Automating Existing Motorized Shades

[ArnSchaeffer]

We moved into a house that has 3 motorized shades installed in very fancy ceiling enclosures (read this as expensive to tear up).

The shades are controlled by line voltage switches, ganged together, that I believe are DPDT center off. Pushing the switch UP makes an individual shade go up (until a pre-set stop point); moving the switch to the center will stop the movement of the shade and moving the switch down will make the shade go down (until a stop point).

I'd like to automate these shades somehow, preferably tying them into a RadioRA2 lighting system that we've installed (and will have other Lutron motorized shades on). But at this point I'd be happy with any remote control system I can easily retrofit.

Does anyone know of a replacement switch that I can install that would switch line voltage to this type of motorized shade and be controllable via an RF or IR signal? Or some other way to automate that doesn't involve installing a complicated mess of switches, relays and contact closures for each existing DPDTCO switch?

Thanks for your help.

 

[wuench]

I have been reading up on this myself (new shades though). First I would check the brand of shade motor you have and see if they have an option. But also Somfy seems to make replacement motors for a lot of existing shades. They have several control options including a wireless one that can be interfaced to automation systems via a controller.

The site with all their docs is somfypro.com.

 

[ArnSchaeffer]

Thanks for the reply wuench. Really though, I don't want to replace the rollers or motors.

It seems like there should be some way to do remote control just at the switch regardless of type of motor. I certainly can replace light switches that way, why not a DPDT CO line voltage switch? What am I missing in my understanding of these systems?

 

[az1324]

Really you'd want something small like this: http://simplehomenet.com/proddetail.asp?prod=Wireless_ZigBee_2-Relay_Controller plus a scene controller that could be linked to it to give the manual control but I don't know if you can find something compatible with your current system.

 

[Deane Johnson]

In all likelihood this is a common setup used by most AC motors. They are fed with 3 wires plus ground. One is the nuetral, then there is a hot wire for each direction. They are usually red and black. When you throw the wall switch up or down, you're switching the hot to either the up or down feed (red or black).

Any external device that will do that will substitute (replace) for the wall switch. It could be done with relays, but I'd probably look at something made by Electronic Solutions Inc. They make shade motor controls that are simple switches like your wall switch except remote controlled. They can be controlled multilple ways, including Z-Wave. ESI is a first rate company, and very helpful on the phone.

http://www.elec-solutions.com/products.html

I don't know what Lutron might make for their system that could be used as I'm not familiar with their products.

Undoubteldly the shade motors have built in stops for the up and down limits.

I don't think of any reason you should think of replacing shade motors.