Is there any update for this issue?
I’m using LEDs with temprature color changing by dimming value, and it is obviously can get only to 80%, where between 80-100 those leds are also able to change its color, but with this throttling it unfortunately can’t be used.
I’m attaching a demonstration, same LED model, controlled by two different dimmers (one is not Inovelli), both on max value.
I just replaced a couple dumb Lutron dimmers with the Red Series and am seeing the same issue. My installations are all single-pole + non-neutral & no bypass. Loads are 4x7w & 5x7w Sunco R20 LED and both are noticeably dimmer than when they were on the old Lutron switches.
I did a quick test with changing the AC Power Type parameter to “Neutral” on one of the dimmer (even though there isn’t one) and was able to increase the dimmer level to about 80%. Pushing past 80% does make the lights brighter but they would shut off right after and then repeat the on-off cycle; or sometimes the lights just flicker and the switch locked up/unresponsive until I pulled the air gap tap to reset. Also, at 80% (with the “Neutral” parameter set), the lights are still brighter than full 100% brightness when “No Neutral” is set. I used a Lux light meter app on my phone to measured the light level on different settings and while the app isn’t accurate, it’s enough to see the difference.
Hope this issue will be resolved soon.
Just purchased, same issue. i will have to go back zooz if not fixed Profile - Eric_Inovelli - Inovelli Community. I cannot see in the kitchen now. at least disclose this fact when purchasing. zooz just notes which light bulbs are not compatible with the switch not breaks the switch for people that purchased it.
so is this something that is going to get corrected or what?
PLEASE RESPOND. WHY NOT MAKE IT AN OPTION IN SETTINGS FOR PEOPLE WHO HAVE THE ISSUE YOU SPEAK ABOUT.
I would love to buy more but font want my outside lights etc. to not be effective because it makes the bulbs lose 20 percent. the fixtures outside bulb wattage cannot be increased.
It appears from the thread that the solution would be to revert to firmware 1.35 if this is in a 3way configuration as that was the last firmware prior to the throttle that was put in place.
A response would be nice…
Not speculating why, but I’m noticing that none of the hard technical questions delving into the internal operation of the zwave devices are getting answered or addressed anymore.
There’s a lot to sort out here and apologies for not getting to this thread before it started spiraling out of control. I took my first vacation in 3 years, I will be more attentive next time to the forums.
Regarding power output…
In a single pole setting, there shouldn’t be any throttling, so I’m not sure why certain people are experiencing this issue. I’m happy to look at it in a case by case basis. Please either reach out to us via a ticket or shoot me a PM and we can work together to resolve (or try to). My guess is it’s probably an incompatible light bulb, but I’m not sure until I can dig deeper into the situation.
In a multi-way setup, yes, as stated above, we throttled the output to 80%. We made this decision because we would get tickets where people would say their switch is defective as it would, “shut off”. We would tell them to set the max to 80% and their response was usually, “I want it to be 100%, how is this an acceptable solution?” or they couldn’t figure out how to set the max to 80% and, “didn’t want to fiddle with it”. Of course, these are valid points and I’m not trying to discount them, but instead of getting reamed out in tickets and 1-starred on Amazon, we made this change.
Since we made the change, we haven’t received one ticket where people noticed that the lights were dimmer than before. It wasn’t until I noticed this thread and a couple others that this was even a problem. You all must have some incredible eyes! Likely why I wear glasses.
In hindsight, we should’ve put an override on the parameter and we will see about trying to add this. Being fully transparent, we are up against resource issues with our manufacturer, so I’m not sure on an ETA. I understand this will cause us to lose some of you as customers and I am truly sorry.
What I’d be willing to do is obviously give you a refund or swap this for a Blue Series switch when they release as they shouldn’t have this issue.
One question for you guys – and I promise I’m not trying to be insensitive here as I understand this issue and hear you guys… but could you swap the bulb out for a higher wattage bulb? I realize in some cases this isn’t possible as it may be connected to a fixture, but in cases where you can, is it possible to swap out the bulb?
