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Smart Switches, LEDs, and No Neutrals 
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videobear Posts: 57
12/9/2015
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I am running into a problem with neutral wires. Or more precisely, the lack of them. My older home has many switches that don't have neutrals in the switch box. Running new wiring from the breaker panel to the switch boxes may prove to be too costly. Most smart switches made to control LED/CFL lights require a neutral wire!
I found a possible solution. Lutron Caseta switches do NOT require a neutral, although they cost a little more than GE/Jasco switches. However, they don't use the Z-wave protocol, but their own Clear Connect protocol. So here's my question: Will the HUB talk to them?
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Christopher Gross Posts: 46
12/9/2015
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Just my two sence,
INSTEON also makes a 2 wire swichlinc. The thing with that is you can't run an led bulb on them. They actually drawl their power through the bulb filament. So when the bulb looks like it's off the switch is putting a very small amount of power through it to power the switch. I found this out the hard way. I have a 4 wire circuit in my house and the builders cheated on the wiring so I didn't have a usable neutral wire in the last switch box. Thing is the 2 wire switchlinc needs to be wired to a load and... I didn't have a load wire there either. I ended up running a new wire to the switch box to power the switchlinc. So... As long as you don't want to run led bulbs the. The 2 wire switchlinc would work for you. The hub handles INSTEON very well also and those switches talk in rf and over the actual wires of the house making them very reliable.
Chris ( not cos Chris ) lol
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Kevin Mathews Posts: 138
12/9/2015
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You shouldn't need to wire back to the panel, just to the light fixture box. You can pick up the neutral there and replace the existing two-wire (Romex, I hope) with three-wire (+ground since you are replacing it!). That will give you line in, (black typically) switched out (red) and the white neutral.
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videobear Posts: 57
12/9/2015
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Thanks! I know about neutrals, and how most switches that don't need them also won't work with LEDs. What I need to know is, can the HUB speak to Lutron Caseta switches?
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Christopher Gross Posts: 46
12/10/2015
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Hey,
I don't see that in the protocols in cos as being supported. Cos Chris will have to answer that question.
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Chris Cicchitelli Administrator Posts: 3390
12/12/2015
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videobear wrote: Thanks! I know about neutrals, and how most switches that don't need them also won't work with LEDs. What I need to know is, can the HUB speak to Lutron Caseta switches? Not yet, but it's on our dev plan for early 2016. I think that's the best choice for you...
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