I’ve been trying for a while to get rid of all (well, most of) my smart bulbs. I want to replace them with zigbee or z-wave controllers in the switches themselves.
However, I have not yet been able to find any such controllers that fit in the narrow Danish switches (LK, specifically LK FUGA AIR, which are in most of our walls).
So far, the smallest I have found are either these (45.5 x 45 x 20.3 mm), or the Sonoff mini zigbee (42.6 x 42.6 x 20 mm). Both are too large, when the wiring and actual switch (front) need to be installed.
Does anyone have a suggestion for one (zigbee or Z-wave) that would fit in the LK FUGA boxes? CE certified, of course, otherwise our electrician won’t install them.
The danish market is special due to the technical trade barrier in the electrical equipment standard.
Its a small market and therefore you will not find many results on your searches.
Remember that CE certification is the tasked the importer to the EU, so if you buy outside of the EU, then its up to you to CE certifiy the products. A chinese manufacturer can just put the CE mark on the product with no consequences.
As if it makes any difference if a European marks it with CE.
The CE mark is a joke and should be removed in my opinion.
Back when it was introduced the markets was not the same. Manufacturers would build good stuff and the CE mark showed they did some testing on their products.
Today it’s all money. I doubt even 50% of the companies that has CE marks on their products do any testing at all.
True it is a joke and it should be scrapped, in my humble opinion.
The CE mark is al though still used by electricians to check for approved equipment and the insurance firms and the government bodies checking building rules look at it too and will take action on issues.
From a consumer point of view it is still crappy though.
It’s not worth much that someone is being held responsible, when your house has burnt down.
OK, probably fair points, but disregarding the discussion about how CE certification actually works these days (keeping in mind the electrician and insurance companies require this), are there any options you are aware of?
The only thing I could say is to mount external switches. Not pretty at all.
But I believe all switches is the same size. It’s probably going to be very hard to find something smaller than standard.
I have found no switches that match Danish mounting cups.
All seems to cater to American, English or German mountings.
ZigBee switches for the Fuga frames have only just arrived and that is years after the 3 other standard frames.
Most manufacturers outside Denmark does not even know that we are using a special form factor for electrical equipment.
Schneider Electric has launched a whole series of Zigbee devices that fit the Fuga layout for Denmark. They are not cheap, but they work, with both ZHA and Zigbee2MQTT.
For your use case, there is a Double Relay Switch and a Dimmer Switch, that can directly replace existing switches in your installation, and then control standard light bulbs or spots, but still be smart. I have tested both of these and they work with HA. There is also a Battery driven switch, which I have not tested, but that seems to have caused some issues for people who tried them.
Search the net for these and you will find a lot of info from people who are already using them.
The issue with the Danish boxes are that they are a lot smaller, than most and even a Shelly/Sonoff will often not fit in there if you also need a switch.
My personal opinion though is that by only doing this your home is no longer smart . If you don’t have an automation or a phone you cannot turn on the light - what is smart about that?
I try to ensure that everyone who visits my house, can switch light on and off with as they are used to, but still having all the options of automations, so that is why I would never remove a switch from the wall, but always replace it with something that can work as usual and still be smart.
But that is my preference, the other solution might work fine for others.
Hi, don’t know in Denmark, but in Italy we usually have big boxes in the wall (scatole di derivazione don’t know the English definition) where wires are connected and routed to lights, wall plugs and switches. You can put your ZigBee devices in them. If you search YouTube for Italian tutorials to install Shelly devices you will see them. You can put your ZigBee gateway next to the box to have a strong signal quality for all of them.
@Hellis81 Thanks for the suggestion, but the whole point is to have the switch hardwired so it still works in case the (zigbee) network or Hass is down. Otherwise I might as well just keep the IKEA and Philips Hue bulbs and remotes that are already installed, they work perfectly 99+ % of the time. Just not when messing with/updating Hass, etc.
I know this is common in most of the world (86 x 86 mm), but that’s not something you get in Denmark. I did actually buy a bunch of them to install in the walls I was renovating anyway, but the electrician said he thought it would detract from the value of the house to have those “clumsy big boxes” (his words), so I decided to stick with the traditional Danish boxes (~50 x 50 mm).
I mean really big boxes, one or two for each floor, where cable routing starts to reach each plug, switch or light on the floor. They are about 50x18 cm.
Danish homes have those too, but the switches are not wired to it.
Here the wires go to the wall switches and then from there to the wall outlet.
The wall switch is just connecting or disconnecting the live wire towards the wall outlet.
The wires coming in might actually go further on to more wall switches, so one fuse in the box you showed pictures of might drive 3,4 or more outlets.
Too bad. In Italy we have boxes like the ones in my picture for dimmers and relays connected to the switches on the walls. Maybe, if you are making some works in the house you can plan something similar to install all your ZigBee devices in one place.
Hey,
I just stumbled upon your post today.
I am currently facing the same issue and are looking for Zigbee dimmers and switches. Did you find a solution that worked for you?
I opened one of the switches today and there is very very little space in there, I think I have about 2cm in depth and there is a bunch of cable, no chance I can squeeze in a relay sadly. This is quite a bummer… I guess my only way is to go with a switch, the only ones I can see that might fit are Schneider ones but 700kr per switch ufff… please let me know what you used and how it works, that would be super nice Thanks a bunch!!
