Ceiling fan control for fan speed and direction?

Other Devices & Integrations Climate Control & Temperature Sensors
1

Hi - not sure if this is the right forum for my question. If not, please let me know where I should be posting.

I just bought a bunch of Insteon Fanlinks and then found out it doesn’t control direction. I would like to be able to put our fans in reverse for the winter months.

Is there a controller that can control the fan speed and direction?

Thanks!

2

I have never seen one for direction.

3

Any fan I’ve ever had has switches embedded in it to do this. You’d almost need to design a special Z-Wave ceiling fan.

Maybe a guy could get real crafty with those microswitches or something :o

4

Bummer. So, if I want to be able to use my fans in reverse, I can’t control them with Vera? Or could I still manually put them in reverse and control with the original remote – basically ignoring Vera?

5

Yes you can still control them with Vera. You will need to set the switch (located on the fan) to “winter” manually, and then use vera - or your remote, to turn them on and off as you would normally when the fan is set to “summer”.

All that the switch is doing is changing the polarity of the single phase motor as required.

Tim

6

I did not answer because I had fans with a remote control. They had no manual switches …
The internal remote control controlled the direction and the speed.

Thank goodness the instructions talked about how to remove the remote control and run it as a single speed fan. You switched wires to change the direction.

I now use leviton Z-Wave fan controllers and a Z-Wave Dimmer for the light and do not worry about reversing the fan. I had planned on separate dimmer and fan control devices on the wall, and wired appropriately.

I tend to use low speed in the Winter, low and medium in the spring and fall, and medium and high in the summer.

And I can control my lights and fans from Vera and any of a number of Android control programs including HAL, I just talk to it!

7

[quote=“timmyg, post:5, topic:175824”]Yes you can still control them with Vera. You will need to set the switch (located on the fan) to “winter” manually, and then use vera - or your remote, to turn them on and off as you would normally when the fan is set to “summer”.

All that the switch is doing is changing the polarity of the single phase motor as required.

Tim[/quote]

OK. I can do that.

Then I should use FanLinc+Alsteon+Keypadlinc for control speed? Or can I just use a regular z-wave switch to turn it on and off and then somehow control speed some other way? We probably won’t change the speed that often, but I don’t want to lock myself into just one speed!

8

We dont have that particular equipment in Australia so I cant provide a definite answer. I used Fibaro relay units in parallel with Mercator RF controllers in my house. I have one set of contacts utilised for the lights and the other for medium speed on the fans. I was hoping that the the RFXtrx would be compatible with the Mercator remotes but no such luck!

Here are a couple of posts that may help you

http://forum.micasaverde.com/index.php/topic,14951.msg113476.html#msg113476
http://forum.micasaverde.com/index.php/topic,14036.msg111303.html#msg111303
http://forum.micasaverde.com/index.php/topic,14862.msg113058.html#msg113058

9

[quote=“timmyg, post:8, topic:175824”]We dont have that particular equipment in Australia so I cant provide a definite answer. I used Fibaro relay units in parallel with Mercator RF controllers in my house. I have one set of contacts utilised for the lights and the other for medium speed on the fans. I was hoping that the the RFXtrx would be compatible with the Mercator remotes but no such luck!

Here are a couple of posts that may help you

http://forum.micasaverde.com/index.php/topic,14951.msg113476.html#msg113476
http://forum.micasaverde.com/index.php/topic,14036.msg111303.html#msg111303
http://forum.micasaverde.com/index.php/topic,14862.msg113058.html#msg113058[/quote]

Thanks. I feel like I read things but somehow they help me want more HA stuff without helping me necessarily put all the pieces together. I just have 6 Fanlincs that have to be returned in the next week if I don’t want to keep them. I’m not sure what to do! I’m thinking that I’ll just control the fans with a switch and can do something fancier later.

10

What did you decide?

I’m curious on this implementation for the future.

11

I ended up returning them. I only have so much brain capacity right now, so I decided to just go with z-wave switches to turn the fan off and on. If I decide later I want to control speed, I’ll figure out the Fanlincs then.