Thanks for the review, Eric! I know you and your family prefer the Philips Hue bulbs (as do I), but was there anything about the bulbs that come with the Hunter fan that didn’t work well, or was difficult? I’m thinking I would not be putting Hue bulbs in the fan, just dimmable LEDs, which would be fine for my use.
Unfortunately my ceilings aren’t high enough to have a bladed ceiling fan, I’m keeping my eyes open for a bladeless ceiling fan that incorporates led lighting. Thanks for the video, it shows what options can automate your home
So that’s a pretty cool hack and all with the lights in a different room, but did you consider maybe that Hunter included cheap bulbs in the box to keep costs down and maybe just try picking up some higher quality dumb bulbs from Philips for example?
Excellent video as always, Eric, and very nice to see you back creating HomeKit content. I ran into the same issues as you with my Hunter ceiling and Hue bulbs and played around a bit. The way I did it was I left the fan in the room it’s supposed to be in (Master Bedroom in my case). I created a Shortcut (within HomeKit’s Convert To Shortcut) that turns the light power on when it’s turned off much like you did. Since Hue doesn’t allow you to set a default of the bulb being off after power is cut, I made it so that the Hue bulbs in the fan turn on to 1% (so as not to get blasted in the retinas) after a power restore. To make sure the The bulbs come back on while the Shortcut is being run, I have it wait three seconds then turn the bulbs off. Works great and didn’t have to move my ceiling fan to a separate room in HomeKit. Also removed the power switch from the Home View so it’s out of sight out of mind. Wish Apple would let us exclude certain devices from Siri requests.
I just junked two Hunter simple connect fans that I installed 3 years ago. Never would work right in HomeKit. Went to dumb fans and added the Lutron Fan control and dimmer switches, works great now!
Through software update, Hunter needs to update the Fan’s light accessory to be recognized as a switch or make it App selectable. The HomeBridge Tuya plugin developer did this to my Fan + Light switch just last night and I have no more problem with Siri cutting power to the bulb! 👍 Good job Tuya plugin developer.
This seems like far too much of a work around for someone that presumably has separate wiring for the fan and light going by the 2-gang box that you have the switch covers on... I would much rather have a dumb fan with a Lutron Caseta controller and then put that Aurora dimmer over top of the other switch for the Hue bulbs.
Yeah I know it's hard for companies to make things globally but I'm sorry for you guys not having more options for ceiling fans. The Bond Bridge Pro makes a variety of ceiling fans smart but I think the bridge itself is US only as well 😕
I went for the Hunter Romulus fan and I absolutely love it. You touched on one of the most impressive features: the rock steady fan performance. My wife likes a strong fan in the summer and could not believe how strong the top speed was nor how quiet and steady it was at the top speed. Ot does seem to me that you went way overkill on the light controls compared to how I ended up. For the wall switch, I just put a blank plate there. No reaching inside or any other way to force a change without a screwdriver. I also mounted the remote holder immediately next to the wall switch so anyone will see it there (it’s also in my master bedroom so there’s no unexpected foot traffic). Finally, I replaced the bulbs with those that are more friendly to dimming. Anything that controls the lights does so smoothly without causing unexpected power disruptions. We also use a simple automation to turn the fan on at a certain temperature and off again when it drops low enough, usually over night when the outside temps drop sufficient to cool our room.
Thanks for sharing Dr. Cole! I'm glad the Hunter Romulus is working well for you. Yeah I wonder if I would have gone through all this if I hadn't already had Philips Hue all setup in our living room. I agree temperature automations are a great feature of smart fans. I haven't been entirely happy with how my HomePods are doing in this regard but that's a topic for another video.
@@EricWelander I agree with your appraisal of the HomePod Mini temp and humidity sensors. For a while, I had an Eve Home and an EcoBee room sensor in my master bedroom and they rarely differed by more than 1 degree (if ever). The HomePods differ from by quite a bit.
I’ve had the Hunter Advocate for about 6 months, and on a daily basis it has WiFi issues even with a static IP. Most of the time it will reconnect on its own, but from time to time I have to tap the wall switch off-on.
Question, what model hue bulbs did you go with? I have a similar setup and my ONLY complaint is I wish the hue bulbs I used aren’t the brightest hue has to offer. But the brighter ones (100w I think?) wouldn’t fit. First world problem. Just curious if you went with the same ones I did.
$200 is definitely betted than the $600 I paid for my "Modern Forms" fan. The Modern Forms fan has an app and is controllable via Alexa w/ a skill, but doesn't integrate with HomeKit and I've never gotten any of their wall switches to pair with the fan (I tried three of them). Additionally, their cloud service seems to struggle with reliability and that service is necessary for control via Alexa or the app. I've started to question just how "smart" the fan really is, but when it works, it is nice.
I bought Hunter aerodyne .. Was able to connect to simple connect and also works either Apple home kit.. after this am not able to opearate using provide remote. Is this normal ?
I think I will stay with dumb fans. Already have smart switches to turn them on and off. Can’t control the lights and fans separately, but they have pull string switches.
Where do you set PMF off. I have a unifi system. I had big time issues when the fan became unresponsive with HomeKit and I could never add it back. Luckily hunter sent me another one
we just purchased a new hunter fan with it`s own control, my plan was to throw the switch out and use a lutron smart switch, when we turn the light off the fan would go off, I called Lutron and they said the switch would not work with a fan\LED light combo with a separate fan and light switch, so for now I have an ugly hunter switch mixed in.
I don’t think I would buy it. What you described seems like too much effort for me to want to buy this fan. And some of what you did might require assistance from someone else. Smart home items should be plug and play. One wonders if manufacturers are failing to hire smart people to insure this.
Hello Eric. Love your channel and find you provide a lot of useful info -thanks! One question: are you aware of any available or coming soon options to enable fan and light control that is HomeKit compatible and only wired to one switch? I have several legacy fans that have the remote functionality for fan and light control separately though only wired to one light switch.
I think I will be replacing the single switch ceiling fans that I have throughout my house with these smart fans. It’s much easier than trying to run a second wire through the wall and ceiling! I don’t use any Phillips Hue lights in my house yet, so a dumb, but dimmable, LED will work fine and make the setup easier. I would also think about removing the wall switch and capping the wires. Then I’d mount one or two Pico remotes or Eve Buttons to provide physical control of the fan and lights.
That sounds like a great plan overall. My one comment is a non-smart switch on the wall is a nice option to force the fan to restart if it drops from your Wi-Fi. It's often easier than going down to the circuit breaker.
I have the same exact Hunter Fans, four of them installed, but I have not been able to get two of them to connect at all. I have contacted Hunter many times to get this resolved, but no luck. Two of the fans I was able to connect and then randomly one of them stopped connecting, so the fan is always on, and I have to screw and unscrew the bulbs. In the other rooms, I switched out the lightbulbs and put in, my old Sylvania, smart bulbs and control of them just the way you are with your hue bulbs. It’s been very frustrating. Only one of the fans now is working as expected. I’m not sure why am having all these issues, I have a great Wi-Fi in my house. I have a eero system and it has caused any problems, but these fans have been such a headache.
