Costco Feit Smart Dimmer Tuya Convert Tasmota

[Technowizard]

@comet424

this topic is way too long to read it all

No offense, but there’s your problem. The topics get pretty big, but best to scan, search, or at least skip to the bottom-ish part to see what’s current next time. Any Tuya type device (which a lot of ESP82XX devices are) manufactured after July-ish 2020, and virtually all made or bought after October 2020, will have new / patched TUYA firmware that prevents custom OTA flashing (e.g. tuya-convert). If you want to flash this, or any other new TUYA type product at this point in time, you’ll have to open them up and serially flash them (e.g. solder wires to a USB type device, etc.). No way around it until the very big IF day that someone finds another firmware vulnerability to exploit for OTA flashing again.

Edit: just wanted to add that there are other switches out there that are easier to open / flash than this one. The Feit dimmer’s biggest hurdle is the need to desolder the TYWE2S module (the part that contains the ESP chip) in order to get to the necessary pins. Some dimmers and what not have pin headers, or at the very least easy to get to pin points to solder your connector to. If that’s still too much or just beyond what you think you can do (it’s ok, not everyone is an electronic guru ), then your best bet is to either find maybe some used or old new stock on ebay, offerup, etc., or look for some of the few switches out there that actually come with Tasmota already on them (see here). Alternatively some devices (e.g. Shelly, etc.) have firmwares that allow local control with built-in MQTT and/or HTTP functions, which will let you do many of the same things you might do / want with a custom firmware flash. You’ll have to Google a bit for those, but that’s really the only way for now to avoid doing the dirty work yourself.

[comet424]

well i was reading orginally though this was a how to link thats why andthen didnt realize there so much trouble lol
do you have a how to link desoldering doesnt help if i dont have pics
How To Flash ESP devices with Tasmota Using Raspberry Pi | Siytek
link didnt help me
but mine doesnt look like that i have no pics of this one… so not sure where to solder

is there a link to how to
here are some pics of one i have i skimmed this article but i probably missed it on what to solder with close up pics… as what i found people only talked about soldering LED but i looking a specific link to get this switch to work with home assistant and my wifi…

[123 (Taras)]

@comet424

i have no pics of this one

There are pictures posted of it in this thread. In fact, the latest ones were posted just 3 days ago. However, you stated:

@comet424

this topic is way too long to read it all

So that’s why you didn’t see them.

Look up a few posts and you will find pictures of the component that must be desoldered before it can be re-programmed.

[comet424]

i did look
i looked at post 301 302 310 311

those the last photos but htats only if you want to control the power LED
thats not how to reprogram the switch with the raspberry pi
because the link i posted
said i need TX RX and Gnd but these pictures

i did look at post 275 from 1 month ago… but there isnt really any pics he didnt show pics of parts removed… or what wires to hook up…

so there is no detailed picture
and in his 4th picture i dont knwo what that little blue square of plastic hes got going on there is

yes reason i said topic too long
as i expected a how to convert
so like 2 or 3 posts
with Stickys at the top of the post with detail picture of this board you desolder exactly this is what it looks desoldered
so like
step 1 .remove screws
step 2 remov these screws
step 3 you wanna cover this
step 4.desolder thi
step 5 this is TX RX GND locations

thats what i looking for
detailed steps with pictures right beside it so you cant screw it up

[comet424]

so what i trying to do is
i just bought these light switchs
and i need step by step how to get it to work with Home assistant
without the need of the internet /web app

i dont need to make the LED brighter i just want to get the light switch to work
i thought all you had to do was plug the light switch in and then it could link to raspberry pi and im done

[flynmoose (Barry Elk)]

@comet424

i need step by step how to get it to work with Home assistant
without the need of the internet /web app

I’m willing to help with the step-by-step for you since I was in your shoes just weeks ago… but DIY communities are “pull yourself up by your bootstraps” crowds. Reading and looking to see if someone else has already asked and been answered is the exchange for a free info that no one is under obligation to provide…

It sounds like you are new to both home automation that is not in the hands of “the cloud” and also new to hardware hacking.

1. This thread should not be the place to figure out how to setup Home-Assistant or the device management choice you need to make. Look elsewhere and ask good questions.