I’m not sure i understand why the switch would shut off at 100% output in a 3 way configuration but not in a 1 way? Overheating? I don’t get how a 3 way vs 1 way changes anything about the load or percentage output?
I installed my first Red Series dimmer in a 3 way configuration (with aux switch and incandescents) today and noticed the lower light output vs the dumb dimmer it replaced.
Its about the way the switch detects something on the 3-way (traveler) terminal. Something causes it to shut off. Manufacturer wasn’t much help in resolving, so they brute-forced it.
It’s a great question and I wish I had more of an engineering background to explain it. One of the downfalls of outsourcing our engineering is that sometimes it’s hard to get a feasible explanation as there’s a language barrier.
Anecdotally, we noticed this only happened when the switch was operating in a 3-Way setup with a dumb switch. Maybe it has to do with the separate relay that’s used in that case, I’m not sure (since it’s connected to a dumb switch, the relay used is an on/off relay – hence the, “clicking” sound you hear similar to our On/Off switch).
Let me go through our notes and see if I can find some sort of explanation and maybe we can figure this out together.
From a firmware standpoint, the only thing we did was set a max brightness to 80% and we were told it was only on the 3-Way w/a dumb switch. However, maybe something was messed up and they just completely throttled the switch, I’m not 100% sure as I’ve never noticed it (or I just got used to the new brightness). In reading through the thread, it seems like there are mixed reviews, so it’s leading me to believe there may be a widespread issue of all values being throttled. But again, I feel like we would’ve gotten a lot of tickets if this was the case. I’m not sure.
EDIT: Ok, managed to track down the email exchange and here is the explanation. I don’t really understand it, but maybe someone here does.
Here is the full email exchange – I’ve highlighted the parts pertaining to this issue (there were some other issues mixed in). Read from the bottom up.
Dimmer Shutoff Issue (full).pdf (2.2 MB)
Thanks for the explanation! I’m happy to try and help test or compare. I wish I had used a lux meter (even if just an app for relative measurement) before and after. I hadn’t heard about this problem being with 3 way configurations so I don’t think it was my brain playing tricks on me. I also did my installation in daytime so there is varying light levels outside and its a 13’+ high ceiling… Lots of variability. But read this thread and thought, hmmm…
For reference this dimmer came with 1.57 installed. I left it on that firmware for now.
+5 
for the transparency. To me it reads as though full output on LOAD causes KEY1 to pick up enough noise to transition high and think the 3 way switch has changed state. Tuning it back to 80% must reduce any induced noise below whatever threshold it has.
Thanks again for responding with all the info and hope you had a nice vacation!
Thanks, yes. I am using it with a 3 way setup actually with a 4 way setup. I have two switches in the kitchen, both seperate breakers. all bulbs on both switches have the same bulbs which are 65 watt led. I replaced one switch with the red switch. The lights on the red switch are signifnantly dimmer to the point where I could hardly see. the same bulbs on the switch I did not replace were much brighter, night and day. I played with switch for a while thinking I did something wrong. then I found this forum which I am grateful because I could have spent days messing with switch.
I did go out and buy 150w equivalent led bulbs and let me just say they are just about as bright as the 65w equivalent led at 100 percent. could be a little less bright or more. 150w bulbs are not cheap and are a but harder to find.
Again, I have a dumb switch and a red switch in the same room so it is easy to see. my issue is that most retrofit kits for can lights are not 150w. most are 65w equivalent led. the plan was to use the retrofits with red switch. I can see now that might not happen.
I might take you up on blue switch offer you mentioned when released. I have another red switch I was going to install on the dumb switch I spoke of.
I do appreciate your time.
One question for you guys – and I promise I’m not trying to be insensitive here as I understand this issue and hear you guys… but could you swap the bulb out for a higher wattage bulb? I realize in some cases this isn’t possible as it may be connected to a fixture, but in cases where you can, is it possible to swap out the bulb?
