I have a low voltage landscape lighting in my backyard, which I plug the transformer into a Z-wave duplex outlet, so I can control its on/off no problem.
My challenge is, there is a section of my landscape lighting that we want a separate on/off control, so our landscaper added a traditional on/off switch so we can manually toggle on/off of that section specifically.
Opening up that switch, looks like my landscape only connects it with 2 wires (I assume load and line). There is no neutral wires in that junction box so I only have 2 wires to work with.
Is there any way I can add z-wave control to that switch? I tried to use a GE Dimmer (v1) that doesn’t require neutral, but it doesn’t seem to feed enough power to that switch. Any suggestion here?
[quote=“jeff3lo, post:1, topic:187461”]I have a low voltage landscape lighting in my backyard, which I plug the transformer into a Z-wave duplex outlet, so I can control its on/off no problem.
My challenge is, there is a section of my landscape lighting that we want a separate on/off control, so our landscaper added a traditional on/off switch so we can manually toggle on/off of that section specifically.
Opening up that switch, looks like my landscape only connects it with 2 wires (I assume load and line). There is no neutral wires in that junction box so I only have 2 wires to work with.
Is there any way I can add z-wave control to that switch? I tried to use a GE Dimmer (v1) that doesn’t require neutral, but it doesn’t seem to feed enough power to that switch. Any suggestion here?
Thank you in advance![/quote]
This is all run off the orginal transformer?
They probley just cut the power or ground on the 12v low voltage wire and put a switch inline. No z-wave light switch will work here as its 12v not 120v. In order for this to work, your going to need to rig up some type of z-wave relay. A Mimolite comes to mind for me. It has a seperate wall wort that will need to be powered up all times for the z-wave to work, then it has a relay which you can switch open and close via z-wave.
You would need to check amperage and voltage to verify everything is in the green tho.
If a switch replacement is no-good, I’m willing to entertain any dry contact / mimolite / micro switch that can support low voltage. Do I have any options there?
You would need a dry contact switch to make this secondary low voltage switch Z-Wave capable.
In order to run the dry contact switch, you will need to provide mains power to the switch. None of the relays/microswitches, that I am aware of, can be run from the low voltage supply. They will need a separate mains supply.
The Mimolite will run off low voltage (9-16VDC). You can easily find a low cost converter (for 12VAC to 12VDC) so the Mimolite could be powered off the landscape lighting. The Mimolite would of course only be powered when the landscape lighting transformer itself is powered. Since it is not designed for outdoor use, you would have to mount it into a protective watertight enclosure.
How difficult would it be for you to run another length of cable directly from the transformer to the section of lighting you want to power separately?
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