Hi, I’m having issues still with our VZW31-SN Red Series Switches. There are about 35 switches. They will work fine for 3-5 days, then suddenly one or two switches (seems to be random) will show as disconnected (Dead) in Home Assistant/zwave JS UI and in turn I notice zwave automations have not run because they are stopping at this particular switch.
Annoying workaround: If I go to the switch an push a button on it, it seems to wake it up, and it will resume connection to HomeAssistant/zwave.
I have a Aeotec Zwave Z-Stick 7. Recently I updated the Z-Stick 7 firmware to V7.21.6 in hopes this would improve but the issue still occurs. The firmware on the VZW31-SN is 1.02. I see there is beta version 1.04 available but I’m hesitant to test that.
Do you have other devices in the Z-Wave mesh or is it only VZW31s? The reason I ask is that there’s a known firmware issue with 700 series Z-Wave adapters where they have a bunch of mesh stability issues. I think upgrading to 800 series is the only way to fix that if that’s the problem you are running into. And if you do do that, the Nabu Casa made ZWA-2 adapter works exceptionally well.
Ok. I didn’t realize there were ongoing issues with the 700 series z-wave adapters. Yes. I do have a variety of z-wave devices on the network. Like zooz power switches, locks, etc… Thank you for pointing that out. I could try ordering the Nabu Casa made ZWA-2 adapter although not sure if I can get it in Canada.
Yes. Only problems with VZW31-SN. Other devices have not had issues with connection. I don’t think I have any 800 series devices. Just 700 series or older. I just ordered the Nabu Casa made ZWA-2 adapter so hopefully that works. I’m also upgrading the firmware to 1.04 beta to see if that helps.
Fingers crossed that it fixes it for you. I’ve personally not had any issues since switching to the Nabu Casa adapter myself. Though I used to have issues with all sorts of devices freezing up like you described, not just the Inovelli ones.
Here is what it looks like when it occurs in zwave js UI. It just shows “Dead”. Then if I go just press a button on the inovelli switch, it starts responding to ping in zwave JS ui. It definitely seems like a inovelli bug because I don’t have issues with other zwave devices disconnecting ever.
Here are the logs from controller around time it seems to have gone into Dead state:
2025-12-17 16:24:24.968 INFO Z-WAVE: [Node 043] Value updated: 50-0-value-65537 39.44 => 39.44
2025-12-17 16:24:32.280 CNTRLR [Node 043] failed to decode the message, retrying with SPAN extension...
2025-12-17 16:24:32.442 DRIVER Dropping message with invalid payload
2025-12-17 16:24:42.339 INFO APP: ::ffff:127.0.0.1 GET /health/zwave 301 162 - 0.384 ms
2025-12-17 16:24:44.394 INFO Z-WAVE: [Node 010] Metadata updated: 50-0-value-66049
2025-12-17 16:24:44.394 INFO Z-WAVE: [Node 010] Value updated: 50-0-value-66049 2.3 => 2.9
2025-12-17 16:24:48.181 CNTRLR [Node 002] The node did not respond after 3 attempts, it is presumed dead
2025-12-17 16:24:48.181 CNTRLR [Node 002] The node is now dead.
2025-12-17 16:24:48.182 INFO Z-WAVE: [Node 002] Is now dead
2025-12-17 16:24:48.184 ERROR Z-WAVE-SERVER: The node did not acknowledge the command (ZW0204)
ZWaveError: The node did not acknowledge the command (ZW0204)
at Driver.sendMessage (file:///opt/node_modules/zwave-js/src/lib/driver/Driver.ts:7174:23)
at Driver.sendCommandInternal (file:///opt/node_modules/zwave-js/src/lib/driver/Driver.ts:7370:28)
at Driver.sendSupervisedCommand (file:///opt/node_modules/zwave-js/src/lib/driver/Driver.ts:7416:27)
at Driver.sendCommand (file:///opt/node_modules/zwave-js/src/lib/driver/Driver.ts:7471:30)
at Proxy.set (file:///opt/node_modules/@zwave-js/cc/src/cc/ConfigurationCC.ts:757:20)
at Proxy.set (file:///opt/node_modules/@zwave-js/cc/src/cc/ConfigurationCC._validateArgs.ts:38:30)
at Proxy.<anonymous> (file:///opt/node_modules/@zwave-js/cc/src/cc/ConfigurationCC.ts:512:30)
at ZWaveNode.setValue (file:///opt/node_modules/zwave-js/src/lib/node/Node.ts:562:39)
at NodeMessageHandler.handle (file:///opt/node_modules/@zwave-js/server/dist-esm/lib/node/message_handler.js:23:43)
at Client.receiveMessage (file:///opt/node_modules/@zwave-js/server/dist-esm/lib/server.js:134:100)
2025-12-17 16:24:48.429 INFO Z-WAVE: [Node 003] Value updated: 112-0-13 80 => 35
2025-12-17 16:24:48.670 INFO Z-WAVE: [Node 005] Value updated: 112-0-13 80 => 35
2025-12-17 16:24:48.914 INFO Z-WAVE: [Node 006] Value updated: 112-0-13 80 => 35
2025-12-17 16:24:49.159 INFO Z-WAVE: [Node 007] Value updated: 112-0-13 80 => 35
2025-12-17 16:24:49.400 INFO Z-WAVE: [Node 021] Value updated: 112-0-13 80 => 35
2025-12-17 16:24:49.647 INFO Z-WAVE: [Node 019] Value updated: 112-0-13 80 => 35
2025-12-17 16:24:49.889 INFO Z-WAVE: [Node 018] Value updated: 112-0-13 80 => 35
2025-12-17 16:24:50.131 INFO Z-WAVE: [Node 020] Value updated: 112-0-13 80 => 35
2025-12-17 16:24:50.379 INFO Z-WAVE: [Node 012] Value updated: 112-0-13 80 => 35
2025-12-17 16:24:50.627 INFO Z-WAVE: [Node 013] Value updated: 112-0-13 80 => 35
2025-12-17 16:24:50.961 INFO Z-WAVE: [Node 038] Value updated: 112-0-13 80 => 35
2025-12-17 16:24:51.205 INFO Z-WAVE: [Node 008] Value updated: 112-0-14 80 => 35
2025-12-17 16:24:51.448 INFO Z-WAVE: [Node 011] Value updated: 112-0-14 80 => 35
2025-12-17 16:24:51.780 INFO Z-WAVE: [Node 015] Value updated: 112-0-14 80 => 35
2025-12-17 16:24:52.172 INFO Z-WAVE: [Node 014] Value updated: 112-0-14 80 => 35
2025-12-17 16:24:52.414 INFO Z-WAVE: [Node 009] Value updated: 112-0-14 80 => 35
2025-12-17 16:24:52.662 INFO Z-WAVE: [Node 010] Value updated: 112-0-14 80 => 35
2025-12-17 16:24:52.907 INFO Z-WAVE: [Node 017] Value updated: 112-0-14 80 => 35
Then after I press the switch it comes back online with this: 2025-12-17 20:36:14.569 INFO Z-WAVE: [Node 002] Has returned from the dead
