Portacool APEX

A Home Assistant custom integration for controlling Portacool APEX evaporative coolers using Portacool’s cloud backend (REST + Firebase Realtime Database).

This integration is UI-configured only (no YAML).

Unofficial integration — not affiliated with or endorsed by Portacool.

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What's working today

Controls

• Power (switch)
• Fan Mode (select) — Off / 10% / 20% / 40% / 70% / 100%
• Pump Mode (select) — Off / Eco / Manual 1–5 / Max
  • Safety: Pump control is disabled when the Water Tank Empty alert is active.
• Timer Mode:.(select) - Off / 30m / 1h / 2h / 4h / 8h

State & telemetry (sensors)

• Timer Remaining (sensor) — countdown derived from TimerExpiry
• Temperatures (sensors)
  • Ambient Temperature (DP3)
  • Exit Temperature (DP4)
  • Internal Component Temperature (DP23)
  • Relative Humidity (DP24)
• Calculated Airflow (CFM) (sensor) — DP7 (empirically correlated)
• Max Airflow % (sensor) — DP7 scaled vs FAN_CFM_MAX
• Input Voltage (sensor) — DP31/DP32 (best available)
• Alert category sensors (sensors)
  • Overall Status
  • Fan / Pump / Water / Temperature / Voltage status
  • Louvers status is hidden on non-louver models (see “Model support”)

Water

• Water Alert (sensor) — Empty / Low / Overfill (from alerts)
• Water Level (sensor) — derived from DP5 (1–5 bars → % scale)

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Model support

The integration should work across the APEX line for the features above.

Louvers

• APEX 500 / 700: hardware includes louvers; louver control datapoints are not implemented yet.
• APEX 1200 / 2000 / 4000: no louvers; louver-related status is hidden.

If you own a louver-capable model and can provide captures (datapoints + invoke-action payloads), louver control support can be added.

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Installation (HACS)

1. Open HACS → Integrations
2. ⋮ → Custom repositories
3. Add repository:
   • https://github.com/JCSharpIII/ha-portacool-apex
   • Category: Integration
4. Install Portacool APEX
5. Restart Home Assistant

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Setup

1. Settings → Devices & Services → Add Integration
2. Search for Portacool APEX
3. Sign in with your Portacool credentials
4. The integration discovers your devices and names the entry from the API (e.g., APEX 1200 (PACA12001A1A))

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How it works

• Commands: POST https://api.services.portacool.com/device-api/devices/invoke-action
• Device discovery: GET /device-api/devices/my
• Alerts: POST /device-api/devices/alerts/latest
• Realtime state: Firebase RTDB (app-authenticated)
  • The integration retrieves a Portacool “firebase custom token”, exchanges it for a Firebase idToken, and reads RTDB nodes for:
    • /users/<uid>/<uniqueId>/datapoints
    • /users/<uid>/<uniqueId>/timer

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Configuration (Options)

Open Settings → Devices & Services → Portacool APEX → Configure.

Typical options:

• Firebase Web API Key (public)
  Only change if Portacool rotates the key and auth starts failing.
• Polling interval
  How often HA refreshes from cloud. (Default value of 8 is recommended.)
• Offline refresh
  Limits cloud refresh when device power is off to reduce traffic. (Default value of 60 is recommended.)

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Dashboard examples

Entities + history + gauge

type: vertical-stack
cards:
  - type: entities
    title: Portacool Apex 1200
    show_header_toggle: false
    entities:
      - entity: switch.apex_1200_power
        name: Power
      - entity: select.apex_1200_fan_mode
        name: Fan Mode
      - entity: select.apex_1200_pump_mode
        name: Pump Mode
      - entity: select.apex_1200_sleep_timer
        name: Timer
      - entity: sensor.apex_1200_timer_remaining
        name: Timer Remaining (s)
      - entity: sensor.apex_1200_water_alert
        name: Alert
    state_color: true
  - type: history-graph
    title: Trends (last 2h)
    hours_to_show: 2
    refresh_interval: 30
    entities:
      - entity: sensor.apex_1200_exit_temperature
        name: Exit
      - entity: sensor.apex_1200_ambient_temperature
        name: Ambient
      - entity: sensor.apex_1200_fan_feedback
        name: Airflow (CFM)
  - type: gauge
    name: Water Level (Estimated)
    entity: sensor.apex_1200_water_level
    min: 0
    max: 110
    needle: false

Notes:

• If you see the device name being prefixed on only one entity in a card, that’s usually the card’s “secondary info” / name resolution behavior; set explicit name: for each entity to keep it consistent.

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Debug logging

logger:
  default: info
  logs:
    custom_components.portacool_apex: debug

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Known limitations

• Cloud-only (no local LAN control)
• Louvers controls not implemented
• Some datapoints remain unknown and are documented as “inferred”

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License

MIT