Control an existing motorized skylight?

I have a skylight in my bathroom. Motorized open and close, installed back in 2002. The switch is waterproof and multi-zone, though we only ever installed the one skylight. It has a full-open control button, three levels of open on separate buttons, a close button, and a stop button.

I would like to replace that switch module with one that could be controlled by Echo Dot: “alexa, open the skylight thirty percent”, “alexa, close the skylight” as well as perform automations within ST based on various conditions. I’m just not quite clear on how to get there from here. There’s not a lot of info about skylights using existing motors out there.

Anyone have any ideas?

Ideas R us. :sunglasses:

Control of motorized windows is always complicated, because too much pressure and the glass can shatter. There are a lot of safety issues involved with these.

I understand that you don’t want to replace your existing control mechanism, and I think that’s very good. I did just want to mention that if you check the quick browse lists there are some motorized window thread in the window coverings category in Project Reports, just for anyone who does find this in the future who is thinking about starting from scratch.

http://thingsthataresmart.wiki/index.php?title=How_to_Quick_Browse_the_Community-Created_SmartApps_Forum_Section

Now, as far as your situation…

There are two different ways to do this.

One) trigger the existing controls electronically. Since you’re not sure about where to start with this, I’m not recommending that you try this as a DIY project. You might be able to find someone who could wire relays to your existing switches. @johnconstantelo or @erocm1231 might have some ideas.

  1. trigger the existing controls mechanically, which is a fancy way of saying add a pusher to a pushbutton.

There’s a South Korean company, Naran, which makes microbots and has an IFTTT Channel. These seem to work pretty well, but they’re expensive. $99 for the bridge that gives you the IFTTT capability, and $49 per microbot. So my guess is you won’t want to go with this option, but I just wanted to mention it because it is something you could install on your own.