Quick Question about relais

[tender crag]

Hey, I just setup my HAOS and am configuring everything and getting used to my new house with all the stuff. But there's one main problem I / my SO have.
We tend to use the switches on the wall too much. I need 4 Shelly dimmers to make my dumb bulbs smart (bathrooms and kitchens have dumb bulbs bc of ip class). For all other switches I want smth I can build beneath and not swap the whole switch. Should I just go with shelly gen 1 to make the switches work as on/off without cutting power and making me unable to turn the lights on via app? Or is there another alternative?

[fervent ginkgo]

Hi, look for the Sonoff Mini with or without neutral. It allows you to use the physical switch or automate it via Home Assistant

[merry chasm]

Agreed with M here, but always tell your country, as different countries use different voltages etc. 😉

[merry chasm]

Or make your bulbs smart using zigbee bulbs , and bypass your switches.

[uncut saddle]

That's the route we went with and that works out pretty well for us. Zigbee bulbs + IKEA switches. I have 3D printed some covers that "disable" the physical switch (in a constant "on" state) and that have the metal base of the IKEA switch attached to them. So now the switches are still in the same spot, but if necessary, we can take them off and use them wherever

also Zigbee light bulbs are a good "backbone" for a Zigbee mesh

[tender crag]

I forgot to mention that all other rooms do have smart bulbs. My Problem is that we use the switches out of habit so after leaving a room my gf or me reflexive use the switch and boom. HA stopped working bc it can't connect to the bulbs anymore. So that's what I'm looking for a solution for. Since the dumb bulbs get shelly dimmer anyways.

Also the relay needs to support (momentary?) buttons? Not all switches stay in one position after being pressed. Most flip back to the initial position and need to be pressed again to toggle again. Idk if all relays can do that. I just know about shellys. Thus asking here for alternatives.

[merry chasm]

what country?

on the light switch, disconnect cables and connect them together. this will bypass the switch completely. I love watching my wife throwing switches still after half a year after i disconnected them. lol

in my region it would be brown (phase) and black (to light)

[tender crag]

im from germany. i thought about this too but wife says she still want working switches in case of everything not working or just cuz she feels like using them. also for guests etc etc. i stopped arguing with her at some point and just said alr i'll do it

[merry chasm]

Find some arguments to disconnect.. saying to her it's better for the hardware and switching would remind her of you doing a wonderfull automation job, lol

if switches would be used, go for M advice

[tender crag]

Yea I'll look into sonoff mini vs shelly when I'm off work. First look they cost about the same sonoff a lil cheaper I think

[primal fulcrum]

The solution to the wife problem is to use inteligent switches. I had the same problem since my begining of home automation 10 years ago. I used switch bypass, wireless hue switches and I finally gave in to inteligent switches which is the easier path to"wifee acceptation" an also kids and visit use.....

you can buy on-off cheap pack of 3 for about 10$ each or even graduated pack of 3 on Amazon for less than 15$ each. 🙂

[tender crag]

Yea but wouldnt the relays make the switched smart basically? The whole Point for me is to not swap the switches since they are new switches which are kinda high quality. So I just wanted to dump some relays behind the switches. Or is there any difference between them? Since Shelly relays can be put into trigger mode or whatever it's called which basically makes the switches normal smart switches

[tender crag]

Also I can only find switches for 10-15€ for a single switch. Which would be the same as the relays from shelly or sonoff.

[tawny garnet]

Exactly the same solution here.

I didn’t CAD those unfortunately. But they are a fab solution.

Ya gotta hate ikea for dropping Zigbee and those square dimmers. Ugh. Luckily I bought many spares.

[uncut saddle]

Are they actually dropping Zigbee? D:

(though we're actually using the Styrbar dimmers mostly. With HA we add random extra features to the "sideways" buttons)

Ah, they're moving towards MoT, but they're probably gonna still have Zigbee devices for quite a while I'd guess

[tawny garnet]

Got several of those too. Guy on eBay was/is selling mounts. I can print them but the designs are private. But it’s cool, I didn’t feel bad supporting his little enterprise. I even have a double Styrbar mount in the kitchen. Which is amusing because the motion sensors mean it’s barely touched. 😄

[uncut saddle]

It's kinda sad that German light switches aren't as standardized (which is kind of ironic, usually there are tons of standards for everything here). Means that I can't just design a cover once and sell it or something, but instead I basically need to design a new one for every type of switch

[tawny garnet]

Bit squishy next to the fridge.

