Afternoon all. I’m awaiting my VeraPlus HA controller and also planning a remodel of the kitchen/living areas. I am putting recessed lighting in the ceiling, and also adding some flood lights outside. I want to have them integrated via Zwave or similar and there are many many choices. Looking for some advice on what I need to look for in a light switches (LED 3 way and LED dimmers) , in a outlet, and also the best way to wire up the recessed lighting. Any specific “must gets” “must check for this” or advice on brands would be greatly appreciated.
Also, any general advice regarding how you did your set up would be great. I’m opening walls and remodeling the entire kitchen living area so want to take advantage to make sure I get it right. (I will be using a licenses electrician, but going to assume he’s not to up on the Home Automation / ZWave “thing”).
Your best bet is integration at the light switch. This allows easy upgrades and as technology changes, easy migration. I have used just about every Z-wave switch there is and the GE/Jasco are the best value. Upside is you can buy them at Lowes, so you don’t have to buy in bulk if you want to slowly expand. They handle LED and 3 way setups with no problem.
Thanks, so best place for the money on switches is Lowes? Nothing else online, I would probably get maybe 4-5 switches to start, not sure where the “bulk” number starts. ha…
I don’t have GE/Jasco switches because they don’t support instant status. I have all of my recessed fixtures on Leviton dimmers. I’ve also replaced all of the bulbs with LEDs, because one set of eight is on most of the time that someone is home and represents at least a little operating savings.
For more information on instant status, maybe look at this thread.
You can get the GE switches at Amazon for roughly the same price as Lowes. Sometimes you can get used amazon warehouse for cheaper, but generally Lowes has a good price. I use the dimmers and on/off switches with LEDs no problem.
I got most of mine through Amazon warehouse deals, but I did have to send two back for physical damage. Someone obviously hooked it up wrong and burned one side… How Amazon though that was OK to resell is beyond me.
After reading about the instant status, I think that is something important. For what you have w/ your recessed and instant status, if I understood correctly from the other post about it, You can set the switch to instantly report and on/off to vera which would then trigger “something” which could be, if it’s after say 8pm turn on to 100% brightness or 75% brightness. Or once switch it turned off, turn off the other “living room” lights. Am I understanding correctly?
Well, first, decouple the thoughts about recessed lighting and Z-Wave switch type; with a few exceptions, a Z-Wave dimmer should be appropriate for most standard-voltage lights, whether recessed or otherwise.
Switches that support instant status report status to the controller instantly. To my knowledge, there is no parameter to turn it off, and I can’t think of a reason to anyway… but yes, it gives you the capability to trigger other “things” based on the operation of that switch. Typically, those things are not actions for the lights directly controlled by that switch; that other thread discusses a weird use case.
Exactly.
If using switches that don’t support instant status, you cannot depend on the switch to trigger the other action(s) immediately. if the timing of the action isn’t important to you, then by all means use any Z-Wave switch; eventually, the controller will poll the switch for status and carry out your intended action, but the time that takes will vary.
Also, some of the newer, cheaper series of Leviton switches (usually denoted as working with “Wink” systems and part numbers that start with a “D”) don’t support instant status, either. They’re fine for bathroom lights, or other peripheral lights that will probably never need to trigger an action… but everywhere else, I only want instant status switches. YMMV
After reading about the instant status, I think that is something important. For what you have w/ your recessed and instant status, if I understood correctly from the other post about it, You can set the switch to instantly report and on/off to vera which would then trigger “something” which could be, if it’s after say 8pm turn on to 100% brightness or 75% brightness. Or once switch it turned off, turn off the other “living room” lights. Am I understanding correctly?[/quote]Jasco did tell me, this came from the product manager, that their new series dimmers and switches will have instant status but they don’t yet have a release date.
I suggest, in the spec, you require a neutral wire in every switch box. Also, tell the electrician to never wire z-wave devices hot.
Plan for a wall mounted android/ipad scene controller in a central area. Planning is necessary to power this device unobtrusively (where to hide the wall wart that will permanently power the tablet).
I would seldom use a leviton multi-button scene controller in new construction design. I would never use z-wave switches that require a traveler wire in new construction. You get some labor saving from the electrician by avoiding conventional 3-4-5 way circuits. You can also reprogram some switch function if you avoid conventional 3-4-5 way circuits and use z-wave for multi-location light control.
[quote=“dzmiller, post:9, topic:191471”]I suggest, in the spec, you require a neutral wire in every switch box. Also, tell the electrician to never wire z-wave devices hot.
Plan for a wall mounted android/ipad scene controller in a central area. Planning is necessary to power this device unobtrusively (where to hide the wall wart that will permanently power the tablet).
