Honeywell Evohome cannot get Weather info over Vodafone (Blocked address or port?)

[jweaver]

I have an Honeywell Evohome central heating controller, which has a feature where it polls "Weather.com" to get the latest weather (Specifically temperature) and then brings the heating on earlier/later if needed.

Problem is, it doesn't work, atleast not for me..... I tried everything and then stumbled upon another user who also had the same issue and the thing we have in common is Vodafone broadband.

I tried everything and was able to prove the fault was with my connection as when I connect to my neighbours broadband (BT), or my mobile Hotspot (EE) it works first time... But as soon as I go back to my home broadband, it just stops working.

To rule out something on my router, I have put the Evohomes IP into the DMZ and I get the same issue..

I am lead to believe that the Evohome polls this address to get the weather

http://104.209.185.251/WeatherAPIProd/api/weather/current?appKey=b9db7a3d469892e8&language=en-us&loc...

And this appears to work.. But interestingly, I see this in my router periodically:

22.02.2023 23:58:30 lan Info process_request: trans IP GET http://192.131.167.190:49153/Weather...onKey=50104_PC for 7
22.02.2023 23:58:30 lan Info Request (file descriptor 7): GET /WeatherAPIProd/api/weather/forecasts/hourly/15hour?appKey=b9db7a3d469892e8&language=en-us&locationKey=50104_PC HTTP/1.0
22.02.2023 23:58:00 lan Info process_request: trans IP GET http://192.131.167.190:49153/Weather...onKey=50104_PC for 7
22.02.2023 23:58:00 lan Info Request (file descriptor 7): GET /WeatherAPIProd/api/weather/current?appKey=b9db7a3d469892e8&language=en-us&locationKey=50104_PC HTTP/1.0
22.02.2023 23:57:53 lan Info Probing device 20:28:bc:1f:c0:ca IP address 192.168.1.234 on interface br-lan

I have tried to engage Honeywell, but their stance is "it works for us", so I am not sure how I can go about debugging this, let alone fixing it.

Does anyone have any thoughts?

[jweaver]

oh yes.. One thing I forgot to mention.. Out of the blue in the summer I noticed that this was fixed.. (You can tell because the temperature appears on the home screen)...

Nothing changed at my end.. It just started working out of the blue.. I just assumed that perhaps VF had done some kind of upgrade, or perhaps had reviewed their "blacklists".

But a few weeks later, it disappeared again and never came back.. I can't explain this, but it was definitely working for around a month out of the blue.

[Ripshod]

Have a read of this thread:

https://forum.vodafone.co.uk/t5/Other-broadband-queries/Router-Connection-to-Honeywell-Evohome-not-w... 

[jweaver]

Nice find.. I never imagined anyone else would be seeing this as the Evohome is a bit of a niche product

I don't fancy factory resetting the router and having to set everything up again just to get the temperature shown.. Especially as it fixed itself for a month and then failed again, so its obviously a bit flaky.

I might reach out to the original author of that thread and see what his experience has been since.

But if I know its something on the router, I can start poking around now to see if I can make a change which might kick this into life.

Thanks for pointing me in this direction.

[Johnt007]

This is an interesting thread. I have been trying to find a solution as I have the same problem. When first registering the Vodafone WiFi on the Evohome it pulls through the weather temperature. However, from then on it never updates the temperature. 

I have found a temporary solution. If I make my laptop a WiFi HotSpot, then log the Evohome into the laptop it works perfectely and updates at regular intervals. The laptop is connected to the internet via the same VF WiFi channel that does not work with the Evo directly. This problem is repeatable every time. Does anyone have any ideas?

[jweaver]

his is a bonkers co-incidence.. Honeywell wrote to me this week with some suggestions which didn't really help, but in the process of trying them I found a couple of settings on the router which has currently fixed the issue.

Their suggestions focussed around firewalls and ports.. And since I had already put the Evohome in the DMZ this didn't really apply. But i turned off the Firewall globally.. When I was doing this I found the router was really slow so did a bit of research and someone recommended disabling the "Device Fingerprinting" (under Settings -> Configuration) option... I did this which seems to have sped up the routers configuration pages no end.

But to my surprise, my EvoHome now has the temperature on the home screen and the smart features..

I have now gone back and disabled the firewall again and its still working.. And I have now turned Device Fingerprinting back on, just to see if it affects the EvoHome.

If you have the same router as me (THG3000) and still have the issue, perhaps you might want to give this a try and report back?

[jweaver]

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