Interesting. I always thought you European were ahead of us brits in standards. Though it’s not surprising; we have the best plugs after all. 😉

[uncut saddle]

Re: IKEA. When they phased out the older smart plugs, they went on sale for half-off, right before the new ones showed up for the same price. So maybe there'll be some juicy discounts for Zigbee devices, too

[uncut saddle]

Better than like 80% of EU countries, I'll give you that. But Schuko is pretty great. Mechanical stability due to the "rails", protection against shock even with a wrongly constructed plug due to the socket being recessed. Reversibility

[tawny garnet]

Not sure. The prices are erratic. I got 3 GU10s plus a Styrbar for about £7 in a sale. Couldn’t believe it. I hate going in those shops but couldn’t help but stock up. I now have about 5 Styrbars sitting idle. 🤣

The GU10s have been brilliant. Controlled with a Zigbee group I have about a dozen in the kitchen ceiling and they’ve been faultless.

[uncut saddle]

On the plus side, maybe I'll just have to try out MoT sometime. Thing about Zigbee is that firmware updates take for absolutely ever and often times just fail at some point

[tawny garnet]

Yeah I want to look at mot too. But I’m weary of having it on my LAN so will use a directly attached USB radio.

[uncut saddle]

the IPv6 aspect kinda creeps me out about Thread... great thing about Zigbee is that its kinda impossible for devices to attack your computers or the internet or something, since they don't "speak internet". With Thread, I suddenly have the 3$ AliX sensor potentially pinging stuff in my network

[uncut saddle]

yeah, exactly

[fervent ginkgo]

I have so many Ikea ZigBee devices as for a new home 😂

And looking for the discounts if apply

[tawny garnet]

Shoot, you took the words right off my fingers. That’s EXACTLY the problem. The great thing about Zigbee is even a trojaned lightbulb could do nothing. MoT? Anything they like probably.

[uncut saddle]

At least with my current setup, I have 4 LAN ports on the server I use for HA. Could use one of them to have a physically separate network for Thread

[fervent ginkgo]

Have you yeard of ZigBee 4.0 ? There is gonna be ZigBee for a long time... and is backwards compatible 😉

[tawny garnet]

Disabling forwarding should sort it. Or use a nft/iptables script.

[uncut saddle]

yeah pretty much

[uncut saddle]

even the best protocol in the world doesn't help if you have no hardware for it. Thus far, IKEA has been a pretty solid contributor to the "smartness" of my home. If they switch to MoT, I guess I'll at least add some Thread at some point

[fervent ginkgo]

Me too 👍 The MoT air quality sensor looks nice

[tawny garnet]

Same. Out of 103 devices on ZHA 64 are from ikea. Got about 15 more in the cupboard for spares or new protects. Still need to sort out some outside lights.

Ooh you can finally get the power sensing Zigbee plugs. Will get a bunch of those.

[uncut saddle]

Yeah, the power sensing ones are great

[tawny garnet]

Pretty much all the Zigbee stuff is marked as clearance here (UK). Prices not reduced yet. I imagine they’ll get high demand so that’ll keep the prices up. It’s difficult not to order more spares!

[uncut saddle]

We have automations for the washer and dryer - the plugs sense when the power draw goes to <10W for more than 5 minutes and then sends us a notification

[tawny garnet]

Interesting use.. Yeah will buy a bunch of them.

[fervent ginkgo]

Same here, but it's no recommended to use this type of plugs with stuff with motors 🤔

[uncut saddle]

you shouldn't switch them while under inductive load. But I'm not doing that

[tawny garnet]

Timmerflotte (where do they get the names) is a £5 temp sensor, I assume MoT. Not git any here to buy unless I <shudder> go in the shop lol. But will definitely have a play when I can get one.

I’m guessing the draw from the appliances is tiny on standby? I can’t think of the last time I turned the washing machine hard off so yeah. I’d be up for leaving it on.

[uncut saddle]

if you only switch them off while the motor is stationary, it's fine too

and IKEA rates them for the whole 16A / 3680W

[tawny garnet]

I’ve been naughty and have a couple of extraction fans on sonoff relays. Not caused me any trouble.

[uncut saddle]

worst thing that can realistically happen is that the relais welds itself closed, i.e. unable to switch off

[tawny garnet]

Yeah. Wouldn’t take long to notice that. 🙂

[fervent ginkgo]

Yes, I don't do that, but other people says that no matter that, it may fry the plug and it's dangerous

[uncut saddle]

there are also plenty of people going around telling you that you mustn't have anything between the device and the socket. No power strips, no extension cord, nothing. Because, of course, anybody can rip open their walls and install 50 outlets per room

[tawny garnet]

Those embedded smart sockets are the worst. Just those USB charging sockets make me wince. Not sure an electron cares if it’s moving on an extension lead or a nice bit of buried cabling, but you should still be careful of load per spur or whatever it’s called.

[fervent ginkgo]

It's not the same 😉

[uncut saddle]

Contact resistance is the biggest aspect in Germany at least. Extension cords are usually all fine to handle 16A, but if the contacts are ancient and corroded and stuff, the power strip can still blow up. Also loop impedance, i.e. you need enough conductivity that a short circuit causes enough current to immediately trip the breaker