I would seldom use a leviton multi-button scene controller in new construction design. I would never use z-wave switches that require a traveler wire in new construction. You get some labor saving from the electrician by avoiding conventional 3-4-5 way circuits. You can also reprogram some switch function if you avoid conventional 3-4-5 way circuits and use z-wave for multi-location light control.[/quote]
DZMILLER, thanks for the info, that’s what I was looking for regarding running a negative and the tablet spot (do you recommend any specific tablets?)
One thing i wasn’t clear on was not using the leviton controller in new construction and also how/why the labor savings for 3/4/5 way circuits. Could you possible explain a little more in detail that aspect. Would the zwave programs limit the need for 3way, I’m not sure how. Any additional specifics are appreciated.
I suggest a tablet that matches your smartphone operating system, which I assume is either android or apple. Small or big is your choice, it doesn’t have to be a new or powerful model.
You don’t need to have any 3/4/5 way wiring with the certain zwave devices. 1) Design your lighting and switches 2) The switch location closest to the light provides the power to the lamp.(Linear WD500Z-1) 2) Add scene controllers switches at locations where you want additional switch control (Linear WT00Z-1).
So -
WD500Z-1 has load control.
WT00Z-1 has no load, it is simply powered by line voltage and is programmed to control zwave devices.
These two devices look essentially identical. The WT00Z-1 works just like a regular switched physically wired to whatever it is currently controlling. That could be one light, or all zwave lights.
I’m curious why people are against having travlers for multi-way switches? To me it is a benefit should the HA system lockup, malfunction, or die, I can still control the lights from all the places I would normally.
Conversely, the benefit I see to having scene controller switches would be if you need the extra z-wave repeaters to improve the network mesh. Also, you could get some extra buttons for additional scene triggers.
I’m not anti-traveler, but I will say this… in every location in my home that there was a 3-way switch configuration, I’ve found another use for the slot. Mostly for scene controllers. The most notable one was some entryway sconces that had a 3-way switch on a post as you enter the front door, and its companion switch along the same plane about 8 feet away. Having a 3-way switch here just didn’t make sense to me if I can use Z-wave instead, so now there’s a scene controller at the entry. And I believe, because I’m using all Leviton Viza RF hardware, the switches and controllers will work independently from the controller anyway… not that HA lockup/malfunction/death has ever been a problem.
[quote=“WhyMe, post:12, topic:191471”]I’m curious why people are against having travlers for multi-way switches? To me it is a benefit should the HA system lockup, malfunction, or die, I can still control the lights from all the places I would normally.
…[/quote]
The scene controller doesn’t require a working HA system to operate lights. Once associated (through Vera or a minimote), the system can function permanently without a central controller.
The advantage is that the scene control can be reprogrammed. For example, the scene controller dimmer(WT00Z) is initially used as a conventional three way for kitchen lights. Then the kitchen table light is added to that control group. Then it’s decided that light control from that switch isn’t necessary, and the dimmer is set to control music volume through the Denon Vera app… Later it is decided that this dimmer scene controller will be used to control all the outside lights.
[quote=“dzmiller, post:11, topic:191471”]So -
WD500Z-1 has load control.
WT00Z-1 has no load, it is simply powered by line voltage and is programmed to control zwave devices.
These two devices look essentially identical. The WT00Z-1 works just like a regular switched physically wired to whatever it is currently controlling. That could be one light, or all zwave lights.[/quote]
So with this setup, what is the reaction time from switching the WT00Z-1 to when the load (light) would switch on/off?
Thanks, and then touching on the “wire 3 way switches or not” issue, basically I could have my electrician wire 3way switches then if I decide not to utilize the 3 way wiring I can just pop in the WT00Z-1, correct?
@nutshellml
Whilst considering all the z-wave kit, I think you should consider an RGBW controller and go for worktop and kickstrip lighting with RGBW LED strip. You get great lighting as well as mood lighting. Just look at some images on various lighting websites to see how god it looks. I wish I was redoing my kitchen so I could add this.
[quote=“nutshellml, post:17, topic:191471”]Thanks, and then touching on the “wire 3 way switches or not” issue, basically I could have my electrician wire 3way switches then if I decide not to utilize the 3 way wiring I can just pop in the WT00Z-1, correct?[/quote]Probably. The issue is that there are certain 3-way wiring scenarios that might prevent you from utilizing the WT00Z-1.
If your 3-way wiring looks like the attached diagram(fairly typical for modern wiring), then you’ll have no problems.
Re: kick strip lighting. Great advice. Love the look. Do you recommend any specific brands. I see some led that are very expensive. Others very low priced.