Tuya devices not connecting correctly after Wi-Fi outage in mesh network

Help! Community Support
#1

On the (fortunately rare) occasions when my mesh Wi-Fi network goes down this plays havoc with my Wi-Fi connected Tuya devices. As the system resets, the Tuya devices often latch on the first part of the network that comes back online, even if the signal is stupidly low. Even when the mesh is rebuilt, the Tuya devices stubbornly remain connected to the distant weak source, and so frequently don’t work particularly well. I have devices positioned next to a mesh extender that if connected when the Wi-Fi is fully operational will record signal strengths of -40db (which is strong). But after a network outage they can latch on to a distant weak part of the network and show signal strengths of -85dB (extremely low), even after the nearby mesh extender finally comes back on line. Annoyingly, even switching them off and back on again has no effect as they seem to remember the source they last connected to.

As this happens with a variety of devices it seems an inbuilt design flaw for Wi-Fi-connected Tuya devices. The only way I can find to fix things is to remove the device from Smart Life and reconnect, which then finds the strongest signal, but this is incredibly inconvenient. As far as I’m aware there is no way to reset the devices remotely, or to force them to reconnect to a stronger Wi-Fi signal (as this is a mesh network, there is a single SSID).

Any suggestions?

1 Like
#2

In my home setup, I have 8 acccess points (not really a mesh setup, as all my APs are wired to a central switch connected to the internet router)

I have configured two SSIDs in each AP: one of them is the same for all APs (MyHome) while the other one is unique to each AP (Garage, Kitchen, Garden, …)

I have configured each Tuya device to connect to the specific SSID of the nearest AP. Other devices which can move around the house (phones, computers, tablets, robot vacuum, etc) use the common SSID (MyHome)

If your mesh system allows for something like this, it is a solution to avoid devices connecting to a distant AP.

3 Likes
#3

Hi @teknofilo ,
Many thanks indeed for this and I think that this is the route to go. Unfortunately, my system (a Sky Q network, using Sky extenders) doesn’t let me configure guest networks.

However, each extender (I have 4 of these) does have an ethernet socket and I think I will be able to do the same thing by adding a wired Wi-Fi access point to each. The relatively inexpensive TP-link TL-WA860RE N300 range extender can be configured to broadcast a 2.4 GHz signal that I can then name with a unique SSID. This would be ideal for Tuya and I could then explicitly link each device to the nearest slave network as you describe. If the main router goes down then each slave network will only come back when its specific extender is functioning properly.

Thank you!

2 Likes