Hello! I have a Blue dimmer switch (VZM31-SN) controlling 2 Hue bulbs. The three devices are bound in a group via Zigbee2MQTT in Home Assistant. I have set things up in this way for reliabilit (i.e. my light switch continues to function in a reasonable manner even if my Home Assistant instance is offline).
In addition to the Zigbee binding, the switch is set to Smart Bulb mode and I am using the “Old Behavior” behavior option. This allows on/off work perfectly. Dimming works decently (though there is an annoying “bounce” seemingly due to a dimming speed difference between the Blue and the Hues).
However, I can’t seem to figure out how to control the colors of the lights from the switch. For example, if I set the lights to red from my phone, I want to be able to return them to a normal color (e.g. 3000K) from the wall switch. Beyond a convenience of not having to pull the phone out of my pocket, it’s a courtesy for any guests I have over.
Like I said - I want to avoid depending on Home Assistant as much as possible, but I figured I’d try the easy path and set up a config press automation that sets the lights to 3000K. I used the Blueprints referenced in the product documentation, but the automation refuses to trigger when I press the config button. I tried some other actions (e.g. double tap up) and still had no luck. As far as I can tell, Home Assistant isn’t even seeing actions emitted by the Blue switch (though I do see state changes in the logs).
Well… next I tried setting up some scenes in Zigbee2MQTT. I created a 3000K scene in the group and I can properly “recall” it from within Z2M, but no button actions on the switch seem to trigger scene recall.
This leads me to a few questions:
- Does Zigbee binding break the broadcasting of button actions to HA?
- Can the Blue do scene recall with bound Hues?
- Is there some other way to accomplish on/off/dimming and some sort of scene control (even if just one scene)?
Thank you!