I don’t have any Inovelli switches (just light strips.) I lurk here because I am interested in your future products (primarily motion switches.) For me, this would definitely be an issue… and no, new bulbs is not an acceptable solution. In my setup, I use switches because I am controlling numerous overhead can lights from one switch. Swapping out 4-10 bulbs per switch doesn’t make any sense (and can introduce other issues.) It also makes it significantly more expensive to do a whole house, because now, not only am I buying new switches, I have to replace every (perfectly good) bulb in the house. That doesn’t make any sense, and I would just move on to a switch from a manufacturer that doesn’t have these issues.
Hi @Eric_Inovelli, sorry to bring up an old thread here. I would like to follow up on swapping for the Blue Series switch now that those are closer to release. I really like all the features of my red series but I am having some bugs with them on the older firmware I installed to avoid the brightness issue.
I also cannot put in a brighter bulb since the switch is controlling integrated LED can lights (simply too expensive to replace and I picked these for particular reasons). I tried staying on the newer firmware and having it less bright but it simply will not work for my household members.
I constantly check for firmware updates but I am guessing the focus has moved to the Blue Series. So given that, I would be happy for a swap. If not that, a refund.
Thanks for all your hard work making a truly innovative product! Not anything out there that can match the LED bar.
Incorrect. Since the Red series manufacturer is not accepting any firmware updates until their debt is paid or other negotiations are made. With the new partner coming online, I would expect more power to help push manufacturer with some updates and more stock. It’s not a dead product just needs some more time to find a resolution.
No worries on bringing it up. I haven’t thought much about any sort of swapping program, but I can think through some options.
What makes this difficult is that when we came out with the Red Series initially people were intentionally breaking their Gen 1’s and/or saying something was wrong in order to get the Gen 2’s and it put us in a very rough spot bc we of course wanted to be nice, but were getting taken advantage of.
I’m not suggesting that is the case here, I’m just saying I need to put some thought behind it so that everyone is happy.
However, @harjms is correct, we are actively working with the Red Series manufacturer to get them to start working on some of these outstanding issues. It’s unfortunately taking a long time.
My plan would be to add a parameter to override the throttle put on to avoid the shut-off.
Let’s revisit this once the Blue Series is actually in market as I would hope by then we will have figured things out with the Red Series manufacturer.
Side note - what bugs are you experiencing with the older firmware? I’m happy to help diagnose them.
Thanks Eric for the quick reply!
Totally understand the concerns. Glad to hear about possible progress being made on the firmware.
What’s interesting is I bought 3 of the Red Series Dimmers at the same time. Downgraded them all to 1.35 firmware after noticing the brightness issue. All three are in 3-way setups with neutrals and control integrated LED fixtures. Two of them work perfectly fine.
However, one of them just does not. Sometimes it does not turn on the light when physically pressed.
My zwave controller (700 series) usually reports the switch as dead. I reset it and try to include it again. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t or is missing parameters. It did not seem to have the issue when I was on the 1.57 firmware for the short time it was on it (so hard to be sure). Just got me thinking about all the bugs that have been fixed since 1.35.
Maybe it’s not the firmware being buggy. Maybe I just got one slightly defective unit.
By “dead” you mean not connected, right? If that’s the case, there are a number of things that can cause that issue. I’d check your mesh, hops, Zwave repair, etc. Additionally, there have been a lot of issues reported regarding the 700 controllers. I’d check the firmware on the stick/controller and upgrade or roll back as indicated.
With Home Assistant adding the ability to update Z-Wave firmware I updated my dimmer to 1.61 last week. My wife then complained the lights were not as bright. This is a fixture with 3 LED bulbs and no neutral, but only the one switch)
Last night i went back to 1.52 and the lights were back to full brightness. I then tried 1.57 and they went dim again. So now I am back to 1.52.
Skimming through the thread it looks like with a 3-way setup they need to reduce the duty cycle to power the switch, so I suspect that is what I am seeing even though I don’t have a 3-way setup.
So I’ll leave it at 1.52, and hope when I need another switch the Ver2 dimmers don’t have this issue.
