Hi all
I'm trying to get my dumb lights smart. I want nice switch plates and haven't seen any I really like. So I was thinking about one of the dimmer modules. But I'm getting so confused. Do any of you have experience and can recommend one that deal with the below requirements.
needs to power led and halogen bulbs
I have some smart colour bulbs (hue) as well which I would like a way of avoiding the issue of losing all "smartness" when guests/wife turns the switch off. Can either of these keep power on and just use a switch press to send a zwave trigger?
Can either deal with multiple trigger commands (double click, hold, etc.)
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks
Alan
No dimmers will let you mix the two on the same line. The dimming works differently for resistive and inductive/capacitive loads. So I'm assuming you just want them to be able to do both, but from different areas?
See below how I do things. But just to be clear you CAN'T phase dim smart lamps. You will damage them. They need a permanent constant supply.
I have used both the aeotec and Fibaro dimmers. Don't even bother with the aeotec ones they are useless. There the same or more money than the Fibaro dimmer 2 and they do half the stuff that the Fibaros do. The switching on them is also crap. If you want them to dim or brighten slower via the switch you have to change its ramp time. This then slows it's ON/ OFF time so they take ages to turn on as this parameter is the same. Where is on the Fibaro it's 2 parameters.
Main advantage in the Fibaro is the fact that you can turn the 2 inputs on the device into button events (this is done by using the "scenes" built into the custom driver). Which means you can use input 1 to control your dimmable load and use input two to trigger a button even of press/ hold double and triple tap to control your smart lamps.
This is how I have it in all rooms, 4 downlights in the corners controlled / dimmed via the dimmer load then the main smart (RGB tunable White) lamp/s in the middle of the room controlled via a RM button controller rule from the second input.
I meant different lines. I just don't want to have to go mixing different brands for different lines if I could avoid it.
I don't want to phase dim them. Ideally, I would want the unit to always supply full power but just send trigger events to the HE when the switch is pressed. If not, I'm assuming you can set the dim levels on the Fibaro and I would set the lower and upper levels to full. If you can't set power to always go to the bulb I guess I'll have to have 2 actions, 1 to turn power on from fibaro and the other to send the relevant scene to the smart bulb.
Do you mean you can have a 2-gang switch connected to 1 fibaro controlling 1 light? Most of my switches are already 2-gang for 2 lights so I won't be able to take advantage of that if so.
No a 2 gang switch to control two lights connected to one Fibaro, one powered/ controlled directly from the dimmer (dumb dimmable lights) and the other permanently supplied from the phase/live (smart lamp) but triggered via the 2nd input. Just to note the switches would have to be changed to push to make switches (I would recommend click minigrid) connected to the dimmer.
You can't do this you just link it through so the device is always powered. Depending on your location of your consumer unit you may need a way to isolate the lamp (ie a key switch). I'm a spark but haven't done this as my lighting circuits are split well and it's not a large spread out house so it's close enough as it's isolation point.
If you have a area/ switch with just smart lamps you need a just a input device really. I also have that I use the Fibaro input unit, but it's not ideal you need a 12v supply to it and it's just contacts so not push or double tap so just open and close. I have been hoping for a powered hardwired ZigBee input unit which would be perfect.
