I have a few oscillating desktop fans which are great for the hot weather without the faff of a ceiling fan installation, or environmental implications of AC, however Id love to make it a bit smarter....
All the fans are controlled by four buttons (three speeds and off), and I have put a smart plug on it so I have some remote control...... but.... its easy to turn off the fan rather than the smart plug.... and the speed cant be changed remotely. I think the buttons are just different capacitors but I haven't yet dismantled it....
Can I use any of the smart fan controllers if I find the right cable on the fan, or have people manipulated something based on 3 relays and a simple switch based device...? Would love to know if anybody else has done something similar.
Could you get a smart button to set right beside the fan, so that you can turn the fan on/off with the press of a button just as easily as turning on/off the fan otherwise? Doesn't give you speed control, of course, but might get you some of what you want.
If you had your heart set on speed control, I kind of doubt the smart ceiling fan controllers would work well - I've wired a few of those up and the wiring seems pretty specific to ceiling fans. If your guess that it's just switching in different capacitors is correct, perhaps you could do that pretty easily with the Zooz Zen16 MultiRelay.
Here's what I've done to make a dumb desk fan smart.
I created a virtual thermostat to utilise the temp sensor in a Hue movement sensor. That feeds in to an instance of the built-in Thermostat Controller & I've got tiles on the dashboard to set the temp at which the fan comes on as well as an "override" button to switch it off if we're going out.
The fan is connected to a run of the mill outlet controller and the rule switches it on/off with a Predicate to stop it switching on in the middle of the night.
Do ya'll have trouble running a motor load on a smart outlet? I have an oscillating fan in my office, and I have it plugged into a Neo Coolcam outlet, just for turning it on and off. I think the load (or maybe the current spike when it turns on and off) is too much for the Neo Coolcam. It works fine 95% of the time, but every once in a while, I'll send it a command, and it'll respond back to Hubitat that it has performed the on/off command, but the actual relay inside won't flip. And then the light on the Neo Coolcam turns red. Usually it fixes itself if I hit the Coolcam's power button manually once or twice.
Smart Outlets are usually relays and thus are less likely to be affected by the motor, assuming that it's rated for such. The outlet needs to have a circuit inside to prevent inrush current from welding the relay contacts together. Having that circuit is how they "rate themselves" for inductive loads.
So a smart outlet would be better for this than a smart plug?
I use a wall wart type...
one of mine is on a Dome DMOF1
(no longer available according to Amazon)
and the rest use Leviton DZPA1:
They've all been in use since 2015 at least. (That's the date Amazon says I bought the Levitons. 2018 for the Dome.)
I also use a pair of Aeon SmartSwitch 6's for my laundry.. Washer and Gas Dryer. Both are significant motors in comparison to the fans 
Interesting. My Neo Coolcam is a wall wart type, similar to the Dome one you pictured.
My bad... poor use of terminology in my post. It's connected to a smart plug, specifically an Ikea Tradfri one. Works a charm.
The Zooz Zen16 is a dry contact multirelay. It requires low voltage to power the electronics and switch the relays. Since the relays are dry contact switches, they can switch any voltage/power level up to the maximum rating of the device. The device has three relays, so you could control three different speeds on the fan as long as the internal wiring of the fan allows you to separate out the wiring for each of three switches.
If you want to control the fan through Hubitat using a temperature sensor for example, that would be fairly simple. If you have voice control capability that would also work. To have pushbutton control over the device, you would need a remote with four buttons 3 speeds plus off.
You need to see information like this...
(Leviton DZPA1 shown)
If it doesn't include "Motor" or "Inductive" specifications, I would not suggest using it for a desktop fan. You can probably get away with it for a bathroom exhaust fan, they are quite small motors and the inductive kickback doesn't have large current behind it. It's all Luck based... how large are the contact pads in the Relay vs the current kickback.
I have a GE Fan Controller:
I just now opened the package 
I bought it back when I was on the verge of giving up waiting for a canopy based Smart Fan controller. I was going to build these into Junction boxes and nail one box per fan up in the attic space. I'd hard wire them in was what I imagined. Then the Hampton Bay Fan controllers came out and I put this idea away. But this morning, I popped open the GE box and wired it to an old outlet.... I'll see if it works
There's no chance of me letting the Magic Smoke out, right?
According to Mr. Murphy of Murphy's Law fame, there is always a possibility.
No surprise to me but it works just fine.
I paired the ZWave Fan Controller and then plugged in a Lasko desktop fan:
I set it to high on its selector on top of the fan and plugged it into my cobbled together outlet. Using the Device Info page, I was able to choose fan speed and indeed, the fan did those speeds. I believe the GE only does High, Med, and Low so the med-low and med-high options on the page seemed to only pick Medium as expected.
Low is a very gentle breeze via the GE. The Fan's physical 4 position switch isn't as gentle. In fact, the first time I clicked Low on the Device Info page, I thought the fan had shut off. It's still spinning on Low 5 mins later so it's definitely low.
Now I have to go to Lowes/Home Depot and get a nice looking box for this
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I'll be really curious to see your final setup!
I picked up a
- 8' extension cord,
- a 'screwless' cover plate,
- plastic 1 gang box, Dremeled off the "ears"
I cut the Extension cord into two parts and then wired up the switch. It's basically a "Lumpy" extension cord. I specifically picked the extension cord to have one socket end, not the triple that is so normal. That meant my choices of color and gauge were limited to stock-on-hand.
https://www.lowes.com/pd/Utilitech-8-ft-16-3-3-Prong-Outdoor-SJTW-Light-Duty-General-Extension-Cord/3551686
https://www.lowes.com/pd/TayMac-1-Gang-Gray-PVC-Weatherproof-New-Work-Old-Work-Standard-Switch-Outlet-Wall-Electrical-Box/4005489
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Interesting! Did you do anything for strain relief where the cord enters and exits the box?
There's an underwriter's knot on each wire end, inside the box.
I'd like it to drill a hole and add a tie wrap, but that's tomorrow's task
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This has been really useful, thank you for your comments/thoughts. I'm going to give it a go with a commercial fan controller and leave the fan on max with a nearby zwave dimmer (or similar) which can send commands to the fan controller.
Obviously I have had this on my ToDo List since 2016 and I must thank everyone for giving me the motivation.
Clearly if I was installing it in the attic area above a ceiling fan, I'd keep the "ears" to screw it down and use Romex cable clamps to keep it all "out of sight" tidy. But this, as a portable Fan Controller is pretty nice to have. I cut the 8 ft extension cord at the 2ft mark, so the piece that plugs in the wall is roughly 6ft and the part that has the outlet end for the fan to plug into is about 2ft. The fan itself has the usual 7ft plug wire, meaning the total length is 15 ft... I may go in and shorten the 6ft part because that's a lot of wire to hide behind the desk.
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