2. You have a choice to make if you want to flash these switches. Tasmota or ESPHome. This thread has a mix of both types of instructions. Again - how to set up ESPHome or TasmoAdmin (or other Tasmota/Sonoff management tool) is beyond this scope. But you have to pick…

3. You CANNOT flash these if they are newer without removing the TYWE2S chip from the main board. This will be VERY hard to do (but not impossible) with a soldering iron alone. It is MUCH easier if you have a SMD hot air gun / desoldering station with temp control.

So - if you hit this point and said “what does that mean?” or “I know nothing about soldering” - then you are probably at a FULL STOP unless you want to a) teach yourself how to de-solder and re-solder.

If so - plan on sacrificing at least one of your boards. I have both a quality soldering iron and an SMD work station and I still managed to destroy two of my 10 boards by tearing the traces away. For me - meh - it cost $20 to learn something.

But it sounds like you are looking for a “just make it work” solution. As previous poster said - there are switches out there that are easier to program and do not require soldering. If you bought these at Costco and are over your head - just take them back and move on.

4. Ok - presuming you still want to move forward, we could start a new thread that is the basics - rather than bury a blow-by-blow in this 300+ post thread. ALL of the necessary steps are in this thread - I figured it out myself. But if you want a consolidated, HOW DO I, let’s take it elsewhere.

[flynmoose (Barry Elk)]

I’ve started said thread. It may take me a day or so to fill it all in. And others have responded to the thread you created as well.

I’ll likely complete my step-by-step by the end of the weekend (2/27/2021).

COSTCO FEIT/Tuya-based WIFI Dimmer - Step-by-Step Guide (Newbie friendly)

As the original COSTO FEIT Wifi Dimmer thread has become quite long and has many branches of topics, this thread will attempt to capture the basics of converting these Tuya-based switches for those that can no longer use the exploit that Tuya-Convert used. If you have old switches (pre-mid2020), you should first try Tuya-Convert because that will be MUCH more simple than these steps. Before we get started with the step by steps, a few WARNINGS, CAUTIONS and NOTES WARNING - you will be dis-ass…

[Technowizard]

Very nice How-To / Writeup flynmoose!

[comet424]

ah ok ill read

see i bought these because they said 2.4ghz and home network same i bought the TPlink smart wifi switchs says 2.4ghz and links to your home network
i went this route as i didnt wanan buy a 100 dollar Z-Wave dongle for home assistant

and i find that this stuff is not plug and play like any Home network device
this doesnt work like a Brother Printer
you install the App or goto the Webserver of the device 192.168.0.1 and then you change the IP address of the switch and change your Wifi on the switch so its part of your own network WPA and you give it an ip address… easy peezy

i did not realize i have to de solder anything or take it apart
and i guess there is no plug and play works out of the box with Home assistant… but ill give it a try to read up. as i didnt expect any of this… just setup on my home network and i done

ill read this stuff in the morning as i have a headache now and ill have my head clear

as i bought 2 types of switchs the TP -link and my cell phone isnt good enough so i did bluestacks to get an android app but that didnt work

so i just have a headache i just wanted a simple plug it in configure it like a brother printer and your setup on your home network i dont understand why there is soo much herdles to get it to work on home network without internet … but ill re read trhe posts tommorow

i appreciate the help so far

[drjb]

Well, nothing is easy in home automation. You have two roads to take, and the choice is only yours.

1. Buy whatever devices you want, and use THEIR software/cloud
2. Do your homework, research products you’re interested in, and find out if they can be used stand-alone (no company cloud).

Most smart gizmos out there fall into category 1. If you want local control, then be ready to
invest a lot of time to get everything working with HA. None of this is plug-n-play … If you want this to be like your printer, you have the wrong expectations/understanding of HA

[Technowizard]

Again there are easier to flash dimmer switches out there. Even if you can’t currently OTA flash them with something like Tuya-Convert, a lot don’t require you to “desolder” anything like this one does. Martin Jerry switches for example are much easier, and there’s plenty of videos out there to show you how to do it. I changed out many of my Feit switches for these, as they’re capable of additional features (multi-press & long/short presses on both the main and dimmer up/down buttons) that Feit can’t do without extensive modding similarly to the above LED switch light project. In fact I only kept the Feit in places where aesthetics were a little more important, and also where I needed them to function with a traditional 3-way toggle switch. If you need a 3-way switch, and were considering the Martin Jerrys, be advised to AVOID the old Martin Jerry STD01 switch, as that one used a non-ESP (i.e. non-flashable) chip. The standard single pole SD01 Dimmer is good though (and the one I was originally talking about), as are the rest to my knowledge (including their newly released 3-way dimmers) which use TYWE3S ESP based modules. As I said to you a few posts back, if you find these or even the Feit dimmers on ebay as used or old new stock, then they might be old enough to still flash with Tuya-Convert… worth a look if you REALLY don’t want to try serially flashing these switches.

