From someone who’s wife is ready to make him sleep outside over the RF issues with the fan canopy modules… I couldn’t agree more!
Most 3-way setups with a neutral available will have 14-3 going to the aux switch, which should make that option easy for most.
Smart switches would just need line and neutral to each extra device. You associate them to the master switch so they control the master switch. Or, control the master doing the actual switching through the hub.
I would think that it would do it via firmware at the smart switch, but I’ll have to defer to the engineers here. I think the issue with why it doesn’t do it now is bc the deliverable was misunderstood by the manufacturer and we’re in the ol’, “there’s not enough space” game with them. But, I will have to check with them again on the reasoning. The weird part to me, that I’ve never understood, is how does 3-Way Aux switch work with Z-Wave bulbs via Associations, but not non-Z-Wave?
I suppose another way to accomplish this would be that when SBM is enabled, the traveler wires would not function, but data traveling across one of the wires would tell the smart switch to send a dim up/down command to the hub.
You’re the engineer lol – I just draw pretty pictures and tell the engineers what we want haha. I just figured that the current schematics (and how GE works) is that they use the neutral and traveler wires and cap the line.
If this is possible, yes, but my understanding (again, not an engineer so my knowledge is limited) is that the travelers won’t provide 100% power to the switch, but rather regulate power to dim up/down. This works fine with a GE switch that doesn’t have any electronic components built in, but since this aux switch has an LED bar, it will need some sort of, “smarts”. Therefore constant 100% 120V needs to be sent to it.
Is that assumption correct?
As for non-neutral, I believe we are able to achieve full functionality as long as there’s a minimum wattage met (similar to how it works now):
I forgot to post it above 
The switch wouldn’t have relays in it – it’s still a momentary switch like GE’s, but it just has a third terminal on it to receive power for the LED bar.
– I’m working on getting you back inside, I promise!
Any updates to this timeline?
Will this be compatible with Red and Blue series switches?
Yes, I’ve been meaning to come back to this as we’ve hit quite the dilemma here and I’d love to solicit some feedback based on the current situation.
Here’s essentially what it boils down to.
So the question becomes, is the aux switch with an LED bar worth it?
We don’t have data around how many people use aux vs dumb switches. My gut tells me it’s something like 75% use a dumb switch, 20% use aux switches and 5% use another smart switch.
The pros of creating one with an LED bar is that obviously all switches will match and you can save $5-10 per switch (but given that the smart home market is pretty price elastic, I’m not sure it even matters to people to save $5-10 – I know to some it does, but even when we raised prices earlier this year, we couldn’t stay in stock).
The cons of creating one with an LED is that it’s going to cost us $100k and I’m not sure what the true demand is for them. If we could get the MSRP to $25, I think it would be worth it, but in order to do that, we’d have to negate the tariff’s (I’m working on this).
We also have the ability to create a non-LED aux switch that we could easily sell less than the competition and at least we wouldn’t have to recommend another brand’s switch.
Anyway, I’m all over the board here and I apologize, but pricing is very important and unfortunately if we want all the bells and whistles, it costs a lot more than what was originally quoted.
Looking forward to everyone’s thoughts!
The other wrinkle here is that I’m not sure the LED aux switch will be compatible with the Red Series switches and so we likely will have to make a separate aux switch.
However, in theory, if the aux switch has a ZigBee chip in it, it should be able to connect to a ZigBee compatible hub and communicate that way. But if there isn’t any hub available, I don’t see how the Red Series Z-Wave switches could talk to the ZigBee aux switch.
More to come here.
The aux switch will 100% be compatible with the Blue Series.
If the difference is $5 to get a LED bar on an aux switch, then kill it. You’d literally have to sell 20k units to see the money again. Easy decision for me.
Produce an in-house simple momentary aux switch that is guaranteed to work and allow people to use that OR a full-feature switch at the 3-way locations.
This is exactly where I’m personally leaning. We can create the momentary switch and sell it for around $15-$17, which would be less than competition and we’d no longer have to recommend another brand.
Ultimately, what it hinges on is if we can somehow skirt the tariff for the LED aux switch. If we can skirt the tariff, the aux switch can be priced at $25 MSRP, which is a tad more than GE/HomeSeer, but you’re getting way more for that extra $5.
I’m supposed to talk to someone next week to see the options. I’m hoping we can pull it off. But my head is in the same space as yours 
It would’ve been nice to have LED bar (with notifications) on the AUX switch, but I had my suspicions from the start if that was going to be technically or financially viable.
Its a bit disappointing to give up those goals, but totally understood. The functionality is [mostly] possible with a full Red Dimmer configured as an AUX switch via association. (the firmware needs to be updated to include fade duration values sent with the association packets).
Actually, the Black Series work pretty well for this if you don’t need the notification animations at the aux locations. I know they were discontinued as they weren’t selling as much as the Red Series. But I wonder if that already-designed-and-built platform could be leveraged/re-marketed as a lower-cost Smart AUX switch/dimmer?
I agree. And while its less exciting to have no leds on the aux switches, I would prefer a same-brand (Inovelli) simple aux switch than have to mix with another brand just to wire up all the multi-way lighting that is more and more prevalent in modern smart homes.
