A few years ago I built a Home Assistant server to capture information from my various temperature sensors and my Emporia Energy Monitors. I added a longer range 433 radio to capture all the Lacrosse & Acurite sensors and a longer range Bluetooth radio to capture a bunch of cheap Bluetooth indoor LCD temp sensors.
Late last year I decided to rebuild my HA server on a faster Raspberry PI. Once that was completed I started thinking about how to better manage the temps that I wanted to monitor.
While the Lacrosse sensors "work" they just aren't very reliable. They don't have a unique signature. If the HA system loses contact for awhile and re-establishes it a new device is created. This is very much not ideal.
I recently found out about the Switch Bot Indoor / Outdoor sensors. These are Bluetooth, have a unique address and can be easily added to HA. I bought 6, probably really only needed 4 but they were relatively cheap. Once connected to HA I now know what sensor is what.
This started me thinking about decommissioning the Lacrosse sensors. The problem is that one of the Lacrosse devices I bought is a nice display that shows 3 of the sensors, plus time and temp at the display location. The problem being that I can't guarantee that the sensors it displays are mine and the ones I think they are.
With that in mind, I bought a few Cheap Yellow Displays (2.8 inch) with an ESP32. Gemini helped me (with a LOT of back & forth) write a working config that connected to HA using ESPHome. I decided the display was too small.
I then bought a CrowPanel 7" ESP32 display that more closely matched the size of my existing temp display. Gemini could not figure out a config after 20 or so tries. I then decided to switch to Claude. Claude hit a working config on the first try. I then worked with Claude to refine the display.
This thing works great. I was able to combine a bunch of different temperature sensors on the screen. I then decided to create multiple pages that I would be able to switch to just by touching the screen. This gives me the ability to show a whole bunch of temp sensors and the Emporia sensors all on an easy to read display so that my wife can look at things. It even shows the Date & Time as well as the 4 day forecast.
This thing works great. I was able to combine a bunch of different temperature sensors on the screen. I then decided to create multiple pages that I would be able to switch to just by touching the screen. This gives me the ability to show a whole bunch of temp sensors and the Emporia sensors all on an easy to read display so that my wife can look at things. It even shows the Date & Time as well as the 4 day forecast.
Next up will be to get a 3D printer so I can create a case for the display and holders for the Switch Bot sensors so I can mount them outside. Once I have those, I can get rid of all the Lacrosse sensors.
I haven't hooked up all the sensors yet, but here is a picture of it.
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