I moved into a new home and I have 3 ceiling fans in my family room. All 3 fans have a separate fan and light switch and are regulated by pull chains. I was wondering what brand of switch (either zigbee or zwave it doesn't matter) I should buy to control these. I do not use Lutron or Hue. I would like a wall switch of some kind. Thanks for any suggestions.
You would get two Z-devices, one dimmer, one Fan controller.
Here's a ZWave fan controller that I use:
https://www.amazon.com/Jasco-Assistant-Compatible-Required-14314/dp/B07WSG4FN4
Obviously any ZWave dimmer would sit nicely alongside.
The Zen30 is a good device, but the OP says he has separate fan and light switches. @csteele's recommendation for the Enbrighten fan control and separate dimmer is probably a better solution for this application.
If I were buying all new today, I'd buy Inovelli in Zigbee.[1]
I like the advanced features, the consistent design strategy, and the 'family-style' customer service and tech support.
[1] At some point, I think it would behoove one to consider Matter-over-Thread for new device rollouts, but I'm not quite sure we are there yet. Yet.
I would like to hook both the light and fan into one switch and control both fan speed and light dimming from the switch. I have double size boxes. 2 controls would be OK.
It looks like $110 for both switches. 3 fans make that very expensive. Maybe I will just leave things as they are.
FWIW, two Jasco z-wave switches (1 fan controller, 1 light dimmer) would run about $70. @csteele provided a link to the fan controller. Jasco makes a matching light dimmer.
They are. 'Value' is a highly personal opinion, but I think it's worth it. I have many Zooz, Homeseer, and Jasco Z-wave devices, and I think they are fine, especially the Zooz and Homeseer versions with their more advanced firmware, but I don't feel that they rise to the level of Inovelli.
You said you do not use Lutron or Hue. You didn't say you were opposed to Lutron and Hue. The Lutron Fan controller switch for pull chain fans works very well when you have separate light and fan switches. It does require the Lutron Pro2 Hub. It also opens up the world of Pico remotes.
For all who submitted suggestions, I thank you. I went with Jasco Smart Fan Control #14314 and Ultra Pro In-Wall Smart Dimmer#59350. They work really well and are pretty easy to install. Just lucky to have deep wall boxes.
If it is not too late reconsider Inovelli Blue with the paired companian switch. For the fan control you will have 255 available speed settings. I was able to fine tune my temperature balancing rules but not to create a hurricanes.
So the fan control is basically a continuously variable speed and not a 3 or 4 speed controller?
I just bought some Enbrighten fan controls that are 4 speed.
I did have some Levitons but they kept locking up and needed power cycle to "reset", so I got tired of that.
I did buy some Inovelli red fan control switches and they were only 3 speed, so I returned them but Inovelli dinged me for the return.. pissed me off!
Surprising yes. I am using a driver designed by @bertabcd1234, not the one provided by Inovelli. From the Device Control page the fan speed settings are 1% - 100% with 10% step (basically 10 predefined speeds). However from RM rule you can set fan speed to anything between 1% - 100% with 1% step. Basically this is dimmer-like control with 100 steps (i.e. speeds). My dumb fans responded very well to the speed control. However practically 10% steps are sufficient. In my rules I am using only 4-5 different speed settings but thanks to device capability and driver each one is carefully chosen by myself (and what is more important, by my wife, need to keep WAF as high as possible).
I forgot to mention, I am using only canopy module. I do not need a companion switch so, I have no idea what this companion switch is doing.
From discussions on the Inovelli forums, I believe the device only supports three distinct speeds. You might get different levels back matching the specific value you set if you use the level command, but there would be a cutoff where the speed actually changes. I believe this matches what I saw as well, though with an actual fan it's pretty hard to tell...
Thanks for the reply!
I see bert says something different though.....
I did see that there are parameters for the different speeds that are possible, but in actuality that could be different.
I guess I will have to chat Inovelli as I don't want to buy these $$$$ controls, find out they are only 3 speed and get dinged for returning the with a 15% "restocking fee"!
Thanks for the update!
This is frustrating to me.
There is NO mention of this on their website! WHY????
They leave out alot of info about their products, but have a "flashy" website with all the graphics...... REALLY annoying!
They have a support subdomain on their website that includes lots of device documentation. It is as un-flashy as one would expect for the tech support part of their site.
I’m not surprised to hear they’re unable to process returns without a restocking fee when a customer’s reason for initiating the return is that they were unfamiliar with the device’s specs/features.
They are a small company after all, and may not be able to eat the costs associated with RMAs that weren’t due to a defective device or some other warranty-related issue.
Frankly, I was surprised to see this very smooth speed control option. So, I immediately tested this. I did not intrumented the test for measuring actual RPMs and simply trusted my feelings (not really scientific approach). I could feel airflow difference in lower range (say upto 45-50%) by changing speed by 5%. Above 50% my sensitivity to (possible) speed (i.e. airflow) change was minimal if any. But by eyes it looked like fan still was responsive.
As a result I was able to fine tune the desired speeds. Practically I am using 4-5 different speed settings but the numbers are defined by myself.
I will not be surprised if different fans will respond differently but I am very happy my old dumb fans could be set to the desired speeds.
AC fan motors use capacitors to control the fan speed. The number of steps is dictated by how many capacitors will fit in the case. They are not small capacitors because of the voltage.
DC fan motors can be "infinitely controlled".
As it happens, I only own AC fans. I can't test
Is the driver accessed with hubitat package manager? What search term is used?
I tried inovelli, fan speed and that didn't work .