becomes. So I thought of having a switch to throw, but with some way of resetting itself because if it's left to me I will forget.

If that ASPI does what I hope it does, then it can switch the sub-DB over to the inverter when grid goes down and reset when grid comes back up. Or I can use it to switch over on a sunny day, knowing that it will reset at a certain time because that's what I programmed it to do and so I can set and forget.

This is not a perfect plan, but it's a good starting point. If that device will do that.

If that ASPI does what I hope it does, then it can switch the sub-DB over to the inverter when grid goes down and reset when grid comes back up. Or I can use it to switch over on a sunny day, knowing that it will reset at a certain time because that's what I programmed it to do and so I can set and forget.

4 hours ago, Bobster. said:

This is not a perfect plan, but it's a good starting point. If that device will do that.

This can be a starting point for the criteria you indicated.

The output of the smart switch can be set to be always on when the grid is on. This mean the relay coil is energised. When energised it is connected to the grid. If grid is off then the inverter backup supplies the load.

When grid is on you have control in manual to switch the relay off for operating from the inverter. Here you can set up some timers for using the daily sun period to reduce grid use.

During foul weather you can alter the time slots for bad days like yesterday to only stay on the grid side.

In this mode when the APP shows off it will be when you have grid but loads are fed from the inverter.

7 hours ago, Bobster. said:

If that still happens with the smart controller, if the controller wakes up when the power is restored, realises that it's 11:00, realises/is told that now it should be in an on state and goes to on, then effectively nothing changes.

One can set the "Device Restart Status" to one of three settings: "Off", "On", or "Remember last status", so in this case you could just set it to "Off" to not switch on when it wakes up again if that is what you want.

Note on the normal CBI Astute, It NEEDS Internet to work. Schedules are stored on the cloud.

If your network / internet is down / iffy, it will not switch.

This is different to the sonoff devices, which can store upto 8 schedules on the device itself.

https://cbi-lowvoltage.co.za/faqs?field_product_reference_tid=Astute%20Smart%20Device&combine=&page=1

No, Astute Smart Devices will not work properly without an internet connection. The device stores all schedules in the cloud, so it needs the internet to set and run the schedules. It can only be switched manually without internet connectivity.

Edited November 5, 2025Nov 5 by abd7

3 hours ago, HennieL said:

One can set the "Device Restart Status" to one of three settings: "Off", "On", or "Remember last status", so in this case you could just set it to "Off" to not switch on when it wakes up again if that is what you want.

I don't think it will do. Currently with the push button thing I have controlling the pool, th timer itself will change states at 10:00 (in my example) and when the grid comes back the pump will start running. Unless it comes back after the programmed off time because the timer will have changed state again.

I don't want the pump running outside the window I give it. Then it will chew up the battery over night.

But I see a way to work with the Astute switch: just program lots of ON events. One each hour until of time (which never changes, so is programmed once). So it will turn on eventually. If I get bored I'll program an event every half hour. If I get really bored then I'll write some code and really screw it up.

5 hours ago, Scorp007 said:

If that ASPI does what I hope it does, then it can switch the sub-DB over to the inverter when grid goes down and reset when grid comes back up. Or I can use it to switch over on a sunny day, knowing that it will reset at a certain time because that's what I programmed it to do and so I can set and forget.

This can be a starting point for the criteria you indicated.

The output of the smart switch can be set to be always on when the grid is on. This mean the relay coil is energised. When energised it is connected to the grid. If grid is off then the inverter backup supplies the load.

When grid is on you have control in manual to switch the relay off for operating from the inverter. Here you can set up some timers for using the daily sun period to reduce grid use.

During foul weather you can alter the time slots for bad days like yesterday to only stay on the grid side.

In this mode when the APP shows off it will be when you have grid but loads are fed from the inverter.

Thank you. I appreciate that diagram and the trouble you went to.

I need to work through that. But I'm not going to implement it. The older I get the less I find smoke amusing.

7 hours ago, Scorp007 said:

If that ASPI does what I hope it does, then it can switch the sub-DB over to the inverter when grid goes down and reset when grid comes back up. Or I can use it to switch over on a sunny day, knowing that it will reset at a certain time because that's what I programmed it to do and so I can set and forget.

This can be a starting point for the criteria you indicated.

The output of the smart switch can be set to be always on when the grid is on. This mean the relay coil is energised. When energised it is connected to the grid. If grid is off then the inverter backup supplies the load.

When grid is on you have control in manual to switch the relay off for operating from the inverter. Here you can set up some timers for using the daily sun period to reduce grid use.

During foul weather you can alter the time slots for bad days like yesterday to only stay on the grid side.

In this mode when the APP shows off it will be when you have grid but loads are fed from the inverter.

You have a relay for live and another for neutral. So the grid neutral & inverter neutral are not tied. You also seem to show the L & N outputs of the switch tied together.

1 minute ago, Bobster. said:

You have a relay for live and another for neutral. So the grid neutral & inverter neutral are not tied. You also seem to show the L & N outputs of the switch tied together.

Yes I am using double contacts of say a 10A 8 pin relay to give you up to 20A continues load. Welded or shorted contacts does not short L and N. I just feel it's safer.

Yes the 2 x N are never connected.

Just now, Scorp007 said:

Yes I am using double contacts of say a 10A 8 pin relay to give you up to 20A continues load. Welded or shorted contacts does not short L and N. I just feel it's safer.

Yes the 2 x N are never connected.

I used to have a relay that was engaged by a timer so that the timer could control a geyser that drew more than the timer could handle.

Please tell me that modern relays don't make as much noise. Apart from the clack as it connected, there was a 50Hz hum the whole time the relay was engaged.

2 minutes ago, Bobster. said:

I used to have a relay that was engaged by a timer so that the timer could control a geyser that drew more than the timer could handle.

Please tell me that modern relays don't make as much noise. Apart from the clack as it connected, there was a 50Hz hum the whole time the relay was engaged.

My relays have no hum. I have also used some Smitt 4 pole relays where each contact is rated 10A and used all 4 in parallel to switch a geyser via a Sonoff. Currently have my Deye grid input this way. My grid is off about 90% of the time. I did have it on a few hours yesterday with the thick clouds the whole day. This way I don't have to draw 50W 24/7 from the grid.

If there is hum it could be that the shading coil on the armature is loose.

7 minutes ago, Bobster. said:

Edited November 5, 2025Nov 5 by Scorp007

On 2025/11/05 at 8:58 PM, Bobster. said:

But I see a way to work with the Astute switch: just program lots of ON events. One each hour until of time (which never changes, so is programmed once). So it will turn on eventually. If I get bored I'll program an event every half hour. If I get really bored then I'll write some code and really screw it up.

That will certainly work, and it's no big deal to set the various "on" times. I have two time slots set on mine (for the geyser) - first "on" times at 04:00 and 04:05, and "off" at 05:00. Second time slot "on" at 10:30 and 10:35 (batteries fully charged), and "off" at 15:30. As stated above, with only two "on" times 5 minutes apart, the controller switches on about 85% of the time. Interestingly, it has never failed to switch off, even though I have only one "off" time programmed for each cycle... If you want to try this I suggest you program your "on" times every 30 minutes, and only have one "off" time programmed at your actual off time - although having a second "off" five minutes later would not cause any harm, and would be easy insurance.