Brunt Blind Engine - Smart Motorized Blind, Make Your Existing Blind To Smart, Automated, Motorized Blind, Connected Home, Home Automation, Compatible with Alexa

I was a bit cautious about buying this product, as it is pretty expensive. I took the plunge and ordered one to try. Installation was pretty straight forward, although I tried the gear marked as ball chain, as that is what my blinds have, and that didn't work great so I switched it to the cord gear, which works so much better. The first blind I used it for was approximately 1.6m wide day/night blind in my bedroom. It worked great opening and closing with no issues. It took a few attempts to get the highest and lowest level as with the day/nights blinds its tricky to get the lines to line up correctly, but got there with persistence!Integration with Alexa was easy enough and I use the Routines on the Alexa app to set automatic opening and closing times, as you can schedule using sunrise and sunset, as apose just times, which works really well.I have since moved my blind engine into my bay window in my lounge and have now purchased a further 4, as my bay has 5 individual blinds, and they work perfect, so far!I love these and everybody comments on how great they are when they see them work. Yes they are pretty expensive but they look great, feel solid and its a bit of peace of mind to know that if I am out the blinds will close themselves to offer that bit of added security!I would definitely recommend these and I will probably get more, for the rest of the house, in time as they aren't cheap!

I've had this for over a year now. It was fairly easy to set up. The rope needs to be tight. It must be screwed to the wall, there's no way the sticky pads would work. When installed correctly it seems pretty powerful.When it works it's fine, however after a couple of days it loses connection - the buttons on the device work but it doesn't work from the app and doesn't work on the configured schedule. Initially I thought this problem was due to it being distant from my wireless router, so I moved the router closer to the blind, but this made no difference.I've contacted Brunt support several times, both on the chat window on the website and via email, but they don't respond. When they do, they ask for the serial number then don't respond any further. As I've had it for a while now I'm stuck with it.I've worked around the problems by plugging it into a plug-in timer which switches it off and on again in the middle of the night. Most of the time it seems to be able to keep running for 24 hours without losing connection.

I purchased one of these and was pretty impressed with its ability to control the blinds via schedule or automated through a smart assistant (Google Home worked pretty well, Alexa still a work in progress)Hey google open the sitting room blinds 50%, worked perfectly. Routine configured within Alexa custom commands to Alexa open the sitting room blinds, she says hey google open the sitting room bly ends 50%, and it worked too.I didn't want to use the half baked welcome and goodbye commands.All was good for a couple of weeks, so I decided I'd get another.Another week or so passes and the first one stops working on the schedule, and no longer responds to voice control.The app shows this as disconnected, no problem, I'll just follow the simple enough re-connection setup. Or so I think.Tried the method of resetting blind length, countless time tried removing and re-adding, but nothing worked.I should also mention that each time you try this you need to set the full open and closed blind, so you have to wait for the system to wind fully up (and down again after it fails) then 70 seconds for it to fail, then remove the device and restart the process hoping it will connect.Now the first device cannot be added back as it never connects back to the wifi and as such removes all ability to automate the blinds.The blind still functions correctly via the buttons on the device, but I didn't buy this for that.Anyway, while I was trying to fix the first one, the second has started to do the same thing, but I've not tried to fix that.They are both on different wifi connections, and I've tried connecting the first to other wifi networks with no success.Internet is fine, network is fine, DHCP works correctly, address pool isn't full, other devices connect without issue, the network is not on 5ghz, anyway they were connecting but just decided to stop.All this said, I've not contacted the support desk yet, but I may update the score if they can assist with this.Edit - Emailed with support. They were helpful enough, but it was a lot of redoing the same steps and suggestions of reset network config on previously working phone. Anyway, the app updated this week and while the devices didn't connect again straight away they both appeared to work again the next day (after re-adding the first) Not sure if something else happened in the home as everything has been moved around for Christmas. Anyway the both devices are now working, so everything is good again. Will update if this changes.When the system works, (and I will assume it is working for good now) it's pretty good, some slippage on one blind, but I think I need to fix the mount using the screws, don't think the adhesive strips gives enough purchase over time.Changing score up to 4 as it does what is expected again. Losing 1 for slippage and limited Alexa integration

I found this to be easy to install as well as moderately easy to link up to my phone and set up with alexa. The motor is strong and it is not too noisy. Even if you use the screws to fix it to the wall I would use the sticky pad to act as a sound damper otherwise the wall will resonate the sound and make it noisy. I did not want to have unsightly cables so I dismantled it and soldered the wires internally. I made a hole in the rear of the casing and passed the power cable through the wall to the rear of the kitchen cabinet where there is a socket. Don't attempt this unless you are confident and I will also add that it will invalidate your guarantee I would assume... The command via alexa is something like "alexa, ask brunt to play goodbye" which is ridiculous. I found a simple workaround to this. Via the Alexa app, I set up a Routine whereby I say "Alexa, open the blind" and linked that command to the Brunt, and the blind opens! You can even set up an alexa routine to open the blinds by a certain percentage. All in all a great product which looks to me like it is built to last but time will tell. I am about to order another one or possibly more.