wxgsi It’s not often that a new home Automation system comes along that can genuinely challenge the elderly, but universally established X10 protocol. but LightwaveRF looks like it could just be the one to knock X10 off its perch in the budget sector. Automated home regular Ant Skelton takes us through a comprehensive overview of this new feature packed wireless home automation system, one that’s going to be a boon for anyone wanting to retro-fit modern controls in their home…
Submission by Ant Skelton – LightwaveRF is a new range of wireless, retrofit home automation modules very much in the spirit of X10. The LightwaveRF system debuted at the gadget show live back in April 2011, and production is now ramping up to serious volumes.
The people behind LightwaveRF, JSJS Designs, may be unfamiliar to Automated home readers. Their background is in assisted living devices for the seriously physically disabled, so it’s not much of a stretch for them to shift their focus from those who are unable to get up and switch on a light to those who are simply too idle. What should really grab your attention though, is that these are the guys who were behind the Byron/B&Q HomeEasy range of devices from a few years ago. like the HomeEasy range, LightwaveRF is available under many different brand names: you might get devices branded JSJS Designs, Siemens, or Electrium.
Like the HomeEasy system, the sheer range of LightwaveRF devices is impressive. There are replacement wall plates for 1, 2, 3 and 4 gang dimmer light switches, and for single and double wall sockets. There are slave dimmer modules for 2-way lighting setups, and battery-powered ‘transmitter only’ devices, akin to the old X10 Stick-a-switch. five different styles are available: white plastic, brass, stainless steel, chrome, and black chrome. Each comes equipped with understated amber and blue LEDs to give some indication of state, and each has a push-fit faceplate to hide the wall fixings. Presumably at a later date spare faceplates will be available so that you can change the style of your switches without changing the underlying electronics. until then, you can swap with a mate.
Other non-wall-mounting accessories are available, including a vast array of handheld remotes each providing slightly different functionality (betraying their HomeEasy heritage there!), a current-clamp power meter, battery powered LED lights, and PIR sensors. finally there are two more intriguing prospects: a “WifiLink” unit which acts as a gateway between your LightwaveRF network and the Internet at large for PC, browser, and smartphone control, and a dimmable 20W CFL bulb with all the smarts built in to it.
The LightwaveRF system operates in the 433MHz and 868 MHz bands, so it’s not going to have to contend with all your WiFi/Bluetooth/Zigbee/Pizza-reheating traffic, just garage door openers and wireless doorbells and the like. An additional benefit is that signals punch through walls with ease, and the lower power requirements mean that battery operated devices can operate from coin cells. The benefits of greater range mean that fancy mesh-networking tricks are unnecessary – LightwaveRF relies on its transmissions being able to cover your whole house, although a dumb repeater unit is available if you have range/blackspot issues.
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Preview
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1
Lightwave L21 smart Dimmer, 1 Gang, Stainless Steel – works with Alexa, Google Assistant, HomeKit….
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2
LightwaveRF by Deta connect 9525 Wireless Scene Setter with White Inserts (Chrome)
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3
Lightwave L42 smart Socket, 3000W, Stainless Steel – works with Alexa, Google Assistant, HomeKit….
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LightwaveRF’s proprietary protocol is two-way capable, but for cost reasons most modules are either transmitters or receivers; few are both. For people looking to replace X10 this means that the holy Grail of device status reporting is still just a dream. In practice, it’s rarely an issue, and JSJS designs promise that two-way RF capable lighting units will follow in about a year’s time. LightwaveRF devices are not compatible with the older HomeEasy range.
Setting up a LightwaveRF system is very simple. You can have as many transmitters and receivers as you like, and receivers (which are typically the devices that do something, like dim a light or control a plug outlet) must be paired with transmitters (typically battery operated, remote control style devices). any given receiver can remember 6 transmitters at a time, and it can also remember 3 mood settings (although by my reckoning, a mood Controller in entry/exit mode can do 5 mood settings, so perhaps 5 moods is the upper limit). Pairing is done by performing some special action (holding buttons down, switching things on and off a certain number of times) on the receiver to put it in pairing mode, before pressing a button on the transmitter with which you wish to pair. From these simple rules relatively complex setups can be built, because a single transmitter button can control any number of receiver devices. once you factor in the WifiLink as one of the transmitters, the possibilities become even more interesting.
5 channel remote control
JSJS Designs’ enthusiasm for making remote controls remains undiminished from the old HomeEasy days; I count 5 different remote controls currently, excluding purely cosmetic variations. here is a modest attempt to classify them:
Name ButtonsOn/Off/DimChannelsMoodsPriceNotes
5 button Remote52No£9.98Has ‘All-Off’
6 button Remote63No£7.40
Handheld Remote10 + 4 way selector16*1£12.98*in pages of four, selectable by slide switch I presume – no mentionvof it is made in the manual! has ‘All-Off’
Mood Remote6 + 4 way selector4?3?£12.98No details available
Socket Locker51No£9.98Permits various baffling combinations of ‘locking’ devices so that they can’t be controlled by front panel, RF, or sometimes both. For dimmers, the meaning of ‘lock’ is further strained.
