Newbie question: How to replace a faulty Z-wave Donexon Thermostat head without losing a scene

[VISYSCO 0]

My neighbours have asked for help replacing a faulty Z-wave Donexon Thermostat head with a new one without having to adjust the scenes and/or nodes.
According to various sources, this should be possible using the Replace option.
However, no matter what I do, I cannot find a Replace option anywhere.
Searching the Fibaro website/forum has not yielded any results.
The supplier/installer of the HC3 no longer exists, so I thought, how hard can it be, and decided to do it myself.
Well... as a Fibaro newbie, I am bit disappointed.
I did manage to connect/include the new thermostat and also to remove it again, but I don't know how to integrate it into the old existing scheme.
I can't exclude the old thermostat either because it no longer works, and I'm afraid that if I force its removal using the 'force removal' option, I'll also lose the existing scenes.

It's an HC3 with software version: 5.200.13.

I'd really appreciate some information and help for this Fibaro newbie...

Edited March 8 by VISYSCO
addition in Title

[Sankotronic 2,370]

Hi @VISYSCO,

 

Before removing faulty Donexon thermostat write down its name and ID number and also check all parameters settings. It is also recommended to check "Climate" section and see in what heating (climate) zone was located.

Check also what scenes are related (triggered) by this thermostat.

After that you can remove it forcibly  from the gateway. Removing thermostat will not remove any scene or other device.

Include new thermostat and then compare its parameters with ones from the old one and adjust if necessary.

Last step is to go to scenes and replace old thermostat ID number with the new one and save changes so they start working with new thermostat.

Note that if scene is in LUA format then you will have to check both left side DECLARATIONS (Conditions/Triggers) and right side ACTIONS and replace all references to old thermostat with those of new thermostat.

 

After this it should start working.

 

10 hours ago, VISYSCO said:

According to various sources, this should be possible using the Replace option.
However, no matter what I do, I cannot find a Replace option anywhere.
Searching the Fibaro website/forum has not yielded any results.

 

I wonder what sources did you checked, but they where obviously not related to z-wave devices. There is no "replacement" button on such devices. To replace faulty z-wave device, it must be first deleted from the system and then new device added using provided manuals. After that user must change all scenes to work with new device since its ID number will be different.

 

10 hours ago, VISYSCO said:

Well... as a Fibaro newbie, I am bit disappointed.

 

Well, as you are Fibaro newbie, I suggest that you first do some homework and get at least basic knowledge about z-wave, Zigbee and home automation in general. After that you will probably still be a bit disappointed, but at least much less because you will know what and how to do and what are the limitations of the Fibaro system you decided to use for your home automation.

 

BTW - I'm with Fibaro since 2015 and despite some trouble I encountered during building my home automation and some limitations I'm still happy with it.  

 

[VISYSCO 0]

Thanks for your help , I am going to try and follow your advice to forcibly remove the thermostat head.
Including the new one is something I already did and worked.
Changing the ID number is something I have to try .

Regarding sources : I found something called replace but that was possibly for the HC2 and in general on some Z-Wave info but I realized that was for HomeAssistant, so my fault.

 

Regarding Fibaro newbie: I don't own a Fibaro HC3, I am trying to help my neighbours because they have an HC 3 installed 3 years ago by a local company.
That company went out of business but not before they messed up this installation.

One of my neighbours is having MS and quite dependent on Fibaro for lighting, heating, automatic doors, etc.
And they have asked me if I could help with the defective thermostat head.

I am not a complete newbie to home automation, I am using another system so that's maybe the reason I found the Fibaro a bit disapointing because it is not intuitive.
Unknown makes unloved, right?🤪