@Eric_Inovelli , I would say (just my opinion) forgo the LED bar on the aux switch. To me I would rather have a matched switch that works and hand my money to a company that backs its products as you all do. If you can get around the tariff issue and create the LED aux switch that would be great but more important to have a switch function and feels like a premium product. The GE works but it took a bit to get them to work routinely.
For Maestro and RadioRA2, Lutron’s companion switches and dimmers do not have any indicators on them. And I’m guessing it’s for all the reasons you’ve been saying. If it were a good idea or worth it, they would (especially for the dimmer).
Hello, I understand that 500 series limited space for new features, witch would effect Z-Wave Aux version. Also the lead time on 700 series is crazy basic on my googling, with that said please do make Z-Wave version of aux switch, I think with what 700 series offers it worth the wait.
I don’t see the point without a LED bar. The Homeseer seems to be a pretty close match, which is all you’d also get without a config button and LED strip.
How much cheaper can a RED dimmer be produced for if you eliminate the unnecessary power components like the relay, MOSFETs, Load and traveler screws etc? Everything not needed to power up the zwave radio via 120V fed into the L and N terminals. Then, new software for it to be used as an associated aux switch.
Answering on mobile so apologies if I’m being short, but the Tigers are crushing the Texans and I have some spare time to chat!
The fight is not over, I am definitely trying my best as I really think this would be an amazing aux switch and really help us be differentiated.
I’m trying to put the story together for investors that it’s worth sacrificing margin. It’s an uphill battle, but I’m working on it!
Possibly. I’ll reply more to this and @PJF’s comment. It’s a good idea, I’m just not sure how low we can get costs.
Yes, this is definitely the argument for an aux switch in general. Even if we have to forego the LED bar, at least we would be able to no have to tell customers to buy a separate brand. At the same time, seeing the cost of the non-LED switch, HomeSeer/GE/Honeywell are making a killing on them. Upwards of 70% margins (dayummmm).
Agree - I’m talking to an importer this Thurs, so I should have an answer then. Another option is manufacturing in Taiwan which may help (labor is higher, but there’s no tariff).
This is an excellent point. Thank you!
Agree - it’s pushing 52 weeks right now which is insane. We’re definitely trying to consider an aux switch which works with both the Red and Blue series and if we can’t, we’ll absolutely come out with a Z-Wave version as that business is not going anywhere any time soon. Lots of demand from very large companies.
I definitely understand this point. Selfishly we’d rather make money than give it to our competitors. In addition, we have a lot of B2B potential and it’s hard to say, “you can buy our switches, but if you want an aux switch, you’ll have to by [competition]”. But yes, it wouldn’t be different at all from HomeSeer/GE/Honeywell. We’ll get the price down for sure, which should help a bit to differentiate.
This is an excellent question and exactly the exercise we went through when working on this.
So, we came to two conclusions:
The reason I questioned removing the excess components from a red dimmer is because it should be possibly to actually do that. Delete all the extra from the BOM and assemble a version with the bare minimum of parts needed. That would make a signaling only device that could be associated to directly control another switch or anything else it could be associated with.
The problem is this would make an association only device and not one that can be wired as an aux switch. I don’t consider this as a huge deal because you have to change a for the aux switch so why not setup an associated switch instead. But, others may not like that.
If you do the stripped down version it will require a neutral since there will not be a load to leak current. That’s fine for me since I have neutrals in my boxes now. I’m actually running associated lzw31-sn.
I installed one aux switch 3-way circuit in the new house and I’m going to replace it and associate a black dimmer to a red dimmer instead, just to get the matching LED strip. There is another location where I could do a 3-way and it will be associated dimmers too.
I’m fussy and I like the matching long LED strip so I’m even using some dimmers where switches could be.
@stu1811, you are correct that a powered device would eliminate using it in a non-neutral setup. But, it should work in any neutral setup since an aux switch also requires 2 wires to connect.
Update – unfortunately (I’m beginning to hate this word) the tariff guy did not pull through and offered a solution that wasn’t feasible for us to work with (the two options were: ship over multiple shipments, but keep the value under $800 OR drop-ship customer orders directly from China).
So, we decided internally to not move forward with the LED bar option at this time. Our thought process is the following (for those curious):
I’m not writing off this project yet as I do believe there is a market for a unique aux switch – but it will have to wait.
I’ll be creating a poll shortly regarding the design for the new aux switch. and closing this thread to create a new one around the new design.
I know there are several of us who have ended up doing this while waiting. It mostly works, but there is at least one ‘fix’ that is needed to the firmware to keep the LED bars more in sync. I documented this back in May and I thought I remembered @EricM_Inovelli acknowleging it. But it hasn’t been fixed yet.
What do you mean be that? 
I’ve had to manually configure them. Not seen anything about two smart switches detecting each other. Am I missing out on a secret feature? 
Also confused by that. If the new non-LED-Bar Aux switch is $18 doesn’t’ that make the “dual smart switch” alternative more like an extra $24? ($18 for the non-led aux versus $42 for the Smart Red Dimmer configured as an Aux)
