Ring doorbell question

bazzabear

bazzabear

bazzabear

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I was considering (again!) getting a Ring doorbell. But checking the listing, a question occurs.

We currently have a wired doorbell, and a chime unit inside the hallway. I could have sworn that when I'd previously read up on how this works, the doorbell could use the existing chime. But the listing now says that you have to bypass the existing chime.

Has something changed in the set-up? or am I just misremembering?

And what does bypassing the chime consist of? I had though it would be a simple case of detaching two wires from the existing button, and attaching them to the new Ring unit.

Thanks for any advice!
 
I have fitted a couple of the Ring Wired doorbells and they are easy if there is existing wiring.
Find where your chime is and remove the cover. Every chime is different (Hilly's link above or just google your chime model number)
Then unscrew 2 wires and connect them together with the supplied Wago connector.

Now remove the old bell and use the base plate of the Ring bell to mark 2 holes and drill them and fit the base plate.
Now screw the wire to the back of the doorbell (either wire to either screw, there is no polarity)
If you connected the correct wires at the chime, the doorbell should light up.
Now just fit the outer cover and secure with the little security screw at the bottom.
Refit the chime cover.
Job done.
Now just set it up on the Ring app.

Couple of pointers.
Make sure there is a decent wifi signal the the door, at my daughters, i didn't and had to fit an old router as an access point in the room nearby.
Some of the more expensive Ring doorbell need more power and you may have to change the doorbell transformer (usually situated in or near the MCU)for a stronger one.
 
They had 50% off vouchers available yesterday, so I have one coming, and expected tomorrow.

Quick question - do I need to switch the electric off to the bell? Or will the voltage in the wires from chime to doorbell be so low it's unnecessary?
 
bazzabear said:
They had 50% off vouchers available yesterday, so I have one coming, and expected tomorrow.

Quick question - do I need to switch the electric off to the bell? Or will the voltage in the wires from chime to doorbell be so low it's unnecessary?
Click to expand...

I think they're 12v to the bell with a low current, so in theory you might be OK but frankly it's never worth the risk.
 
Yeah, I do agree. If someone was going to tell me with certainty I might have considered it. But I will take the sensible option!

Just keeping my fingers crossed it will work the existing chime. I don't really see any reason it wouldn't.

But if not, we've an Alexa enabled Sonos 1 in the kitchen. It's just that what volume it is set to tends to vary wildly depending on what it was last used for.
 
All successfully fitted!
I now see that the reason why you have to bypass the chime (and therefore lose it's ability to ring) is because the doorbell needs the power. This means I probably should have paid the £5 extra to get the Ring Chime itself.

The other option is to get my Sonos One to play the doorbell. But I've enabled Ring successfully on the Alexa app, and can see the camera - but the only Echo device it lists is a fire tablet. Any ideas why it would be failing to recognise that the Sonos can be used for this?
 
bazzabear said:
All successfully fitted!
I now see that the reason why you have to bypass the chime (and therefore lose it's ability to ring) is because the doorbell needs the power. This means I probably should have paid the £5 extra to get the Ring Chime itself.

The other option is to get my Sonos One to play the doorbell. But I've enabled Ring successfully on the Alexa app, and can see the camera - but the only Echo device it lists is a fire tablet. Any ideas why it would be failing to recognise that the Sonos can be used for this?
Click to expand...
I tried and failed to get our Sonos One playing Ring alerts through our Ring Wired (which we love by the way; so cheap and much more useful than I thought it would be).

In the end I settled for getting my watch, phone, tablets etc. playing it through the Ring app. There are plenty of devices around the house such that we never miss it.

I might still get a Chime though.
 
OK, oddness has occurred!

I did some googling, which suggested exactly what you said - you can't get a Sonos device to be the 'announcement' device.

However (and this might be useful for you) instead you can set up a routine in Alexa telling her that when the doorbell is pushed, she should play a sound on the Sonos.

I set up that routine, and played it, and it worked perfectly - doorbell noise. (It might even be possible to add another action which sets the volume of the device first, which would be ideal.

Now the really odd bit. I went and pressed the doorbell. It played the routine. Perfect. And then Alexa's voice said "There's somebody at the front door." That wasn't in the routine!

So I turned off the routine, pressed the doorbell again - and Alexa tells me there's someone at the door, through the Sonos one. Despite it not having let me pick the Sonos One as an announcement device. So I don't understand at all.
 
Checking the Alexa settings, the only device appearing as available for announcements is a fire tablet (my daughters) and this was selected. But the announcements were not appearing on her tablet, only being heard on the Sonos. Unchecked that device, and they're not heard anywhere. Re-checked ... and they're still not being heard anywhere. Whatever confusing thing was happening, has now stopped. Very weird.

Anyway, so I have gone back to using a routine as described above, and that works perfectly. You can set the volume before playing the sound too.
 
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