The task is to automate the control of 6 split aircon units in my house. For historical reasons, they are a wild mix of different makes and ages - Panasonic, Fujitsu, Kelvinator, Stirling and MHI. The goal is to control these units via a home automation system that is hosted locally (instead of cloud-based). Hardware Components I use the ESP8266-based WeMos D1 Mini, which is hooked up with a IR transmitter and receiver to emulate the aircon remote control. For the firmware, I settled on Tasmota , since it was able to support all the makes of aircon units in my house (via IRRemote8266 ). I also played around with ESPHome , but its IR Remote Climate component has more limited aircon support (eg. no Panasonic support). Building the hardware is pretty straightforward. I bought the stock IR transmitter and receiver boards from AliExpress, thinking it would make my job easier (wrong). I also bought a bunch of TSOP34838 IR receivers for comparison. Turns out you don't really need al