Z Wave radio failure after Leviton VRI06 installation

General Discussion
,
1

I have had two different, brand new hubs both report failures of their Z Wave radios. The support team seems stumped (although they have a second replacement on its way to me now). I thought I would “poll the audience” for suggestions.

Here is what happened:

  1. Received the brand new hub, set it up with the ios app. it immediately recognized my 5 sonos units.
  2. I went to add a Leviton VRI06-1LZ (600W dimmer switch). It seems to add correctly, but I cannot control the switch from the Smartthings app. According to the rep on the phone, they see the Z wave radio with a failure (or repeatedly turning on and off).

Same exact steps and same outcome with the replacement hub they sent.

I also tried adding a different Z Wave device (different manufacturer), but same issue. Could it be that this leviton switch somehow broke the hub? Seems pretty far fetched. Could it also be that I just got two bad hubs (maybe a bad batch since they both came directly from Samsung only a couple of weeks apart)?

The switch is explicitly listed in the app as being compatible.

Any ideas?

2

I’ve never heard of a Z wave switch breaking a Z wave controller, So I agree that sounds unlikely. I agree a bad batch of hubs seems more likely assuming there was no local current surge or mismatch, that could also damage the hubs even without having any devices joined to the network.

Have you checked the outlet they were plugged into to make sure there’s no electrical fault there?

3

JDRoberts,

Thanks for the suggestion. I will check the outlet, although I have used it for other electronics. I did use the same transformer (plug) for both hubs. I suppose it is possible that the first hub came with a bad transformer and I damaged the second by using the original power source.

1 Like