Hi All, I have been looking into 12v garden lighting. I tested the Brilliant wifi/tuya smart garden light kit but was not happy with the resulting light (no white, only RBG) plus Bunnings here in NZ did not sell an RGB extension cord so cant get the lights to the place I need. I did also look at the Holman stuff and there is Philips Hue (which i have inside) but both those are super $$. Has anyone done anything DIY? Warm white lights as a minimum, but would prefer to be able RGBW with individually addressable lights with dimming capability.
Ive searched a lot for this and just cannot find anything.
PS: I would like approx 5 spot style lights for under trees and large palms etc and some wall (fence) mounted pathway lights for the driveway etc.
Just search Amazon for 12v garden lights, there are plenty. I have used the Sunvie warm white ones with transformer, but only smart control is on/off through smart relay switch.
I have done exactly that, in my case it’s the booster element for a solar HWS so rarely used. I am about to get it moved off the controlled load (and cancel the tariff) since now I can control when it’s on through HA and my off-peak tariff is usually the same price as the controlled load tariff. All the benefits of controlled load and none of the drawbacks.
It just goes in the feed to the HWS after the breaker. What other way could it be done? I mean, it’s just a switch - no different to a manual booster switch.
The reason I asked is because I had one wired just like that. I had already changed my element in the hws from a 3.6kw element to a 2.4kw so that the load would not exceed the rated 16A of the Shelly.
However the Shelly keeps tripping going over 2.5kw.
Seems odd because 2.5kW is only just over 10A at 240V. And it’s a resistive load so power factor is not an issue. I’ve had no such problem, my element is 3.6kW.
I thought it odd as well so dry tested the shelly on the bench with a small load of only one light. works OK there. I’m now thinking that maybe the thermostat in the hws is what is making the circuit stop and I am assuming that the 1pm is tripping?
I would suggest for an important high power draw load such as a water heating element to use a Shelly to control a seperate contactor rather than switch the load itself. Contactors are designed for performing this sort of work reliably day in day out.
Not @Rubyman77 but I’m using a number of Deta switches and outlets, all flashed with ESPHome/Libretiny and I’m pretty happy. I particularly like that they have robust terminals - big enough to get multiple wires into. The Shelly switches e.g. have pissy little terminals that don’t seem like they were intended to have mains cables inserted.
im wondering if anyone here uses the Yale Unity Security Screen door lock? I managed to connect the bluetooth with homeassistant but result is inconsistent and keeps dropping off.
I wonder if forking another $100 for the yale bridge will improve the experience?
I have the Yale assure with the bridge. Yes it’s much better, but integrates into HA via WiFi. The BT connection is only for the yale smartphone app. To be honest I switched to the zigbee module which makes the bridge redundant. Yes it also means I can’t use the Yale smartphone app, but zigbee seems faster than the spotty August HA integration.