Home Automation

I do have a handful of hue lights and a hub so it’s an option, but specifically for these two lights in the hall, a hue replacement is not really feasible unless I replace the whole units. The problem I have, is that one of the lights is connected to the switch, the other, has no switched live so I can either wire into live for permanent on, or leave disconnected for permanent off (as it has been for 2+ years).

My thinking is I can put something like a Shelly 1 Mini in the problem light, and use it to turn the light on/off over wifi. But then I need a way to control the Shelly unit. Obviously I could set up something in HA and use my phone, but it would be nice to have it controlled from a physical switch for ease.

So that leads me to, 2x Shelly 1 mini, one in each light in the hall. Then some kind of a switch on the wall to replace the current switch entirely, when you press this new switch, it sends a command to HA which then triggers both Shelly’s to turn on.

Previous house had an old galaxy tab on the wall for all things Smart Control, but in this case I would really just like some kind of semi traditional switch.

yeah, you can do that. Fairly bodgy obviously!! I’ve actually similar in my bedroom where there are two separate light fittings on either side, but connected to the same circuit & controlled by a single switch. I’ve used a Shelly i4 (which provides 4 distinct inputs, I’m only using 2 though obviously), replacing the single switch on the wall with their Wall Switch 2 which is wired into the i4.

You could of course use a standard 2-gang switch, but momentary switches such as the Shelly one work so much better with smart lighting! The only drawback with the Shelly Wall Switch is it’s slightly too small for UK switch boxes. It’s not a massive issue although I plan to design & 3d print something that does fit properly at some point!

Obviously with this solution the switch is detached from the light, and relies on your WiFi network being up for it to work! (which works fine for me although overall I’d say Zigbee is a slightly better/more reliable solution). You can however script the switch Shelly to fire off an HTTP request directly to the Shellys controlling the lights which at least takes HA out of the equation!

I just got some wifi wall switches that work a treat

The problem I have, is that one of the lights is connected to the switch, the other, has no switched live so I can either wire into live for permanent on, or leave disconnected for permanent off (as it has been for 2+ years).

How did it end up like that? Did someone really add a light fitting for a light that couldn’t be turned on and off?

You could wire up the first shelly to the normal switch, and then use HA to control the second shelly when the state of the first one changes.

@pdw your guess is as good as mine..! Both hall lights are new(ish) so were fitted when the previous owners renovated. I’m not sure what they were thinking…

Two shellys with some automation to make them sync (could I again skip HA and make shelly 1 run a script when it gets power to trigger shelly 2?) sounds like a good first step to get past the boss, though I do like the idea of the i4 and wall switch!

could I again skip HA and make shelly 1 run a script when it gets power to trigger shelly 2?

not when it gets powered – it would need to remain powered permanently – but when it receives a switch input (or the relay is triggered), yes

Ah, I’ve just looked at the manual for the mini and I misunderstood how it works. So I feed it permanent live, output to the light, and for light 1, I connect the switched live to the switch port of the shelly, then I can make shelly 1 turn on shelly 2 when shelly 1 switched live goes on ?

yep!