Installing Smart Light Switches

After all the painting I have been doing, I felt like the house was in relatively good shape for me to take a break from painting and do something with a lower priority status that I have personally been wanting to do for a long time: install smart light switches.

I actually started on this yesterday, but the thunderstorm delayed me. I have been buying up used and open-box Z-wave light switches like the ones pictured above for months now, and I have so far accumulated three sets of three-way switches and one standalone switch.

The three-way switches (one light or set of lights controlled by two switches in different locations) were a huge pain in the butt. I am certainly not an electrician, but according to everything I read on-line, whoever wired up the lights in this house did not always follow standard convention for what each color of wire did. I had to get out my voltmeter to determine which lines were actually hot, and I tripled my cumulative number of 110V electrical shocks (it was 2 before this weekend). Regardless, I successfully installed three-way dimmer switches for the kitchen LED lights and the upstairs hallway, a three-way on/off switch (no dimming) for the entryway ceiling fan, and a standalone on/off switch for the exterior lights (so they can turn on automatically at dusk).

The smart switches are larger than normal switches, and it was a challenge to fit everything back into the electrical boxes. I went from having all toggle-switches, to having this:

Left to right: Slave switch for the ceiling fan, standard toggle for a switched outlet, and a master switch for the exterior lights.

After verifying that everything worked correctly and I did not smell any smoke, I eventually got to this:

I rearranged two switches at the top of the stairs so they were each physically closer to the lights they controlled. No idea why they were not like that from the start.

Part of installing new light switches was figuring out what circuit the lights were on. Part of the work I did today was creating a record of all the lights, outlets and appliances each circuit controls. I have not actually drawn a map yet, but having the record is definitely nice. At this point I think I have about a quarter of the electrical panel figured out.

After counting up the old switches now sitting in a box, it looks like I replaced 14 switches yesterday and today. I still have a dimmer switch and a fan timer to install in the master bathroom water closet, and a dual light-and-fan-controller for the family room ceiling fan. I'm tired, and I feel like this post is rambling. I might edit it later to tighten things up, but one more thing before I close my computer for the night: I installed a garbage disposal switch as well today. It only operates the garbage disposal while it is being pressed - let go, and the disposal turns off.