No neutral wire dimmer, recommendations?

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1

Hello,

I am in a house for which a lot of the current switches and dimmers do not have a neutral wire and would like to automate some of them.

What are the best systems or dimmer models that can work with Hubitat that do not require a neutral wire?

I read Lutron Caseta works well, but requires their hub.

Any non-hub solutions exist?

Thank you!

2

GE/Jasco recently came out with a no neutral dimmer:

Inovelli makes them too. See this thread for details:

3

You will regret later not going with Lutron, it has been so nice for over 2 years not having a single reliability issue with any dimmer throughout the house.

Not to mention the ability of using ttheir low priced pico button controllers throughout. The difference in the price of these vs other button controllers pays for the lutron pro hub.

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4

:point_up_2: This. Completely.

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5

I like the Inovelli line myself...

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6

I have a couple of the Invoelli Red and Black in non neutral switch boxes and they have worked well for me.

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7

+1 for Lutron, despite the need to purchase a Caseta pro bridge.

Caseta has both switches and dimmers that work really well without neutral, and the Caseta integration with Hubitat is top notch.

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8

This struck me as odd. Do they really have no neutral switches (as opposed to dimmers that can be configured to behave as a switch)? The point being that the load on the switch would still have to be a dimmable light, and not a fan, outlet, etc. that would require an on/off relay.

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Not sure if they’re still in production, but the PD-5WS-DV works with single-speed fan motors (or just one speed of a pull-chain fan) and non-dimmable bulbs.

https://www.lutron.com/TechnicalDocumentLibrary/369831_ENG.pdf

Edit: Although as the document indicates, a LUT-MLC bypass might be required for low wattage scenarios like LED bulbs. Personally I haven’t needed to use one, even with LED bulbs.

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10

Yes they are still on Amazon
https://www.amazon.com/Lutron-PD-5S-DV-WH-Electrical-Distribution-Switcher/dp/B00NCEMBIA/ref=sr_1_3?dchild=1&keywords=Lutron+PD-5WS-DV-WH&qid=1618673606&sr=8-3

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That’s the PD-5S-DV, although I’ve never been able to determine if it’s at all different from the PD-5WS-DV internally. 80 bucks from a marketplace seller is pretty steep :confused:.

Lutron markets one for Caseta, and the other for direct pairing with picos only.

But both will actually work with caseta, if I’m not mistaken. One of Lutron’s many product line quirks.

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As far as I know the "W" comes with a wall plate.

I have 2 of the non "W"'s working in my system

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13

There is a general consensus here that Lutron Caseta switches are highly reliable, and very dependable. They also do not require a neutral.
However, please keep in mind:

  1. higher cost of each switch/dimmer (including a pro hub)
  2. the style/look is not to everyone's taste
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14

Yes, this switch is actually amazing. We have it in our office (until we come out with our own) and it's lightning fast (no 700ms delay to turn on lol) and it's been very reliable.

We were going to put our dimmer switch in there, but the office is kind of old and it has tube lighting where I couldn't get up to get a bypass installed, so I just went Lutron.

Great recommendation and I'll confirm, they work great!

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15

I tried one of the GE/Jasco no neutral dimmers, but was unhappy over the lack of control over ramping rates which older Jasco dimmers had. I also had strobing issues with the lights I had it connected to (Lithonia).

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This and it's worth it.

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17

Not just their hub, their PRO hub, But as others have said, you will not be disappointed. I have maybe 30 of them and they are ROCK SOLID. I ripped out all my other zwave switches a while back and Lutron is the only thing I will use.

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They are still made, they are just switches, and they work great. They even come in different colors. None of my installations have involved the LUT-MLC either.

19

I have an older house w\ no neutrals, I'm going to be installing some of these but I noticed that when used in 3 way configuration I need the GE Enbrighten Add-On Switch (model 46199) but it requires a neutral.

I know that neutral conversations are all over the forum, i've spent all morning reading the posts, however does anyone have a recommendation for 3-way configurations with no neutral?

I'm considering the Lutron Caseta, but wondered if there was any way to leverage these switches, maybe in conjunction with a Leviton paddle switch and Fibaro dimmer 2?

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The Inovelli and Zooz switches have a no neutral option I belive, and I think you can use them with a standard switch in a 3-way setup.

Another option on three ways is to remove the add on and just control the one switch and place something like a Zooz ZEN34 where the extra switch plates are.

{edit} I think they talk about this in the last HE live event they had on youtube.

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