[drjb]

The status LED is whitish and fixed color. Anyone tried to put in a different color LED e.g., blue?

If so, can you give specs of candidate LEDs ?

[Mathieu_Lafrance]

You’d have to change the resistor as well, blue leds have higher working voltage than any other leds. Some blue leds need higher than 3.3V, so likely to NOT work since most likely the logic board is powered off from 3.3V.

[drjb]

Thank you Mathieu, and nice explanation as well.

[beren (Chris)]

How is tasmota 9.x working? Do you lose commands like people were before? I flashed https://github.com/TheEebb/tasmota-tuyamcu-fix on mine, but it’s still on 8.5.0. My first one is working well but my 2nd was giving me unknown command for TuyaMCU and DimmerRange, will work on that tomorrow.

My issue was I needed to reflow the ESP. Must have been a bad connection to Tx or Rx. Did all 3 without destroying a single pad! I ended up using the air gun to preheat the board, then the iron to get all the pads (esp ground) hot, then the air gun rotating to each one. I also used liquid flux https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00RYTD0T8 and applied with a brush liberally before I started.

[beren (Chris)]

Wow the LEDs, especially the main button, are bright. I wish there was a way to control it or have it only on/blink with Wi-Fi problems, but I found some self adhesive vinyl (For vinyl cutters) at the hobby store. I used the silver and put one layer over the green lights and two layers over the white light. Here’s some comparison photos:

Not to bad for $1.50. I’m pretty sure this is what the lightdims people use for 10 times the price. You can see the white light a little bit in the dark.

[Technowizard]

I just threw a piece of white gorilla tape on mine, but this looks much better! LOL!

[beren (Chris)]

So I put the vinyl on the pcb on top of the white led, but on the front plastic for the green leds because I didn’t want to rip off the rubber surrounding the green leds. This is what I used: https://www.hobbylobby.com/Scrapbook-Paper-Crafts/Die-Cut-Machines-Accessories/Vinyl-Specialty-Sheets/Silver-Self-Adhesive-Vinyl/p/80926445

The black looks like a total blackout, want to find one that lets some light through. Like the silver. Best part is the silver doesn’t look brownish like the glue from electrical tape.

You can see the glow at night but not at day, it’s pretty good

[Technowizard]

Somewhat related topic that I also posted in @flynmoose newbie guide. I’ve got another device with a TYWE2S module I’m trying to flash; however, its onboard components are going to make heat flowing the solder points very difficult to do without damaging them, at least without professional equipment. So my question which I don’t think has been asked yet is has anyone tried just removing the TYWE2S module cover/lid? Here’s a generic pic I found on the web of what I’m talking about:

It looks to be just held on with some sporadic solder around the edges. If that can be removed to expose the ESP8285 chip, then we could access the GPIO directly on the chip (pin 15 IIRC). Sure that isn’t a simple task any amateur with a soldering iron can do, but I’m confident anyone with at least some moderate experience, a steady hand, some fine wire, and a magnifying glass or scope could easily do… at least something sufficient enough to temporarily ground out GPIO0 to enter flash mode.

Again, it might be nearly as difficult as just removing whole module in the case of the Feit Dimmer; however, in other situations (e.g. my candelabra bulb I’m working on) it might be more doable. I plan to give it a whack next week if no one has tried this.

Update: the covers on these module pry off fairly easily… I gently pried mine off with a scribe. I’ll try flashing it later tonight or tomorrow, and report back how it goes.

[Technowizard]

Just in case anyone was curious, here’s a pic of one my Feit dimmers with that I also removed TYWE2S module cover from. GPIO0 is the accessible (pin 15 which is the bottom 2nd from right pin on ESP chip) this way, albeit a VERY small pin to attempt to ground. I haven’t actually tried flashing this yet, but should be a fairly easy with all the other required pins already being available below the module. Just need to get a fine test lead and good magnifying glass to temporarily ground the pin.