APNT-28 - Sunset-Sunrise Light with Fibaro Home Center

This application note shows how to use the Fibaro Home Center to automatically control a light at sunset and sunrise.

Project Aim

The aim of this project is to automatically control a light during darkness:

Use Home Center (HC) as the central controller and scheduler
Light turns On at Sunset (Dusk)
Light turns Off at Sunrise (Dawn)
The time of Sunset and Sunrise is automatically calculated by HC - no need to change the times manually

This type of automation is very useful for outside lights that need to illuminate gardens or yards, or for a nightlight to comfort children while they sleep.

Components

For this project we used a Z-Wave system comprising of:

Fibaro Dimmer module - used to control the light via Z-Wave
Fibaro Home Center 2 (HC2) or Home Center Lite (HC Lite) - central Z-Wave controller and scheduler

Z-Wave Devices for Sunset and Sunrise lighting control

Scene Control

After including the devices into the Fibaro Home Center (HC) controller we will use 'Scenes' to control the times at which the light is turned On and Off by the dimmer.

We will need to create two scenes in HC:

Sunset On - turns the light On at Sunset (dusk)
Sunrise Off - turns the light Off at Sunrise (dawn)

Set Your Location

Before configuring the scenes, make sure you have entered your location correctly the HC's configuration settings.

Go to the Configuration tab and select the Location from left-hand navigation bar
Google the Longitude of your town/city
Enter the Latitude and Longitude values in Home Center
Click the 'Save' button on the right-hand menu

Setting Location in HC2

Create the Sunset On Scene

Scenes are created and edited in HC's Scenes Tab, to create the 'Sunset On' scene

Go to the Scenes tab and click 'Add Scene' in left-hand navigation bar
Give the new scene a name - for example 'Sunset On'
Choose a Room from the drop-down list - this example uses 'Outside'
Select the 'Active Scene' and 'Start when Home Center starts' boxes

Scene General Tab

Click the 'Advanced' tab and then in 'Add scene using graphic block' click 'Save'
In the black scene box click the '+' icon to add devices and triggers for the scene
From the drop-down menu got to Timers and select 'Days or Week'
Select the days that you would like the scenes to be active - Monday, Tuesday... Sunday
Select 'Sunset' in the Time drop-down menu (ignore the time values alongside it)
In the Orange block change 'And' to 'Then'
Click the click the '+' icon at the bottom of the black scene box
From the drop-down menu got to Devices and select the device to be controlled by the scene - for this example it is Fibaro Dimmer
In the Fibaro Dimmer's Green block set it to 'Turn On', you can also enter a value for the light's brightness level such as 10% for a night-light
Click the grey 'Save' button
That's the main ON scene that will control the light at sunset.

Sunset On Scene

Create the Sunrise Off Scene

This scene is created following the same process as for the 'Sunset On' scene:

Go to the Scenes tab and click 'Add Scene'
Name the scene 'Sunset Off' and allocate to a room
Select 'Sunrise'
Select 'Turn Off' for the Fibaro Dimmer's state
Remember to click the grey 'Save' button
Also make sure the 'Active Scene' and 'Start when Home Center 2 starts' boxes are selected in the scene's General tab