Power plug on washer

[trickyrick]

I have a plug on a washer that monitors power.
The thought is when power stays at 0 watts for 15 seconds the load is done
and I have a light go on
For some reason, the odd time the washer draws from 3 to 12 watts all on its own (not sure what it’s doing) so the light goes on prematurely.
Any ideas on how to stop this without using other sensors like motion

[Paul1964]

I’ve managed to achieve this, but its a bit trial & error and probably varies between different machines and power points.

If you look at the power usage, you’ll probably see it never goes to 0 watts. I logged the usage to a spreadsheet before going for “remains less than 3w for 5 mins” This may not work for all programmes e.g if it holds for 10 mins doing nothing before the programme advances.

I have a similar piston for the dishwasher which is more complex as it has a 10 min period in the middle of the cycle when the power drops to the same level as when its finished. Increasing the wait can work (e.g to 15 mins) but then you don’t get a notification until 15 mins after its finished. This might not be a problem to you, however I wanted to make it more immediate!

[eibyer]

I also use a power monitor for the washer. I set a boolean washer_on to true if power stays over 8W for 4 minutes and washer_on is false. If power drops down to below 8W for 11 minutes and washer_on is true, then the wash is done, do the variable reset and flip a switch for the nag notification.

You’ll have to do some trial and error like @Paul1964 mentioned.

[Paul1964]

This is my piston, it has a few extras. The global is set so a separate piston can remind you when you walk into the laundry. It also covers resetting variables by powering off the socket.