What do I need to turn on my Ramada and Horse Corral from my home?

[Shaggy]

So what I want to do is have a setup to where I can turn on my ramada lights(and floods that are on the ramada in the backyard and also turn on my horse pen/chicken coop that is even farther back while in my house by the back door.  What I was hoping to do is use one of the my switches and change it to the multi button switch and add 5 or 6 light setups(Back Porch, ramada lights, ramada flood lights, horse pen lights).  I want to be able to stand there inside the house and turn all those lights on before I even step out of the house.

 

 

[Cyknight]

Well, for one you'll need to integrate those lights you want controlled - from there it's programming/binding. The tricky part will be covering the distance, assuming the current switches are not in the house already. - depending on what those distances are there are options of course - zigbee range extenders, maybe a controller somewhere nearby.

[Shaggy]

What C4 products do I need to buy to have this all work?  I have a C4 brain and 3 touch screens.

[d1amund]

More info needed. Where are the current switches located for these light loads in question? And what load type and wattage are each? Are these standard switches or contactors?

[Cyknight]

Just now, d1amund said:

More info needed. Where are the current switches located for these light loads in question? And what load type and wattage are each?

This - without that info, there's no real way of telling what is required...

[Shaggy]

Ok, the ramada has 2 basic switches that are covered with the outdoor insulation flaps.  One turns on the ceiling lights(all LED) for the ramada and the other turns on 3 flood lights(All LED).  I have one basic switch on the horse pen with the same insulated flap that turns on 3 florescent lights(Not LED).  My idea would be to replace a switch on my interior wall next to my back door that currently controls the back porch lights now.  Replace that one switch with this type of control4 switch:

Now one of those buttons is used for the porch, another would be used for the ramada lights, another to be used for the ramada flood lights, and another to be used for the horse pen.  I would love the convenience to just be able to turn all those on from inside my house so that I don't have to walk out there to turn on lights.

What I get is if this is a zigbee type switch, won't the switch on the ramada be a repeater for the switch on the horse pen?

[d1amund]

Sorry; to me, a ramada is a porch or more often something like a pavilion or gazebo, but yet you also say you have a switch that controls the back porch light from the inside of the residence. What/where is this ramada and physically (distance-wise too) where are these other existing switches that control these other loads located in relation to the interior switch that you refer to having control over the back porch? As you can likely assume...I am getting at the issue of range for zigbee to actually work reliably here.

[Shaggy]

Here is what I mean when I say ramada

The length from my switch indoors that I would like to use is probably 50 - 60 feet to the switch on the ramada.  Now the distance from my ramada switch to my horse pen switch is probably the same distance, 50 - 60 feet away.  So basically, everything is inline with each other.  I would walk south 60 feet from the back door and will make it to the ramada, then I would walk south again 60 feet and be at my horse pen.  So the horse pen is around 120 feet away from my back door.  Hope this helps with the idea of how things are laid out.

[d1amund]

Much clearer now, thanks. I understand the dilemma but my gut says this will not work, due to the distance from the interior house switch to the other structures. That's just a hunch, a strong one, but nevertheless a hunch because any install I've ever done had a data link (via copper or fiber) from the primary residence to the remote structures to link it all together. I think you're asking too much from an interior mounted zigbee keypad to travel that distance over free air and then have that switch create a hop another time another distance to the other switches. You'll need a controller down at the structures or may be able to get away with a zigbee extender at the porch with the antenna aimed toward the remote structures...that will take some testing at the actual site to see if it's reliable however. The most reliable method would be a hard wired controller at each structure creating a mesh for each structures light switches.

[Shaggy]

Ok, I totally understand.  What if I put up a Omni pole that will extend my wifi out to both the ramada and horse pen.  Will the switches work off that extended wifi from the omni pole?

If that would work, what items do I need to make my setup work?  What type of zigbee switch would I need?  I know I will probably have to call my installer to install all this(wish Control4 gave me more control of the system rather then having to call on the installer all the time).

[d1amund]

No. The switches are zigbee not wifi. The only thing you could do with that would be controllers setup as wifi to run the mesh for the switches. I am however not a fan of that practice.

[Shaggy]

What would be a good zigbee extender?  What would you recommend to get this to work?

Even if I don't set this up through Control4, will I be able to use this zigbee setup through something like smartthings with a similar multi switch?

 

 

[Cyknight]

You'd have two options.

 

Start with the cheaper one - get some ZigBee extenders. There's one from Control4 which is OK - but I'd suggest these: https://www.blackwiredesigns.com/help/axxess-rcs6-6-relay-3-contact-sensor/

 

Probably get one per location, plus one at the house. These units have far geater range - but understand that though these are rated for 400f, that doesn't mean a switch can talk 400f back...so you'll want to use them as 'nodes' to talk to each other, and locally to the local devices. Mind you - this will not come cheap - the extenders are more expensive than the switches - but it's not that crazy a price.

 

If that truly fails, your other option is to get a controller for each location (probably two EA-1) and set those up for wifi using your existing setup for that. Of course, the controllers are less resistant to the elements, while the Axxess units I linked are about as robust as it gets. In Arizona temps should be acceptable, but you'll want to prevent dust and other elements as much as possible. Obviously this gets expensive even faster.

My gut says that with the Axxess units, you'll have a pretty solid setup - but this is one of  those situations where only trying will tell.