Kasa Switch Works Every Other Time With App
The three way switch works great... perfect with the other common 3-4 way switches. BUT, when I use the app, the switch will click ever other time to turn on and off. So if the light is off and I use the app to turn it on, it will click and turn on. Then if I use the app to turn off, it will not click but will show that it turned off. If I think click to turn it off (because it shows it is off), it will click and turn off but show that it is on. If I use the app one more time, it will not click at the switch, but will now show that it is turned off.
Using the physical switch, it works every time. Using any of the switches, it works just fine. It is just using the app that this is happening.
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When the app doesn't follow the state of the lights, it is often caused by the length of the wires between the switches, especially if the wires are run underground or there are regular dumb switches in the configuration. It is recommended that the traveler wire between the two HS210 units stay below 100 feet.
You should also try pairing the satellite and the main by starting with both "off", then press the two HS210 units four times alternately (in the order of A, B, A, B) to check whether the Wi-Fi light on the HS210 will change (the wifi light turns on and then off). If it does change, it indicates a wiring issue, if it does not change then it is likely that the traveler wires are too long.
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@Riley_S The configuration is very simple. There are three switches. One on the house, one inside the garage, and one on the patio next to the garage. The power goes to the house from the garage breaker (3 wires) about 15 feet (8 feet of it is under ground in conduit). From there 4 wires go back to the garage to the inside switch. Again, about 15 feet. From there 4 wires go about 15 feet to the outside wall of the garage to the last switch which is the smart switch. From there 3 wires go about 10 feet to the outlet that runs the patio lights. All the switches have worked perfectly before and after replacing the three way switch with this smart switch. The ONLY issue is that the app always skips a command. The status light will turn off when I press the switch or tell the app to turn it on but then the status switch will turn back on. The app will show that the light is turned on. If I push the app to turn off the lights, the switch doesn't go click, the status light doesn't change (stays on) and the app shows that it is turned off. If I push the app to turn the lights back on, the lights turn off (switch clicks), the status light turns off and then back on. The app shows the lights are off but they are on. One more push of the app switch and the switch doesn't click, the lights stay off, and the app shows that the lights off like they are. I can do everything with the switches and the lights will turn off and on like they should no matter which switch I use. I can only do this at night because I can't see the status light during the day with the sun shining on it. I find it very hard to believe that it is the wiring when everything physically works... only the communication between the switch and app don't seem to work correctly as the switch skips every other command.
Robert
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@Riley_S Last night I did more testing. The switch status light will turn off when the switch clicks but then turn back on right afterwards. That doesn't bother me as I can turn off the status light from the app if I want to keep it off. It the switch doesn't click, then it doesn't do anything. Again, it doesn't click with every other push of the app power switch.
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@Riley_S I did some more testing... I moved my wifi repeater that it is attached to the outlet just under the switch. Still having problems. But I noticed that the command "Alexa, Turn off patio lights" doesn't do anything but the command "Alexa, Turn on patio lights" will turn them on and off. So is this an issue with the software? My other three way switch in the house from another company works as expected.If I can't get your product to work correctly, I will need to return as defective and purchase the one from Amazon Basic which does work.
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I am having this exact same issue. I feel like it has something to do with having three switches on the circuit instead of two. Did you ever figure this out?
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I figured it out! I was able to resolve my issue by wiring both traveler wires to the same terminal on the switch instead of wiring to the individual terminals.
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I will say that doing it this way did cause my other two "dummy" switches to no longer work, but I actually kind of prefer that because the whole reason I wanted the smart switch was to set the lights on a timer.
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I guess the real issue is that I am a programmer and I am approching this like a programmer. Basically, with a three way switch, there are two possible line wires that can provide power to the switch. Depending on the status of the other switches, power will switch between those two wires and so whichever way this switch is set to get from one of the lines will determine if it is going to provide power to the load. Because these are "smart switches" I thought there would be a chip in there that would look at the load wire to see what the current status of the switch was (on/off) and then based upon the command given it would change this switch.
So if the load was energized and the command was to turn on, it wouldn't do anything. If the load was not energized and the command was to turn on it would throw the switch. But I guess for Kasa, smart just means that you can operate the switch via an app... not that it is really that smart. While I like being able to use the app to run the switch, it is not very handy if I don't know what the status of the load wire is myself. So I can't have an automated "off" at 10pm like I do with other switches because the status may already be off.
For now, I will continue to use it because I can look at my patio camera to see what the status is and turn it off when I am away. But as soon as I fine a real "smart 3-way switch" I will taking it out because it is basically do different than a standard smart 1 way switch.
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