Hi! I would like to show a little DIY project I did lately to enhance the Z-Wave receiving possibilities of the power meter device from Aeon Labs (DSB28-ZWEU E2). The device is located in the electrical distribution box which is made of steel.
I put a repeater in it and it worked for months flawlessly, but since 2 weeks it is no more integrated in the Z-Wave network (deleting and reincusion, manually mesh rebuild didn't work). (Be careful, this device is working with 230 Volts, I am an electrical engineer and know what I am doing. Only let professionals do this work!) So I opened the device and remove the internal antenna and mount an external into it: Dismantled device with the internal antenna To make an external antenna a GND pin is needed for the shield of the Koax cable. The cable is taken from an old external WiFi antenna. I isolated the shield with a 'shrinking tube' to build the antenna it is important to remove the outer shield weave exactly about 86 mm (which is lamda/4 of 868MHz) My first thought was to drill a hole in the steelbox to get the antenna outside of the box. But I don't like the idea, because the Box is located at my porch at the main entrance of my house -so everyone would see the ugly antenna... So I shove the 80 cm long antenna into the electro tube which leads the lines into the house. This works since 3 days perfect and I will report in the next few weeks if it is still working. I think this solution will work with every Z-Wave device (also with battery powered ones). Sometimes it could be a matter of a few zentimeters if a device is reaching the Z-Wave network and is working or not.