3.16.2014

we are in control (of the lights)



The Green House Lady has been after us (appropriately so...) for having our outdoor lights on all day. It is amazingly dark in a 'hood with very few street lamps. Before the time change, when the sun set before we left work, we'd come home and stumble like drunks to the darkened front door. So we'd leave the outside lights on all day to keep the neighbors from talking.

Part of the reason for the delay was for us to figure out what to do with the switches at the front door. An automated or remotely controlled switch is not available in our switches of choice (Adorne). Further complicating things is that whatever switch cover is used has to be shaved back on one side because it interferes with the trim.

After further thought (prompted by said Green House Lady), we went with this switch by Honeywell:


What's cool about this thing is that you set it once and it adjusts the turn-on times in the evening and turn-off times in the morning based on sunset and sunrise at your latitude and longitude. You also get to provide an offset to set your preference on how much before sunset or sunrise you want your lights to turn on. With the ability to locally override and set a different schedule for everyday, it has quite a bit of flexibility. Furthermore, it automatically accounts for daylight savings time and burns your program into its memory (so no need to worry about a battery).

Convenience and saving electricity. Sweet!

5 comments:

  1. Cool switch. If you do want to transition over to automation for your lighting and still keep your Adorne switches, Aeotec makes a teeny-tiny Z-Wave module that should fit in your boxes. http://aeotec.com/z-wave-in-wall-switches

    Then you can go full-on automation with the lighting and keep those fancy switches.

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    Replies
    1. Andrew: So how does that work? Couldn't find a photo of the module on the page...

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    2. Have you had success integrating the adorne switches with Aeotec? How do the adorne dimmers work with Aeotec?

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  2. Neat! That lady sure sounds smart.

    ReplyDelete