The best home automation upgrade you can make is to install these on your bathroom fans. The timer never forgets to turn off the fan. The real energy savings is that you do not needlessly blow a bunch of heated or cooled air out of your house.
After 11 years, the buttons on my most heavily used unit started to fall off. This is because each button is held on by four extremely thin and brittle fingers. I'm a bit miffed that I have to replace the entire unit just for this. Hopefully in the past decade Leviton has corrected this weakness in the design.
Here are my recommendations for these units:
* In new construction, install deep junction boxes everywhere so that if you decide to install bulky controls like this timer, they'll fit
* Install only units that can handle "inductive load", like the LTB models. This means they can control motors and fluorescent lighting. Lighting options are changing these days, so don't limit yourself to "incandescent only".
* Install 30 minute LTB30-1LZ or 15 minute LTB15-1LZ timers for half bathrooms. That's plenty of time to evacuate a small room of noxious odors.
* Install 60 minute LTB60-1LZ timers for full baths. The extra time is needed to clear out all the moisture, and you can always choose less time.
* In the garage I use a 2 hour LTB02-1LZ timer for the lights over the cars and laundry
* For the lights over my workbench where I am engaged for longer periods of time, I use a 12 hour LTB12-1LZ timer Leviton LTB30-1LZ Decora 1800W Incandescent/20A Resistive-Inductive 1HP Preset 5-10-15-30 Minute Countdown Timer Switch, White/Ivory/Light Almond
I love these switches for my bathroom vent fans and heater fans so I don't forget to switch them off. I like the way they look, and they are extremely simple to use.
This is a replacement for the older model 6230. The differences are:
- The LED's are green (6230 was red).
- 3 different color button covers are included.
- Neutral connection is mandatory (the 6230 didn't need the neutral for low current applications, this one does)
- Support for 3-way operation.
- Smaller heatsink, no need to break off tabs for side-by-side switches.
These switches are very deep - if you are installing a new box, get the deep kind like this one so you'll have plenty of space for the wiring:
Thomas & Betts #BH234R 2G OldWork SuperBLU Box
We bought super quiet fans for the bathroom which was great. The downside was that they were quiet enough to be left on. The controllers by Leviton in Home Depot only control lights, they are not strong enough for fans. After installing these ones from Amazon, its great. They work with the vent fans and turn themselves off. With 4 kids in the house, its perfect! They come with different color button controllers to match your environment. Feels like a quality product and acts like one.
Great switch. I have it on my bathroom fan to control the fan only (light is on its own switch).
Its been on for about a month and works great. Its nice to be able to keep the fan on for 10-15 minutes after you get out of the shower without worrying about going back and turning it off.
Install was pretty straightforward, if you know how to wire a switch. NOTE that you need to have a neutral wire at the switch for the timer to work. It also has a wire to run a 3-way switch, which I didn't use. (who uses 3-way switches on a fan???? Maybe if you had this on a light?)
Anyway, make sure you have a decent amount of room in your switch box. This thing is kinda big (about the size of a GFCI outlet, maybe a bit bigger).
(and I don't know why the one guy gave it a 3-star because he later found a 60 minute timer... I think an hour for a bath fan is too long... this one is perfect. And even if he likes another option better, it doesn't mean that this switch is bad...)
UPDATE
- switch is still working great after several months
- I noticed in the manual that you can reprogram these switches... if you decide that you wanted to have a 60 minute timer you can go through a sequence of buttons to change it. You would have to relabel the buttons, but this is an option for those that change their mind and wish they had a 60 minute timer and then rate this switch real low.
First, having the ability to let the fan run for 30 minutes after a shower is awesome. Really helps keep the shower draw an allays any mold fears.
Installation can be tricky. You'll need a neutral line (white) in the box. I had a junction of 3 neutral lines in the box and I was able to tap right into that. However, if you're installing more than one of these on the same circuit, you'll need to isolate the neutral that goes to the appliance. However, most people are probably just installing this in the bathroom and shouldn't have that issue.
You'll also need to know which load (black) line goes to the appliance, in my case bathroom fan. If you wire the load backwards, it won't work properly. Take your time and you'll be fine. So you'll have two black lines that you're taking off your old switch and will need to figure out which one goes to the actual appliance. In theory if you reversed them, no damage will happen, the switch just won't operate. So if you are having problems, check that.
This is a nice switch that works well alone. However, if you plan to use it for a three-way application, good luck. It is not compatible with a regular toggle switch, and even if you order the vizio+ switch specified in the instructions, that won't work either. Sadly, I had to find this out the hard way by hiring a master electrician for several hours to work on the switches and talk with Leviton technical support before they admitted that the vizio+ doesn't work.
So, use it for a two-way application and you will be happy. Use it for a three-way application and you will be poorer and disappointed. - Programmable Timer - Bathroom Fan - Exhaust Fan Timer - Energy Efficient'
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