smart lighting

gingerbreadmen

Hi all thinking of finally taking the plunge to smart lighting and want to control two 5 lamp fitting which have non dimmable led lamps so thinking of a smart switch has anyone had any experience with these. Are there good ones and bad ones. Any help would be appreciated as a googling has found these are not cheep so want to make sure I get it right the first time.  

steviebabes

Sonoff (eWelink) switches and plugs, cheap and reliable, compatible with Alexa/Google Home.

gingerbreadmen

steviebabes said:

Sonoff (eWelink) switches and plugs, cheap and reliable, compatible with Alexa/Google Home. 

   Was looking to replace wall switch with smart switch.
with Alexa/google compatible

Takmon

gingerbreadmen said:

steviebabes said:

Sonoff (eWelink) switches and plugs, cheap and reliable, compatible with Alexa/Google Home. 

   Was looking to replace wall switch with smart switch.
with Alexa/google compatible

Sonoff do smart switches for the wall and I got all mine from ebay for around £10 each with postage. But you need to check if you have a neutral wire otherwise you will need to look at a different type of switch.

gingerbreadmen

Hi thanks for the suggestions. Any other options?

victor2

No experience with these things, but you could try something like this:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/FORNORM-SmartLife-Control-Household-Appliances/dp/B07HF55HL7

It would have to be installed in the ceiling near the light fitting, where there is a neutral wire, as regular wall switches don't usually have one, and there probably isn't room for the switch anyway.

gingerbreadmen

victor2 said:

No experience with these things, but you could try something like this:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/FORNORM-SmartLife-Control-Household-Appliances/dp/B07HF55HL7

It would have to be installed in the ceiling near the light fitting, where there is a neutral wire, as regular wall switches don't usually have one, and there probably isn't room for the switch anyway.

Hi thanks for the link they look really good for where you have downlighters in the ceiling but these are light fittings where there is no where to put this but great for another project. 

Cornucopia

The issue is that the typical wiring in UK houses has a technical problem interfacing to smart switches in the wall box.   As mentioned above, you either need to place the smart switch in a different location, where it can access permanently powered Live and Neutral connections, or you need a more complex type of smart switch that is able to derive its power supply from current leakage through the lamp.

You really need to properly survey the wall boxes and then work out which smart switches might be compatible.   The two things you need to know are how deep the box is (there are various standard depths) and whether there is a Neutral connection (that will be loose in the box) that the switch could use, which you *might* have if you live in a fairly new property.

Personally, I would suggest keeping to switching standalone lamps (uplighters, table lamps) for your first foray into home automation and see how you get on with that.

Or.. you could look at smart bulbs.

gingerbreadmen

Hi all thanks for all your comments. Ive done survey of the switch that i want to install the smart switch. It has a lovely deep box and also has a neutral wire. Now the tricky bit, I need a 2 gang 2 way smart switch these are proving hard to find from this country. if anyone knows where to buy these it would be greatly appreciated.  

Takmon

gingerbreadmen said:

Hi all thanks for all your comments. Ive done survey of the switch that i want to install the smart switch. It has a lovely deep box and also has a neutral wire. Now the tricky bit, I need a 2 gang 2 way smart switch these are proving hard to find from this country. if anyone knows where to buy these it would be greatly appreciated.  

You won't be able to get a 2 way smart switch because the switch won't know if it's turning the light on or off so wouldn't operate properly when receiving commands. You would need to replace both the switches that control the same light and they would need to work together to know if the light was on or off and there is no easy way to do this with an off the shelf product.

But the easiest solution is to replace one of the switches with a 2 gang smart switch then blank off any other switches on the same circuit. You won't need the other switches anyway if you can use voice commands to control the lights.

gingerbreadmen

There seems to be some over seas seller's  selling 2 way smart switches. Glad I put on here first thanks Takmom saved me a few quid. Not really sure what to do now as really need a normal switch as well.