How do I know if I have a neutral available at the top of the stairs?

[JohnHome]

Bry,

Thank you for helping me in this ticket:

Smart Presence Dimmer VZM32-SN Flashing Yellow & Cyan

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F6-E_8LXT14 It’s flashing yellow and cyan. What is causing my switch to behave like this? The load has two fixtures. One of which I disconnected. The other fixture has an incandescent bulb in it. It’s a 3-way switch with a dumb 3-way switch on the other end. I’ve confirmed the LOAD and LINE wires are correct. I disconnected all wires and used a voltage probe to confirm the load wire. With this switch completely disconnected only the LOAD wire has power and no…

I have ordered an Aux switch to install at the top of the stairs.

It occurred to me that it would be really nice if I could have a another presence switch at the top of the stairs. I already own a second presence switch so I could install it now rather than having to wait for the aux switch to arrive.

I know the wiring diagram says that I can’t have a 3-way with a smart switch in a “no neutral configuration”. Is my setup non-neutral or is there a neutral available at the top of the stairs. How do I determine that?

John

[grooves12]

[JohnHome]

I watched the video. The summary is: the white wire is neutral.

If you see my thread with @Bry , the wiring for my 3-way configuration is different. The white is HOT/LINE.

The question is whether I can have a smart presence switch instead of an aux switch at the remote end. Is this doable?

[Bry]

@JohnHome

The question is whether I can have a smart presence switch instead of an aux switch at the remote end. Is this doable?

So at present, the only place you have a neutral is your light box. There is no neutral in either of the two switch boxes.

When you provision two Inovelli switches, each switch box needs a hot and a neutral. To accomplish this, you would have to rewire at the light box. You would have to wire the light full-time hot and then send a hot and neutral over the two wire to your first switch box. At the first switch box you would have to send a hot and neutral over to the other switch box using two of the three conductors.

Then you need to switch your bulb from a dumb bulb to a Zigbee smart bulb, because the light would be wired hot full time. You would then bind that light and the two switches together using Zigbee binding.

[JohnHome]

Thank you for the extra info. I am using Zigbee smart bulbs. I don’t feel comfortable making this change to the wiring so I think I’ll just wait for the Aux switch to arrive in the mail. They are on backorder, but hopefully it won’t be too long.

I really appreciate all your help!

I have 3 more presence switches on order so I look forward to getting them installed when they arrive.

John