Complete Fibaro Home start up - HELP

[tajinder97uk 0]

Hi everyone,

 

Firstly, I apologise for asking questions that I am sure everyone has asked. In a nutshell I have bitten on more than I can chew on a massive home renovation and want to install Fibaro however am going to have to do this myself. I have some knowledge of how this all works but need a ton of guidance. I am based in London and below is what I was hoping to do and if I can get advice on what products to look into etc that would set me on the right way… and please assume you are talking to an idiot and dumb everything down J

 

Task 1 – Lighting

From my understanding the Dimmer2 module will work up to 250w however I must have dimmable bulbs installed. However, for my hallway lighting which on each floor (ground, first floor and loft) I have a 3 way circuit to turn lights on and off, do I need to install a separate dimmer module to each of the circuits behind the switch (as I was planning on have a 3 way switch) OR do I have to install a relay switch to each of the circuits?

 

Task 2 – Underfloor heating

I will be installing water underfloor heating downstairs (5 zones off the same manifold) and then electric underfloor heating in the bathrooms upstairs and the loft. I really am confused on how I can integrate this into the system. What underfloor heating do I need? What valves do I hook up to the manifold…how can this control the temperature? How do I wire the thermostats for the electric UFH and how can temperature go up and down?

 

Task 3 –Electric gate and intercom

I am planning on having a gated front with an intercom. I want to be able to get notifications on my phone should someone press the buzzer so I can speak to them and let them in if needed remotely.. I also want thobes to open the gates when I press it. Is there a certain motor I should buy? Certain intercom system?

 

Task 4 – Air con

I want to either install or run all the pipework and fit the actual units at a later date (depending on how I am getting on with costs) so want to know what air con systems are fibaro compatible? I want the units in the ceiling with grills so everything is hidden. I understand that I could use modules (figuring out how to wire them is another story) however I want to go with the easiest and most straight forward options given it will be a self fit.

 

Task 5 – radiators

I want to be able to control the tempreture of certain radiators, can you confirm all I need is a danfoss radiator valve?

 

Task 6 – front door lock

I was locking at installing a front door lock that can be opening with a code and with your phone. Any specific locks that you would recommend? i want to be able to override it should it not work so that is important to me

 

Task 7 – cinema room

Basically I am going to have a cinema room in the loft. I will be installing sonos throughout the house and have over 10 zones. However, in my loft I want to be able to control the tv, set up lighting scenes for when I hit pause etc. I don’t see how just a relay switch can do this as I need to control the tv, sky etc. Can I please get information on this?

 

I understand I am after a lot however I have tried doing a ton of research prior to taking up your time so really would appreciate the help on how I can do each of the above along with information on EXACTLY what I need given I am based in London etc.

 

Thank you in advance.

Kind regards,

Taj

 

[alex88 70]

You are asking a lot. Most everything you need is on the forum, albeit it hard to find in some cases ...

 

 

1) yes, the lights should be dimmable, however i believe you can set the dim increment so you trick the dimmer into behaving like a relay... you would need to read up more on this before installing it as such. for the second question - not sure, but you can find the answer on the forum. i have a two way switch with a single relay at one end. it works just fine. 

 

2) for water based heating I use fibaro relays to control honeywell electric actuators, the temp is measured using fibaro motion sensors or aeotec 4 in 1 modules. you need to setup linked devices to link the thermometer with the relay and setup the heating panel to link the room to the zones you have created;

for electric heating i use a fibaro UBS with a dalls 18B20 temp sensors connected plus a fibaro relay to control the electric underfloor heating mat. the underfloor heating was the bog standard mat that the plumbers installed, however i threw away the temp probe and didn't buy a wall controller.

 

3) i struggled with intercoms. in the end i have a mobotix. i am not sure i would recommend it though. I had to setup a 3xc PBX to get it to work. If you use apple products (which i don't) i hear there is an intecomm app built into the fibaro tablet/phone apps - have a look at that. all i can say is think hard about whether you really need your intercomm connected to your home automation system. as far as getting notifications it is as simple as making sure that you install an intercomm with outputs on it that you can connect either a relay or dimmer module (my mobotix mt25 has just this); when the button is pressed you can trigger a scene to either send you and email of send a push message to your phone. with my 3cx pbx, in theory (though I haven't set it up) i can get my phone to ring when the front door bell is pushed and I am not at home.. when i am at home it rings as long as i am connected to my local wifi .. pretty cool!

 

4) there are a couple of options here, the cheapest and easiest i found was the zxt-120, however some people swear by the global cache IR products. global cache will take longer to configure, but zxt-120 can be a pain in the backside to figure out which code works and for my mitsubishi zen i still can't get heating and cooling to work on a single parameter

 

5) as mentioned above - i use fibaro motion sensors / or aeotec 4-in-1 for temp plus honeywell actuators and relays to control the rads. i believe there were issues (read: limitations) with danfoss products where you couldn't control setpoints very well. maybe they have been fixed, but it was bad enough at the time (2-3 years ago) to put me off installing them.

 

6) my electric door is controllable by connecting a fibaro relay to it (however it has long been removed). i would not suggest doing this, however, as it may pose a security risk. there are lots of posts on the forum about zwave locks, which i presume are more secure

 

7) my tv room is controlled by two buttons connected to a fibaro dimmer module:

- button 1 - lights + tv

- button 2 - tv only

 

When I press button 1 the:

- lights turn on to a preset dim level

- the tv is turned on (i connected a relay to a switched fuse spur which the tv is powered from)

- the amplifier is turned on (using a VD - many posted on this forum on controlling amps via virtual devices - i have both onkyo and pioneer working just fine)... i would say the onkyo is very reliable.

- the amplifier input is set to the correct one

- a rj45 to hdmi extender is powered off and then on again to make sure the signal is clean

- if my pc is off (i use my pc as the interface for my tv) i get a voice announcement over my sonos to tell me that the pc is off and that I need to turn it on else i wont get a picture on the tv. to do this the amplifier input is changed to the sonos input and then switch back to the tv input...i found an input on my amp where the picture continues to be transmitted despite the audio input being changed; quite handy really

 

if you need to control a device that is ir based then i would suggest you use a global cache ir device, program it accordingly and you should be able to turn it on/off, change inputs etc. Fortunately i don't need to do this.

 

When i press button 1 again. 

- the amplifier input it switched to another input where my sonos is connected so i can listen to music

- i get a message over my sonos saying that the lights will fade over the next 15 seconds

- the lights then fade over the next 15 seconds 

- the tv is turned off

it's a beautiful thing when it works! 

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Button 2 does the same as button one, but without impacting the lights.

 

Sounds like you had all of the ambitions I had over 4 years ago when I started seriously researching home automation systems.

 

Good luck!