I have a Altura 68" fan from the home depot. It uses a remote control to change speeds and turn on and off. It has some crazy “brain” inside of it that controls everything. I was wondering if anyone has converted any of these fans to a z-wave fan control. When I flip the switch at the wall it powers the fan’s “brain” and not the actual fan. The “brain” then controls the fan based on the input from the remote. I do not think I can use a standard ge z-wave switch.
The crazy “brain” appears to be a receiver integrated into the motor housing. I have a different fan - “Windward III” which also does not have a receiver in the canopy. My receiver is on the top of the motor along with some DIP switches to change signals. Your model is more electronic as far as the pairing goes.
So, you definitely would not be able to use any controller where a receiver needs to be mounted up in the canopy. I don’t see any reason why you couldn’t install a Z-wave switch. You would still not be able to control it remotely as your remote will override it. All you would be able to do is turn off/on the fan if it was previously left on.
In addition to being controlled by an old-school RF remote, the in-canopy receiver has a zigbee module so it can be paired to a zigbee gateway like ST and controlled remotely. There is a community-developed device handler for this device so it does work with ST, but unofficially.
If what @SDKevdog says is true, this may not work for you. It depends on the fan model and whether the fan is designed to work with a receiver that can be removed and replaced by this one. If you have a receiver that works the same way but is hard-wired into the fan motor, then presumably you can’t replace it with this device. I don’t know enough about your fan to comment on that. You should look at the installation manual.