Curious behaviour when using a switch with both Insteon and X-10

[Andyj@sabresoft.com]

I have two Insteon switches that are set up in a 3 -way arrangement controlling the lights in my garage. I also control the lights with an X-10 Receiver so that I can turn the lights on/off from our cars via HomeLink (which works with X-10). And I also have an X-10 remote keypad that allows us to switch the lights on/off from inside the house. Also using HomeBridge Insteon plugin we can control the lights via HomeKit. All works well.

We recently installed a new ceiling mounted heater to replace a defunct wall mounted unit. This new heater casts a big shadow in one part of the garage and I decided to add another wall mounted light, but wanted to maintain on/off operation from the main lights switches and remote controls. This is where things got strange..

My first attempt was to move the X-10 receiver close to where this new light was installed and use the outlet on the receiver for this new light. This worked when the X-10 remote or HomeLink initiated the on/off command, which also controlled the Insteon switch, but if the wall switches were used, of course the X-10 receiver would not be controlled by the Insteon switch. Generally this is not a huge issue because when we leave we turn on the lights from the inside remote (rather than trying to locate the wall switch in the dark) and turn it off in the car as we are leaving. When we come home we generally don’t use the garage ceiling lights as the garage door operator lights provide enough light. But we have a fridge in the garage, and when going out for something we generally use X-10 remote on the way out and hit the wall switch as we go in. This left the extra light turned on, and grief from the Boss!

So my simple solution was to power the extra light from a smart wall plug, and with a HomeKit automation turn the smart plug on/off when the Insteon switch was turned on. This works just fine with the physical wall switches and any HomeKit/Siri initiation. But with the X-10 remote and HomeLink, the extra light was not being triggered when the Insteon switch was being operated by X-10. Strange because the HomeKit automation was based on the Insteon switch being turned on/off, either physically or electronically via Insteon hub, and the switch does show as being on/off in HomeKit and the Insteon app when the X-10 remote/HomeLink issue the instruction, but the extra light does not react. Very weird.

Any thoughts why this might be the case?

[paulbates]

It would help to have this more broken down...Some clarifications and questions:

- Original: Insteon switch - insteon switch 3 way, the red lead from one of the switches powers the light when switched on?
- How is x-10 reaching the insteon switches from HomeLink? Are they older insteon switches that can also recieve/transmit x10? or?
- I ask the above question because newer insteon switches no longer support x-10

As an alternative, use a Hawkeye motion sensor in the garage.. If placed right, any movement generates an X10 on, then the lights come on automatically. I do this in my garage with and insteon and the wife loves it. But I did something similar with Hawkeys at my last house.

[Andyj@sabresoft.com]

Hawkeye sounds interesting, but this doesn't really serve my purpose.

To answer your specific questions:

1. There are two original switches (I had them in my old house and moved them), which date back about 10+ years. I originally had X10 switches at the old house, but the main switch failed (I find X10 equipment isn't particularly robust), and I replaced them with the Insteon switches.

1a. The switch near the door to the house is the "hot" switch that connects to the light, the other near the outside side door of the garage is the slave.

2. The X-10 signal comes from an X-10 transceiver module, set to "A'. The main garage light switch is also set to respond to 'A'.

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2a. This all works well, with respect to the main lights.

3. We have the following usual means of operating the lights:

(a) When we leave the house to drive away, we use the X-10 remote keypad to turn the lights on from inside the house, which we prefer over using the switch in the garage as there are two switches there, and the first one operates the outside lights and is frequently turned on but not turned off as nothing seems to happen, so rather than grope around in the dark we just use the remote mounted on the wall beside the alarm panel;

(b) As we drive away we use the HomeLink to turn the lights off;

(c) When we get home we usually just depend on the door operator lights, but if we will be puttering around in the garage (say putting groceries into our secondary fridge in the garage) we either use HomeLink to turn on the main lights, or if I'm already out of the car I frequent just ask Siri to turn them on (via HomeBridge Insteon plugin).

(d) Go out to grab something from the fridge, turn on with X-10 remote, and just hit the main switch on the way back into the house.

(e) I also have a "garbage night" HomeLink automation that turns on these lights and several lights on the outside (garage, front lights, side of garage and side of house) - I just invoke with "Hey Siri Garbage Night" and "Hey Siri Garbage Done".

All this works well.

It's the addition of the extra light to cover the dark spot beside the Boss's car when she gets in/out that has complicated matters. Both solutions sort of work some of the time.

1. Connecting directly to the Transceiver per our normal processes as noted above:

(a) X-10 keypad - all lights come on;

(b) HomeLink - all lights go off;

(c) Don't really need the ceiling lights as the door operator lights are mounted lower and don't suffer from the dark zone created by the furnace with the ceiling lights;

(d) The fridge run fails with the wall switch (easily fixed by hitting the X-10 remote once inside, but the Boss wasn't happy with this.

(e) Garbage night routine doesn't turn on the extra light as HomeBridge can't communicate with X-10, but not really a big issue.

2. Using the smart plug doesn't work too well:

(a) X-10 and HomeLink don't control the plug, despite causing the Insteon switch (that triggers the plug) to go on/off;

(b) Main wall switch works;

(c) Slave wall switch doesn't work (but I think that I might be able to get around this by adding that switch directly to HomeBridge);

(d) Siri/HomeKit commands work.

I spent a little time today playing with my 3-way switches (I have 3 sets of them), and have noticed the following:

1. When either the main or slave switch is operated, lights come on or go off, and the switch LEDs on both switches rise or fall in sync. But in HomeKit AND Insteon Director the button/icon is only lit up or darkened IF the main switch is used;

2. When SIRI or HomeKit (all 3 sets) or X-10 (garage and outside front lights only) or HomeLink (garage lights only) operates the lights, only the main switch LEDs show their status correctly.

One solution might be to use an older Insteon plug and make it respond to the same "A" signal from the transceiver, but not sure where to find one, and I did own a couple a while back and sold them because they wouldn't fully shut off, causing LED lights to sit there and glow faintly.

This really is not a huge issue, but just frustrates my OCD IOT perfection plans.