The five button remote is the most compact of the available remotes at about 8×3.5x1cm. It has a glossy finish and pleasantly tactile buttons, and an amber LED to indicate when it’s transmitting. It can control two channels independently (on, off, bright, dim) and has an ‘all-off’ button (where here ‘all’ means ‘all devices which are paired to this transmitter). The remote is powered by a single CR2032 3 volt battery.
Mood lighting Controller (Master wall Switch)
The mood lighting Controller is a battery-powered transmitter, which fits in a single lightswitch backbox and as such is ideal for providing a lightswitch at a location where there is no mains wiring. since the unit protrudes less than a millimetre from the back of the face-plate, it would also be feasible to mount it directly to a wall with double-sided tape (provided) or velcro.
The controller is powered by a single 3volt CR2032 battery, has a blue LED to indicate transmission, and has two large buttons and four smaller ones. The large buttons can be configured as on/off/bright/dim buttons, are as entry and exit mood presets; this mode is controlled by a small slide switch on the rear of the unit, which is also where battery replacement may be effected. The button themselves feel a bit flimsy and loose fitting, but they have a satisfying clicky action (without the resounding clatter of my Clipsal modular switches) and so far have stood up to a reasonable level of abuse in our household without any problems.
The four smaller buttons are an ‘All Off’ button,and one each for three mood presets. Each receiver device can remember three different preset mood levels, so pressing ‘mood 1’ on the mood lighting controller simply instructs each paired receiver to transition to whatever level it has stored in its ‘mood 1’ memory. You can slide the selector on the back of the switch to ‘M’ to enable the two large buttons to also transmit mood messages, in which case you gain two extra moods at the expense of manual on/off control. setting a mood level is simply a case of setting the light levels you want on any paired receivers then holding down the mood button on the transmitter until the LED flashes.
I had initially assumed that changing the setting on the slide switch or replacing the battery would require removing the screws and taking off the entire face-plate, until it was pointed out to me that the black module can be clicked out of the transparent fixing bracket with ease, for exactly this purpose.
JSJS designs estimate that the batteries last 2 years under ‘average’ use, so hopefully it won’t be necessary too often. The units don’t report back battery status, which is a pity, as you won’t get any advanced warning of impending battery failure.
1-gang dimmer 250W
The single channel 250W dimmer is a LightwaveRF receiver which can replace existing in-wall dimmer light fittings. It does not require a neutral connection. It uses the same removable faceplate approach as the mood lighting controller to hide the fixing screws, and will fit comfortably into a 25mm back-box. Two, three and four channel equivalents are also available, at 210W per channel. higher wattage dimmers will not be made available, as JSJS designs expect that the market for incandescents is a shrinking one. Each channel has a couple of buttons, and a pair of reasonably discrete LEDs, one amber and one blue. The dimmer is compatible with all incadescent and low-energy halogen bulbs, as well as dimmable low-voltage transformers. JSJS designs report that it will also work with dimmable LEDs and most dimmale CFLs provided that there is something in the circuit to provide a resistive load on startup, such as a normal bulb (eg 20W halogen) or a 15-20W resistor. Indeed, they are in the process of releasing a suitable ballast module for this very purpose. The dimmer circuit is a leading-edge triac affair, yet is completely silent in operation.
Also available is a single gang slave dimmer, which doesn’t have any radio electronics in it, but which is able to participate in multi-way switching scenarios like the ubiquitous UK hall/landing combo. You can have up to six of these in any given circuit, although why you’d want that many is anybody’s guess.
All dimmers are soft-start, and fade on and off beautifully, as well as segueing smoothly between preset moods. As an added bonus, on activation they’ll return to whatever level they were at when they were last switched off. If a light is on and there’s a power cut, the dimmer will revert to the off state when power returns, which seems like an odd decision, especially if you’ve carefully programmed up occupancy emulating settings to fool burglars while you’re away. The justification is that because there is no mechanical switch to provide visual feedback this is somehow safer if you are lunatic enough to attempt work on the circuit during a power-cut using only a cursory glance at the lightswitch as a safety reassurance. After all, nobody has ever wired a regular lightswitch upside down.
In use, the amber LED glows softly when the light fitting is off, and the pleasingly subdued blue LED indicates that it is on. This seems the wrong way round to me as standard neon indicators glow amber when the power is on, but it’s a minor quibble. pressing and holding both the buttons puts the dimmer in pairing mode, making it receptive to the advances of any nearby transmitters, and the lights flash alternately to indicate this.