I don’t want lights to be controller only through phone. Or even worse some silly remote control, which you end up having 20 of them. I also want them hooked up to a classic rocker/toggle wall switch. I’m really amazed that this is a big ask, considering I literally can’t find a single device that has this. I’m currently using 2 devices to accomplish this. So I have a Shelly relay connected to a dumb rocker wall switch. Then the output from the relay is connected to a led controller. So when the wall switch is flipped off, it cuts the power to the led control. This work, but it kind of sucks:
the lights do turn on “immidiately”, but there is quite a delay before HA sees the LED controler as online. So you can turn it on, but you have to wait a while to be able to e.g. dim
it constantly spams the HA logs that it can’t connect to the device when they are off. Ok, granted, this is due to the led controllers being WiFi, but even if they were Zigbee it wouldn’t be much better. Maybe I wouldn’t see the logs, but it would constantly mess with the Zigbee mash
So I wanted to reduce the clutter, replace these with a single device, “a led controller with toggle switch contacts”, but I literally can’t find any.
I’ve seen some Gledopto Pro models that have contacts for an external switch, but it’s only for momentary, not rocker/toggle switches. And I don’t want momentary switches. Maybe I’m old school, but I prefer to bang on the switch and not look for the tiny little dot that I gently have to press.
I’m amazed that this is hard to find. Almost every single relay has contacts for these, why don’t led controllers?
Does anyone have a recommedation?
The only other idea I have is to cut the wire between the controller and the leds, and put a switch there. But in that case the controller wouldn’t know that it’s off. So that is not a great solution either. Or alternativelly put a Shelly there, but then I’m back to using 2 device again, just hooking them up in different order
Since you have a Shelly relay already, use an automation in HA to turn the lights on / off when the rocker is toggled. Do not connect the the output from the switch to the LED Driver, leave that connected and powered all the time so HA can control it at all times.
Doing the above will stop the spamming in the HA logs and since everything is local should be almost instantaneous for the light turning on.
Obviously the only downside of this set-up is it is reliant on your Home Assistant server running all the time, and if it goes down your light switches won’t work.
What type of LED’s are you trying to control? I believe the Gledopto controllers run WLED and depending on the firmware version it should be possible to use a switch instead of a momentary button. Personally I would suggest Quindor’s Dig product line.
There’s no need to change the wiring. Most Shellies support decoupled (detached switch) mode. If you flash them with ESPHome, you can also automate the Shelly directly so that it reverts to being a dumb controller and switches off power if there’s no connection to HA.
@zolaktt You could also change your switch to one that supports decoupled mode and get rid of the Shelly, but they you’d have to rely on HA automations all the time.
Not sure how I should answer that. “Normal” led strips, 12/24V. Some are cob, some smb. I was looking at the 5-in-1 gledopto pro line, but they only mention push/momentary buttons. I’ve read somewhere that if you connect a rocker switch instead, it will actually change brightness, not turn on/off, but maybe I misinterpreted that.
I don’t want to go the DIY ESP route, since I want to switch these to Zigbee. Apart from getting rid of 2 devices, secondary goal is to get these off WiFi.
I could do that, but honestly I think that is the worst solution. It’s fully dependent on HA, which I don’t like. If I’m forced to stick with 2 devices, I’d rather change the wiring and put the Shelly after the led driver.
I don’t want to change switches. I have normal, dumb, switches, and I want to keep those. I have the same switches in the whole house. I don’t want a one-off, needlessly expensive switch just because of this.
I think most of you are missing the point, since everyone is suggesting how to DIY it with Shellys and ESP. I appreciate all the suggestions, but my main question is does anyone know of a Zigbee led driver with contacts for a rocker switch. Main goals are getting rid of 2 devices and getting them off WiFi. Flashing the Shelly with ESP achieves neither.
I don’t think it’s a matter of “inventing” it. If almost every relay can handle a rocker switch, so could a led driver. It’s just a question if any brand is making those, or they all just assume people are happy with silly remotes and momentary switches
I think the issue here is that the LED Controller is allowing the colors to change, hence not something easily controlled by a simple rocker switch and probably why nothing like this appears to exist.
The only thing I can suggest for simplicity is using a Dig2Analog from Quindor to control the LED strip as a single pixel. Combine that with an ESP device running WLED and follow the video above to use a Rocker Switch. You can run a buck converter to change the power that drives the LED strip down to 5v to suit a ESP Dev Board and connect a relay to stop power draw from the LED strip when they should be off. The switch would then act as an on/off and you would be able to control the colors using either HA or the WLED app. This would end up being a single device albeit still on WiFi.
If you really want to get it off WiFi, you could use a POE based ESP32 dev board and run ethernet. This will also allow you to power the ESP32 and hence the relay can be used to switch the LED power supply on/off via the live input as opposed to live outputs.
If you really want to go the Zigbee route you could look at an ESP32-C6 or other boards that support Zigbee. I’m not aware of any similar projects, so you would need to do most of the coding yourself.
rocker switch as input of a smart switch (ie Shelly 1). The device can be configured to toggle output on rocker position change. It will turn on or off your light (led appliance). However some appliances might reset to default light properties on AC lost (switch turn off)
the same as above but use smart device only for intercepting rocker pos change. it requires your led appliance to be integrated with HA anyway. Then you can use automation which reacts on the message from smart input device, controlling the LED. cons: if HA/wifi is down you lost control of the light. pros: you can use input device instead of relay one. these are smaller and bit cheaper
if your want to control LED strip rather than an appliance, and have 3 wires from the rocker to the led available, you can locate RGB controller (and possibly power supply) near to the led, then use 2 wires for power, one for state of the rocker. But only if the led controller provide option to be controlled by AC (Shelly RGBW had small transoptor module in the package)
As I’ve mentioned before, I don’t see the point in any of these approaches. Needless complication with detached switches and driving everything through automations.
If I’m forced to stick with 2 devices then I’ll just move the Shelly between the LED controller and the strip. It will simply cut off the power to the strip, after the controller. The LED controller will think lights are on all the time. And I have a light template in HA that will combine the 2 devices (on/off state from the Shelly, everything else from the controller), same as I do now. In my opinion, that is a much cleaner solution than detached switches, and the switch works without HA or automations. But again, that wasn’t my main point. I know I can do this. I was looking for an all-in-one device, so I wouldn’t have to do this
sorry I didn’t read the whole conversation.
actually only my the 2nd option assumes detached switches. But I understand the first and the third must not fit your requirements.
It’s not even cheating. You have 4 channels, use them as you want.
You might want to have a look at Shelly Plus RGBW PM as well…
Both can be flashed with esphome if stock Shelly setup doesn’t fit for some reason.
