I am finishing my basement and I am going to have 2 main areas that I want to turn on when I turn on or off the main switch. So the main switch is at the entrance of the basement. The second switch is in the theater area. This is what I want. Turn on or off the main switch and it turns on or off the theater switch . But if I want to dim or shut off the theater switch it does not do the same on the main switch. I have searched through the post and I have not seen anything like this. Can anyone help me with this.
Not very standard wiring but I don’t think it is a problem. Just wire the switches in series.
power wire to main switch. Then out of the main switch branch to lights and theater switch. If you shut off the main switch then the power to the theater switch is cut.
That would work for regular dumb switches. However, since you are on this forum I’m guessing you are planning on using smart switches. In that case just wire them up seperately and use an app like smartlighting or webcore to get the functionality you want.
It’s not hard to do as long as you use smart bulbs in the theater area. You’ll find this discussed in the forum in a number of threads under the concept of zone lighting, it’s one of the main reasons that people will choose smart bulbs. All of the fixtures run off of the same circuit branch, but you want them to do different things at different times.
So the switch in the theater area becomes a smart switch which is not wired to control the load. Instead, it sends a message to the hub which then sends a message to the bulbs.
Depending on the exact brands and models chosen, you can also use a switch in the theater area which is either battery powered or uses kinetic energy, so then you can put it anywhere at all you want, it doesn’t have to be wired in. These work the same way: they send a message to the hub which sends a message to the bulbs.
So that’s one way to do it. Otherwise have an electrician separate the theater zone so it’s on a different circuit branch and then you have even more options for how to handle things.
I have them as 2 different switches right now both smart dimmer switches. Can I use the smart bulb follow me but instead of smart bulbs use the switches?
If both switches control the current on the same current branch, then no.
So it all comes down to how current gets to the non-theater zone fixtures.
Just wire them up as two independent switch circuits. Nothing fancy in the wiring required. Then set up the smartlighting app to turn off the theater when the main switch is turned off. The beauty of smart things is you can set up almost any logic you want.
@JDRoberts Yes they are 100% isolated switches
@sainsworth Thank you I never saw that I could turn on a switch when another switch turns on in the smart lighting. Now I look stupid. I thought it would be harder than that. Thank you to both to both of you.