So we’ve just bought a home and the basement switch is 3 way: one switch at the top of the stairs and there’s another switch downstairs as you enter from the garage.
The problem: the basement is finished and the living room downstairs only has 2 receptacles and one of them is on that switched circuit along with two ceiling lights.
We have the AV system down there, which is currently wired to said switched receptacle and right now every time I go downstairs and turn everything on to watch something, I unscrew the bulbs to get the lighting set up. When the GF gets to the top of the stairs, she toggles the switches because it’s dark and shuts everything down. Argh!
So what I’m looking for is the ability to control the lights from both the upstairs and downstairs switches, but without switching the power at the receptacle. It seems like some kind of smart switch maybe the way forward but been flailing around looking for the right combination.
Seems like replacing the existing switches are the first step, but anyone have any thoughts on the next?
Run a new circuit for the receptacles
On the switched receptacle one outlet is usually hot and the other one is switched. You’ll be able to tell if the brass tab on the side of the plug is broken off. Just replace the outlet with a new one. Connect the ground, neutral and hot wires to the outlet, cap off the switched wire and leave it in the box
You aren’t renting, you bought this home. Run a new wire and get it powered how you want.
Or, replace the switches with smart switches, replace the bulbs with smart bulbs, and leave the circuit powered permanently and link the switches to command the bulbs over the network (without using the switches relays at all).
The best long term solution is to run wires in the wall. While you’re at it, you could install more plugs in the living room.
But if you don’t have the budget for that right now, I would get an inovelli blue series ZigBee smart switch and an aux switch, a ZigBee hub like Home Assistant, and some ZigBee smart bulbs.
Using ZigBee bulbs with the Inovelli ZigBee switch will give you really low latency between turning “on” the switch and the light actually turning on. It’s almost instantaneous, unlike some cloud based solutions that can take a second or two, and occasionally just fail.
Thanks. I want to explore some smart solutions before the power tools come out. At this stage, I’m trying to keep scope creep to a minimum as this is part of a much larger fix up project.
Once I install the new flooring downstairs, replace all the receptacles that need replacing, swap out all the ceiling lights that are now dangling because they’re going to be replaced, redo the trap under the kitchen sink because the PO made a mess of it and we’ve got a negative slope, etc etc…I’ll likely come back to the idea of running a new circuit, but for now getting always-on power to the outlet for movie night is really my only concern.
Thanks very much of the specific suggestions of the ZigBee hub and bulbs. That was exactly what I was looking for,
Have you checked that both outlets are switched? Very often they are wired where only half is switched and the other is always powered. If that’s the case, there’s nothing you need to do except switch to the other outlet.
If both halves are switched and there is no constant hot in the box, then there isn’t much you can do. If the power is turned off at the switched, a smart plug isn’t going to be able to function either.
I suggest having an electrician check it for a constant hot and wire that up instead of the switched hot.
I unscrew the bulbs to get the lighting set up.
I might be missing something here, is this on the basement and why?
So basically there’s light bulbs on the stairs and there’s 2 ceiling lights in the basement. Are you using e27 bulbs for all the lights?
Walk out basement. The house is on a slope and it’s basically a ranch sitting on top of a garage and a sort of mini apartment - living room and master suite.
Downstairs living room has two ceiling fixtures, two receptacles and two switches (at the top of the stairs and as you come in from the garage).
And yup E27 LEDs in the ceiling that I just screw and unscrew to keep the AV system on.
Sorry - should have been more clear.
I still don’t quite understand the need to unscrew and screw the led. Probably some diagram would help. From what I can recommend, without rewiring you could.
Add a smart relay (shelly) to 3 way switch, replace the lights with smart bulbs (cloudfree). Enable decouple mode on the relay, relay stays on. Link the lights to the relay with device group. So toggling on/off would only toggle the smart lights but the AV stays on.
Probably add a condition that the lights in the basement only get toggled off if nobody’s sitting on the couch.
On the switched outlet - is only one of the outlets switched and the other always hot? That’s the normal way that a switched outlet is wired.
If so, just rewire the outlet to not use the switched feed. Wire both outlets to the line that’s always hot.