We are busy with a new house and want to add Fibaro dimmers behind all wall switches. I know theres tons of topics about these, but im still left with questions. I want to make sure i get this right because its a big investment.
For the dimmers i want to install literally translated ‘pulse pressers’.
A single switch should be quite simple: 1 dimmer, 1 single pulse and 1 light switch.
More tricky seems a setup with dual switches like these:
How would this setup work? 2 seperate fibaro dimmers, a dual pulse and dual switch?
Also i already have a bunch of Hue lamps and want to buy more. I am a little confused about how to combine these with the fibaro dimmers. Specificly the physical switch part.
I am told hue bulbs and fibaro dimmers dont play well together and should not be used together. The Hue lights are all grouped together and will be operated by dedicated switches. These switches cant be pulse so they would be just on/off switches. Meaning 2 things: 1. If a switch turns off i cant turn a light on with ST anymore. and 2. the physical switches will work in a different way as the other switches with a fibaro dimmer and pulse.
This is an example of what i want : 1 double switch as in the image above. Left switch is a group of GU10 dumb lights with a fibaro dimmer. And the right switch controls some hue bulbs.
Im guessing there should be a correct way to do this. But i am unsure how. Is there a way using the fibaro dimmer? Could i bypass the switch so the hue bulbs stay live or use the s2 of the dimmer? Will i be able to use the right switch in exactly the same way as the left?
Any help or suggestions will be very much appreciated!
You should be able to do this with a Fibaro dimmer 2 and using the S2 connection to send a message to the smartthings hub to turn on the Hue lamps rather than control a circuit branch.
That said, I don’t know if the Fibaro dimmer 2 is currently working after all the recent app and platform changes. So you should check the forum for more information on that. It will definitely need custom code.
Im assuming you are using on/off switches. Im rather looking for a setup using pulse pressers. This so i can get the dim options and the 2nd and r3rd click the fibaro offers.
Ive read several people saying their hue bulbs dont work well together with the fibaro. Dim poorly using the fibaro, lights jump to 100% when switching physically. You do not have these issues?
I’m guessing your term “pulse presser“ is what are commonly called a “momentary switch“ or a “retractive switch.“ this is a non-latching switch, so that it only makes contact while you are pressing on it, then it returns immediately to its resting position. Like a traditional doorbell button.
From what i understood they are pretty much just on/off switches, but with a spring in them. They jump back to original state.
These should work much better with the fibaro dimmer. They will give you more options. But that means your second switch, which is a dumb switch connected to smart bulbs, would stop working. Dumb switches wont work with pulse. So im wondering how to make that 2nd switch work with a second fibaro or with the s2 function so when pressing the 2nd switch fibaro signals ST and ST will give a signal to the hue bulbs. I figure that way all physical switches operate the same way
The Fibaro Dimmer 2 works with on/off and momentary (retractive) switches just fine. For dimming you are better off with the momentary ones though. You need 1 Dimmer 2 module per light you wish to automate. The S2 can be used to control another device, but to do so you need to leverage the scenes capability. I do this via WebCore and have not found a way to do it with Automations.
I have a number of Dimmer 2 modules and there have been no dramas during the recent changes. They work locally and work well. However, if I were starting again I would seriously consider the Aeotec Nano Dimmer given the recent tie up between ST and Aeotec. It might be a better long term bet.
Good to hear everything works perfectly for you, including the S2.
If it works with webcore its good enough for me, aslong it doesnt get too complicated.
Ill look into the aeotec ones, too bad they are zwave aswell. I would actually like a mix of zwave and zigbee modules so when i install these modules i also can take care of full zwave and zigbee coverage throughout the house.
Do you use the s2 for smart bulbs? What is your experience?
Via Webcore S2 creates and action that you can use to for whatever you want. Heres one of my pistons. This use case has a normal dumb outdoor PIR connected to S2.
Hue bulbs on S2 of the same dimmer. The electrical wire for Hue wont be connected to the switch, instead the bulbs will get permanent power supply.
Example B: (2 dimmers)
Regular bulbs with Fibaro or Aeotec dimmer on S1
Another set of regular bulbs, these cant go on the S2 of the first dimmer. Im gonna need a second dimmer here.
To control everything on the example im going to need 3 dimmers in total. Now i can control all 4 series of lights by physical switches and by Smartthings. Plus Smartthings will understand i turned on the lights by pressing a physical switch. And the Hue bulbs can get dimmed with the physical swtich using a pulse instead of on/off and code something in webcore. So there wont be any difference in the working of the physcial switches, no matter if its hue or regular.
Am i understand this finally?
I am not sure its good from a safety perspective to have the smart bulbs on permanent supply. People may assume that if you switch off the light the power is cut to the bulb, which will not be the case here.
Use of S2 for dimming a smart bulb may be tricky. The scene output from S2 is as follows
Momentary Switch
26 : 1 x click
24 : 2 x click
25 : 3 x click
22 : hold
23 : release
Toggle Switch
20 : OFF to ON
21 : ONto OFF
24 : 2 x click
25 : 3 x click
Webcore would receive an event for each switch integration that you would then need to translate into the dimming function using code. Someone may already have done this though. best to check on the Webcore forum.
I apologize if this isn’t the correct place to ask this question. I recently purchased a Fibaro Dimmer 2 and only plan to control it via smartthings app and a remote switch (not connected directly to Dimmer 2). I can control it with the app just fine (on/off/dimming) and I can control it with a Zooz Zen 34 using automations for on/off, but is there a way to control dimming using a remote switch such as the Zen 34 or another one?
