Can anyone suggest a tower fan (or air cooler) that can be controlled locally from HA without requiring an internet connection?
It doesn’t have to be a smart device. It’s also okay if it remembers the intensity/strength setting and can be controlled with a smart plug. I just want it to be child safe, quiet, good looking and strong enough for a 35m2 (=300sf) open kitchen / living space that can get rather hot during summer. It doesn’t have to be super-cheap. And I don’t want to have to use a tiny IR remote that might get misplaced. Thanks!
This one may one to look into for your needs if its in stock and at a reasonable price in your region:
The IR blaster controls would be the overall easiest way to implement it into home assistant and to control other IR based devices like this that you have in the home via the scenes that you want to run if they don’t have a native integration for control.
Robert, thanks. The IR blaster is a smart workaround to the online connection, I’ll need to think where to place it to be in line of sight to the fan – it does reduce flexibility in positioning the fan from day to day. But maybe that’s how it’ll have to work. I just hoped someone is selling e.g. a Zigbee/MQTT product.
As for Dreo, I wasn’t yet able to find a reseller in Europe for the stronger fan mentioned in the video. I’ve asked their support team and hope to hear back from them soon.
I have a WiFi Fujitsu AC unit that is being controlled via a custom yaml configuration integration via the FGLair API in my instance at this time and was looking into the IR blaster system myself as a backup down the line should that get dropped by Fujitsu since it’s good to have options.
The blaster hub iirc just needs to be in the same room as the devices that you want to control and just to be in line of sight for best consistent use so you could place one in each room where you have a device you want to control.
Then you just need to have it learn the remote codes for those devices and go from there for your automation’s.
I have a Vornado fan with IR remote controlled by a RM4c blaster; had to put it on a power monitoring smart plug so I can tell by the wattage what speed it’s at. I’m not a fan of this method, so I also got a Holmes WiFi (tuya) fan. It comes with a WBR3 WiFi module that, at least so far, cannot run esphome/liibretiny, so I unsoldered it and replaced it with an esp32 running tasmota, so now it’s a MQTT over WiFi fan. There are a few EU fans on the blackadder list but not a lot of clarity which can be flashed vs require a module transplant. While fans tend to be easier to transplant (typically only need the tx/rx pins), they can be clunky to program; fortunately there are some good examples out there.
@peterxian and @TH3xR34P3R: Thanks. It shouldn’t surprise me, but it still does. Is there really no relevant market segment for a fan using modern and open standards & protocols, instead of the IR technology of the 1970s? I have zero experience with soldering and would just like to purchase a fan that works (as a fan and as a smart home device), but it seems there aren’t enough people like me.
Get the fan you want and smarten it up if it’s not smart. I use Broadlink RMMINI’s to control my fans (and a lot of other things) and it works fine. Sure it would be nice to have something fully integrated that doesn’t require the internet but by the time I filter for those I’m left with, what, 2-3 devices to choose from? I have nice high-end Dyson fans all over, they are pretty darn smart now
I made this mistake on a humidifier and it was total junk but it could be controlled via an API. I ditched it and got a IR based humidifier and it’s perfect, a few calculations and I know how many hours it can run on a tank and I’ve been spot on with it. Now I have two more of them and they are a lot smarter and larger capacity than you can get in the smart variety.
Honestly I think there are a LOT of people like you who want the same thing and that’s why there are some seriously ridiculous “smart” things out there. An IR blaster (like the RMMINI) requires no soldering or anything, just a bit of automation in HA.
For everything else that does not have an integration the best option is to use an IR blaster hub to allow HA to use the codes through it for automation control.
The issue is that, until recently, there were no modern open protocol standards for smart fan control. The good news is that Matter v1.2 added support for fans last October. The bad news is HA might be the only controller that’s updated Matter 1.2 so there aren’t many products available yet. The only one I could find was this GoveeLife Smart Tower Fan 2.0. Good luck!
As a quick update: Neither the Dreo Polyfan nor the Govee Smart Tower Fan are being sold in Europe – and the Govee support team also states, that they have no plans to do so in the future. I’m probably ending my hunt for a smart fan here and will go for the suggested route of a dumb fan with a IR blaster.
Then you get to have what suits you best and geek out on making it smarter. And, one day, if you feel like soldering up an ESP you can really go to town.
