Normal wall switch in the hallway for the bathroom ceiling light. In the ceiling light is a white Hue bulb which is connected to Homey through the Hue bridge.
Inside the the bathroom I have a switch for a mirror light und there I installed a Shelly 1pm which works fine and which I can control via Homey.
I control the ceiling light through the wall switch. Actually it is quite “stupid” and does not do anything so far.
Now I want to connect the Hue bulb with the Shelly. Meaning, when I switch on the ceiling through the wall switch, the Shelly should activate the mirror light as well. However I did not get this working. The reason I think is that even when the power of the Hue bulb is off (through the switch) it keeps its last status in Homey (which is on). So the flow I had built is not getting activated.
You’re basically trying to make a “dumb” switch smart by abusing a Hue bulb. This won’t work properly (as you have discovered) because smart bulbs are not meant to be physically switched on/off at all: they should always be powered and managed via its smart features.
A possible solution could be to replace the Hue bulb with a regular bulb and create the smart switch using another Shelly that you place behind the dumb switch. So the dumb switch would switch the Shelly, and in turn Homey would switch on the other Shelly.
However, the same applies: the Shelly behind the switch should also always be powered, so it’s only going to work well if it’s permanently powered, meaning that you need both a neutral and live feed behind the switch (which isn’t always the case).
There are also some smart switches from Xiaomi that don’t require a neutral connection (see here), but I don’t know how well they work or if they are supported by Homey.
As an alternative, you could use a wireless smart switch to handle your bathroom lighting, for instance one of the Aqara switches. Switch on your “dumb” switch so it’s always on, and use the Aqara switch to switch on/off the lights (using a few Homey flows).
Absolutely, you are right with what you say. And I fully agree that it is not the best solution by far. Was just wondering if maybe someone has a great idea. I was already thinking about to get a second Shelly. And it would work, as all phases/wires are behind the switch in the hallway.
Since you already have Shelly, you probably have L and N available.
Not sure why you want to keep the Hue light, and not replace it with a dumb bulb. Easiest solution, and since it’s a simple white Hue easy to find a dumb alternative.
Use a second shelly behind the switch of the Hue lamp,
Homey can activate the Hue bulb/Shelly based on a change of state in another Shelly. No need to be on the same circuit. Put a second shelly behind Hue wall switch only to control the mirror light shelly. So it doesn’t do anything on the Hue circuit, but when it change state Homey can tell the other shelly to change state too.
You might use DDD to activate another shelly on push (or sw change) of state. Not my favourite, you need to manage 2 (3) environments (Homey and Shelly, AND Hue), and possible conflicts between flows, actions, etc…
Other solution: shelly behind Hue dumb switch, with Shelly auto on =1 sec. So if somebody switches of the Hue circuit, the S1 will switch it on again after 1 sec. But you need to control the Hue bulb via Homey or Hue app, so it only lights up when you want. The Shelly has also power on settings.
Problem in this case the Hue bridge overrules the Homey flows. Same for Shelly actions. That is why I try to stick with 1 management environment.
Some idea’s because I’m missing some info (I think).
