hey all
i currently have a celling fan/light which is controlled via a pull chain and has no wall switch to control the fan (only a light switch) i am trying to look for any celling fans i could buy that can connect to home assistant preferably without wifi in case it was to drop at any time but i dont mind any suggestions are helpful thank you
I have one as well in the same situation with a pull chain but a light switch on the wall for built-in lights in ths unit. It also had a second chain for the lights but left that turned on at the fixture and removed the chain so the lights are controlled by a Shelly Dimmer 2 behind a momentary wall switch (replacing a dimmer switch) programmed for down=off, hold down=dim, up=on, hold up=brighten (a total PITA but a very specific use case, here. But I digress…
My pull switch for the fan is the typical, per pull, off-low-med-hi-off sort of thing. I have asked in the forums if anyone had any ideas for getting a Shelly relay to work with the fan but they suggested using three separate relays, one for each of those speeds. I don’t like that idea… so although the way I control those lights is elegant, it might be a cleaner solution to just replace the fan altogether with something smart that can interface with HA… but I need one with lights as well… !
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yes since the fan has no wall switch for the fan control I’ve been finding it hard to look for good devices im just trying to get any smart fan suggestions at this point anything that i can connect to home assistant to turn on and off the fan/light
You would probably want to control them separately of course. I’d like to keep the pull chain for the fan only (instead of a wall switch for that part) and just put a shelly up in the fixture somehow for just the fan since I have the light covered. I just have no clue how it would be wired… or which shelly to use for it
i dont mind just getting a whole new ceiling fan unit take out the current “dumb” one and install some smart one, its just rough trying to find a good smart ceiling fan unit that would connect with home assistant
To integrate fans with HA I grabbed a Bond Bridge.
I have 3 ceiling fans. Two were dumb when I bought them and one was zigbee based.
The zigbee fan is a Hampton Bay brand (internally it’s a “King of Fans”) from Home Depot. Unfortunately they don’t sell them anymore.
The other two fans I have are just dumb fans I upgraded to smart by adding an iFan04 controller from Sonoff. It’s wifi based but it has a remote that works without wifi.
The only other option I know of is to buy a zwave fan controller. The only big downside to those is that they are mostly (if not all) installed in the wall and not in the fan itself so you need wires to the fan for each fan speed. Which it doesn’t sound like you do.
i have seen the i fan thing around im just wondering if it continues to work without internet in home assistant and it works on a fan that has no wall switch?
The iFan04 is local only (no cloud) so it doesn’t need the internet to work. It does need wifi to be smart.
As far as I know the fan still works without wifi. So if your wifi goes down it should still work with the remote.
as long as you have an always on hot wire at the fan it will work.
But your existing light switch won’t work. you will need to either use HA or the remote to operate the light. Or you could put a smart light switch in the wall that remotely controls the light. Which is what I do for my zigbee fan.
the fan is always powered. I have a smart light switch that isn’t connected to anything on the output. It is simply there to be a smart interface. if the switch gets toggled HA sends a signal to toggle the light.
If HA (or wifi for the iFan04) is down the fan still works with the remote.
that all sounds good just to clarify again if i was to loose internet that means any fan automations wont run is that right?
No.
internet is not wifi.
If you lose internet everything still works.
If you lose your home wifi the fan automations won’t work. But the remote will still work.
Just going to mention I’ve struggled with Bond and some fans. There’s no communication back from the fan to Bond, so if you go and use a fan remote, Bond won’t know you’ve changed a speed or light setting.
I had a Modern Forms fan that came with a Bluetooth remote but also used a WiFi app. They integrate with Home Assistant to run locally on WiFi and quite reliable.