I attempted to do this with Leviton’s products but apparently (after a call with Leviton it is apparently a feature instead of a bug) they cant trigger a z wave status when using the “Digital Companion” switch.
What I have is a room with a traditional 3 way setup. What I wanted to do was add lamp lighting to that. So I bought a Leviton Z wave switch and its dumb companion. I also bought two of their z wave outlets to control the lamps.
Everything wired up and both the master and the slave control the overhead lights just fine, the issue I am coming up against is the z wave status will only be triggered if I turn the lights on/off AT THE MASTER. Doing anything at the slave causes the master to turn the load on but not trigger a status update to turn on the lamps.
Has anyone sucessfully wired up someones tech that would allow both switches in a 3 way setup to update the status? It seems like it should be pretty simple but for some reason Leviton decided to only let the companion switches tell the master to turn the load on, not update the status.
I don’t know for sure, but I have a feeling that you and the Leviton folks were actually talking about two different things. That is, things can be set up somewhat differently on a SmartThings platform that if you were just using one of the Leviton controllers.
What’s the exact model of both The master and the auxiliary that you are using?
I wish that were the case, the people at Leviton were pretty dense. But I explained it like I was talking to a child and I think they understood what I was wanting to do, just that it doesnt do it.
The main switch is the DZ15S. Then to make it work as a 3 way a DD0SR is put into the second box of the 3 way. Its really just a dumb switch that sends a signal to the main switch, which is fine logically.
And as a 3 way, it works. Also receiving z wave commands everything works normally. But the DZ15S will only send a signal to Smartthings if you hit the button on it, not turn the circuit on using the DD0SR. And the issue is I have two DZR15A outlets I want to be triggered, so that is the hangup.
I just dont get the logic of having the DZ15S only turn on the relay when it gets a signal from the DD0SR instead of doing its full function, just as if it was triggered by its own switch. Thats really all its missing, the Smarthings functions work really well (and quickly).
, There’s a whole bunch I could say here about association versus hail etc. And the Fact that Leviton has two different Z wave lines, the DZ line and the VIZIA line
Plus that DD remote is for their Bluetooth line. NOT their zwave line. So I’m not sure it would work with that master anyway.
The recommended auxiliary switch for both the Vizia and DZ lines is the VP0SR line (there are two different models).
Basically, there are two ways for an auxiliary switch to work with a zwave master . An auxiliary switch which has its own Z wave radio and is recognized by smartthings as a separate device on the network, not just a remote to the master, can give you status. There are a bunch of these. Including the Cooper, the linear/go control, Homeseer, and a couple of others.
Those that don’t have a radio but just use physical traveler wires to communicate to their own master switch, such as the GE models, don’t usually give you status from the auxiliary.
So short answer: yes, there are many switches that can do this. And there are ways to do it even with some of the switches which is physical traveler wires.
So you can certainly get what you want, but at the moment I’m not up to going into all the details on each model, so I’ll leave that for others to discuss.
Is this basically an issue with instant status updates? In other words if a switch is toggled on the DZ15S, the status will be updated immediately. However, if there is a toggle on the DD0SR causing the DZ15S to change state, is the issue that the DZ15S never reports a state change (even after doing a refresh) or that it does not instantly report the state change? Are there any updates in the Activity Log when toggling the DD0SR?
JDRoberts, you cant trust their site. That model is basically discontinued (you cant find it from any large sites, just ones that have old stock. Per their support, the manual that comes with the switch, etc, its all the companion switch I have. And it works in a 3 way application just fine as a switch, just not to trigger an event. Ive spent time with their CS confirming this.
capfan, I can see the state change when I force a refresh from the hub. The issue is when I flip the switch itself it sends a signal to refresh the state within a second to the hub but not when its turned on with the aux. After talking to two levels of support apparently Leviton says “it is what it is.” Just seems like a pretty big ball for a company of that experience to drop.
professordave, does it happen automatically? As in you have the app open, flip the aux, and the app updates the status on its own in a second or two? Also how his your setup wired up? Is it a real 3 way (with a signal wire) or is it a virtual with a z wave event from the aux? My understanding was Linear did things a bit differently where you had a powered aux that sent the signal instead of using the traveler wire.
Maybe the issue is with the device handler. I have a couple of the DZ15S (but no companion switches) and SmartThings added them as Z-Wave Relays initially and I changed them to Z-Wave Switches (using the template) and modified the LED status parameters so they could be configured to work with the DZ15S. Perhaps there is some event generated when the DD0SR causes the DZ15S to change state that is simply ignored by the device handler.
If you have a SmartThings developer account, you could check the “Live Logging” section and if you see real-time updates there when you toggle the DD0SR then there is probably hope for a resolution.
Actually nothing is showing up in live logging regarding the physical pressing of either switch. Although if I press on the primary I do see the status update for the switch in the app, just nothing in live logging.
I think I did find, under the developer site, where you update the switch. I didnt see leviton so I just changed it to z wave switch to see if that would change it, nothing.
Do you see your devices and hub listed under “My Hubs” and “My Devices”?
Assuming you see your devices, then something should definitely be showing up in “Live Logging”. Is this an issue where you see no messages from any device or just none from the DZ15S? Switching from Z-Wave Relay to Z-Wave Switch probably won’t make much of a difference since they are very similar. The only major difference is that the switch has a section you can modify to control the LED status light under the switch.
As an aside from the main topic, this worked for me:
All 3 devices show online.
Im actually only seeing logging “tabs” for the Google Home and the two outlets under logging. Im seeing nothing for the switch, not even if I trigger it from the app.
Also looking in events its not registering anything even if I hit the button on the main switch (but smarthings status shows it on). So odd.
Ok so I changed it to Generic Z Wave Switch to match the outlets and now it registers in logging.
