Things are moving along nicely, so the next project is putting some smarts into the ceiling fan.
We currently have a completely dumb device, which has a pull chain for speed, and a really poorly designed switch on the side of the fan itself to control direction. With our high cathedral ceiling, it takes standing on a step ladder, and holding a yardstick to throw that small direction switch.
It's a Bowen 52 inch if it makes a difference, although ours has walnut finish blades rather than the nickel ones in that sample on Amazon. As far as I know, it's an AC motor, so I'm not completely out of luck if I decide to keep it and just install a remote.
What I'm looking for is a solution that at a minimum permits control of on/off and the reversible motor from the HE. Speed control would be nice, but it's not a deal breaker. However the reverse control is. Replacing the entire fan is an option, if necessary.
I've got a single modern switch in the wall where I can put a control, although to be honest, I'm expecting that in normal operation I'll just let the HE read the temperature information from the thermostat, and make a decision as to what to do with the fan on the basis of what the HVAC is currently up to.
What worries me about this is that when I see images of the various remotes, I see light control, fan on/off and speed, but I've not seen any hint of a unit that has remote control of the motor direction. Am I completely out of luck here?
It's not very common to find smart controls that handle motor reversal. Typically those are included when the fan ships with the control, which most times is not zigbee or z-wave, but typically RF control. You might be able to create a smart reversal device using maybe the fibaro smart implant relay(the smallest relay I'm aware of) It likely might fit behind the light canopy
That's a little bit of what I was afraid of. And let me guess, all these RF controls are proprietary, and thus become a problem to work with HE.
That's about the direction I'm thinking of going. With an AC motor, I should be able to put a universal fan control in the canopy. Then, depending on what the direction switch is, try and run some small wires to bring those contacts up to the canopy. If it's low voltage, any jumper cable will do, if there's mains on it, I'm probably looking at a length of Romex.
I looked around for the Fibaro Implant found it, so that's one possibility. I also came across this: MHCOZY Zigbee relay. That looks pretty small to me, but I'd have to 3d print an enclosure for it, I don't want a loose circuit board in the same enclosure as mains wiring. That's just not a good idea.
That'll work if it's a SPDT or SPST switch, they make a "dual gang" version of the same device which should be a drop in for a DPDT or DPST switch. Although, I'll need to pay very close attention to what I'm doing if I use the dual gang version, because I won't be able to guarantee that both switches flip over at the same instant.
That's the path I'd be tempted to take and just make a box to put the MHCOZY in the fan-ceiling cover bell. Been really impressed with that little card.
EDIT: BUT WAIT ! Let's remember these AREN'T powered by 120VAC so there's that to deal with up there ! ""Two working voltage: USB 5V or AC/DC 7-32V""
Are you reversing the direction seasonally? I'll assume the answer is yes, and if my assumption is wrong, please disregard. The primary reason that the direction is reversed during the heating season is to avoid the "cool breeze" effect of the fan while still de-stratifying the air in the room. You can usually achieve the same outcome by just leaving the fan on low speed. If your ceilings are as high as mine (and they sound like they might be) you won't be able to feel any air currents and you'll keep that warm air from stagnating way up where it doesn't do anyone any good.
I'm not sure how the directional control works, but that relay device (single relay) looks like it has two outputs (normally open AND normally closed) that are exclusive. Only one can be active at a time. The third terminal would be the 'common' or input terminal. You may be able to avoid dual relays and the associated timing issues.
Missing from the Bond Bridge is state feedback. So to know if the fan is on high, med or low, you'd have to look at last command sent and assume it took. RF commands generally are mostly reliable, so probably safe to assume the last speed command was implemented.
You'd mentioned further up the thread that you've got a setup using an RF controlled fan and a Bond Bridge. After a little more research and consideration, I decided it would be too much effort to try and retrofit a remote onto my current fan.
So that leads to the question of what model fan you have, since duplicating your setup is most likely to get me where I want to be.
It's a Hunter. The fan in our bedroom went bad and I just asked my my wife to order whatever she wanted. I should have reviewed it. I would have preferred a dumb fan with a pull chain. I have separate wiring for the light and fan and I had smart switches for each already installed. When I got the fan and after I installed it I realized that I could not control the fan with the switches. I ended up just hard wiring the fan and putting ZEN34 remotes for both light switches and getting the bond bridge for control.