Unfortunately logging supports the behavior. If i flip the switch on the main unit I get an instant status update. If i switch it on the secondary it changes the status physically but no update is sent. It only registered in live logging if i refreshed the status manually in the app.
Thanks for the device update. Leviton is in the process of upgrading their whole Z wave line, so they have a number of new models coming out. Since the auxiliary can also be used with the Bluetooth line, it sounds like it is using the physical traveler wires to communicate to the master. I’m surprised if it even shows up in your device list in SmartThings.
One thing that hasn’t changed is that Leviton has two different Z wave lines, the Vizia line and the DZ line. The DZ line is their budget line and does not implement the zwave “hail” Command set. Consequently, the DZ line does not report its own status back to the hub if it is manually changed at the switch. (The product descriptions for this model should say that it does not implement “instant status.”)
What is the difference between Vizia RF + and DZC?
If automatic two-way feedback is required, Leviton recommends the Vizia RF + product line, which provides advanced features beyond DZC. DZC must be polled in order to update the status.
There are a couple ways to get around that, The most common being to use the association feature. The master gets associated to the smartthings hub so the hub gets told when there is a physical change at the switch.
However–when the physical change is at the auxiliary which is using traveler wires to communicate to the master, this is not perceived as the same kind of change, and some models, including the DZ line, don’t trigger the association commandset in that case and that’s why the hub doesn’t know about it. So the Leviton folks were correct that that’s just how it works. It is. Their alternative is their more expensive Vizia line which is why they probably don’t see it as a big issue. They do offer the feature, but not on their budget models.
You could solve this issue for yourself by polling the master, but that adds a lot of network traffic and isn’t recommended.
Probably the simplest choice would just be to go with a different brand that has a virtual three-way, but that’s up to you.
edited to update everything I said above is true for the original DZ models, but it looks like the newest versions, the ones with zwave plus, can use hail. But based on the OP’s descriptions, they aren’t using it if the action is initiate initiated on the auxiliary.
It is using the traveler wires to communicate with the master and doesnt show up. Only the master shows up. It triggers the master using the digital signal over the travelers. The oddity is that the main switch doesnt update its status.
I dont get the “DZC not updating its status” thing. It certainly does. If I trigger the DZ15S smarthings updates its status within a second in the app, and would trigger an event in the same amount of time.
I would like to see the Vizia stuff as it appears to be, maybe, more aesthetically pleasing. But it isnt carried by virtually anyone. And my understand is the main difference is that the Vizia stuff can work with their controllers AND Z wave, while the DZ stuff is JUST Z wave, meaning it needs someone elses controller to do anything. Also the DZ is Z wave plus compatible, whatever that means.
It seems like the DZ15S supports hail commands and there does not appear to be any updated version of the Vizia RF+ line available or coming soon that supports Z-Wave Plus. Some more info here:
There are no higher end Z-Wave Plus alternatives available from Leviton. I would definitely keep pursuing this with Leviton as it seem like a problem on their part.
Leviton has not updated their website and all of their marketing materials appear to refer to old product. The new devices hitting the market are not as pictured or described in any of the marketing materials I’ve found.
Zwave plus is the newest generation of zwave, the fifth generation. (It’s also called fifth GEN or series 500). The older generations are now called Z wave classic.
Z wave plus has quite a few advantages over z wave classic, although they are compatible with each other and you can have some of each on your network. The biggest difference is that you as a customer would notice right away is that zwave plus has a significantly longer range, better battery life, and is somewhat easier to pair in place. There are some additional technical improvements.
The original Leviton DZ switches were using Z wave classic, but The newest versions have z wave plus chips. It’s likely that the Vizia line will also switch to zwave plus eventually.
Leviton’s Old DZC Line
It’s not that the DZ line can’t work with a Leviton controller – – it can work with any certified Z wave controller, classic or Z wave plus. The difference is that there are some additional features in the Vizia line which will not be available with a DZ switch.
When used with a smartthings controller, the original DZ switch is updating its status, but it is using a different method update its status. ( technically it is using association instead of hail.) And that different method is not being triggered when the auxiliary switch is pressed. It’s just the way it works. It sounds like the same issue may have carried over to the new models.
The Vizia line uses hail to update its status, and I think that also gets triggered when the auxiliary tells the master to turn on, but someone else who has the device can confirm that.
It looks like the newest version of the DZ line, the zwave +ones, has been updated so that it also has hail, I’m just not sure if it is using it when an auxiliary triggers the switch.
Shopping
As far as where to buy the Vizia devices, most of the specialty Z wave retailers have them, and Home Depot carries the line on their website, but not in store. I just checked several of these and everybody had them in stock. (HAWorld Online, Home controls inc, Smart Home, Westside, zwaveproducts.com, Home Depot all had VIZIA switches in stock this morning.)
They’re really intended for professional installers, so if you’re just shopping at brick and mortar stores you won’t see them. But if you check the online specialty retailers they should be pretty easy to find. They will likely go out of stock if a new model as expected, but that’s understandable.
If it was me, though, at this point I would only be looking at zwave plus devices, so I wouldn’t be shopping for Vizia right now.
I can find some of the switches, but the coordinating remote is listed but “out of stock” online. That is why I went with the DZ models.
And, yeah, as everyone else noticed. Leviton seems to have sunset the Vizia, just letting it wither and die online (half of their content regarding Vizia is “file not found.”
It seems the DZ is the new line, and its missing some stuff (like properly working). So these will go back, the smarthings hub will stay, and I will shop around for switches. Ill try the GE next since someone tested those out, I just thought they looked kind of cheap and a lot of reviewers said they had a lag when using the physical switch, but maybe those are old models.
They will likely go out of stock if a new model as expected, but that’s understandable.