Shelly Installer in Leeds

Smart home control without having to rewire the whole house

A smart home doesn’t have to start with a full property renovation and thousands of pounds of equipment.

Sometimes the problem is much simpler.

You might have a couple of lighting circuits that you’d like to control together.

You may want to dim several areas of an open-plan kitchen from one screen.

Perhaps the switch for your garden lighting is in completely the wrong place.

Or you simply want to know how much electricity certain parts of your home are actually using.

This is where Shelly can be a very useful option.

SmartOhm Electrical and Smart Home installs Shelly smart lighting and automation systems throughout Leeds and surrounding areas, and we’ve used the equipment on everything from small retrofit lighting jobs to more involved smart home installations.

Shelly’s range includes compact relays and dimmers that can be incorporated into existing electrical installations, alongside professional DIN-rail equipment, energy-monitoring products and wall-mounted smart home controllers.

For us, one of Shelly’s biggest advantages is its flexibility.

You can start small.

And if you want to do more later, the system can grow with you.

Talk to us about Shelly

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What is Shelly?

Shelly is a range of smart electrical control and automation products.

Depending on the installation, Shelly equipment can be used for things such as:

• Lighting control
• Dimming
• Smart switches
• Smart relays
• Heating and climate control
• Blinds and shutters
• Appliance control
• Energy monitoring
• Scenes and automations
• Voice control
• Integration with wider smart home systems

Many Shelly products are designed to work with the electrical circuit itself rather than relying on every lamp or appliance being replaced with a proprietary smart version.

Shelly’s compact relay range, for example, is designed for retrofit applications around existing switching, while its Pro products provide DIN-rail options aimed at professional installations.

That makes Shelly particularly interesting for existing homes.

You don’t necessarily have to rip everything out and start again to add useful smart control.

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Shelly works particularly well as a retrofit solution

This is probably where we use Shelly most.

A customer already has perfectly good lighting.

They already have switches.

The room is decorated.

They don’t want walls chasing out and cables running everywhere.

They just want the lighting to do something it currently can’t.

Depending on the existing wiring and what we’re trying to achieve, Shelly can often give us a way of adding smart control while retaining much of the existing electrical installation.

That doesn’t mean every property or every circuit is automatically suitable.

We still need to look at:

• Existing wiring
• Available space
• Neutral arrangements
• Electrical loads
• LED compatibility
• Dimming requirements
• Wi-Fi and network coverage
• How the existing switches are being used

But where the installation is suitable, Shelly can provide a cost-effective way of adding useful smart home features without turning the job into a major refurbishment.

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A simple Shelly lighting system in Cleckheaton

One of our smaller installations was at a property in Cleckheaton.

The customer had:

• Two ceiling lighting circuits
• Two LED coffered ceiling lighting circuits

They didn’t need a complicated whole-house automation system.

They simply wanted better control of the room and the ability to set the lighting differently depending on how they were using the space.

Shelly allowed us to bring those four areas of lighting together and create scene-based control.

That’s an important point.

Four separate lighting circuits give you flexibility, but manually adjusting each one every time you use the room quickly becomes irritating.

Once scenes are introduced, the customer can set several circuits together.

Rather than thinking about four individual switches, they can think about what they’re actually doing in the room.

That’s when smart lighting starts to make sense.

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Start with one room – build from there

The Cleckheaton project is a good example of why Shelly doesn’t have to mean a full smart home installation.

You can start with one room.

Or even one circuit.

For example, somebody might begin with a couple of lighting circuits controlled together, then expand later to include:

• Kitchen lighting
• Garden lighting
• Energy monitoring

And eventually they might want a more complete smart home control system.

Shelly’s product range spans small smart relays through to DIN-rail professional products and larger control interfaces, so there are several ways of scaling an installation depending on the project.

You don’t necessarily need to decide what the entire house will look like five years from now before adding useful automation today.

What we’d usually recommend is making sure what we install now doesn’t unnecessarily limit what you may want to do later.

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A retrofit garden lighting solution in Horsforth

Another good example came from a property in Horsforth, Leeds.

The customer already had garden lighting installed.

The lights illuminated some beautiful statues positioned around the garden.

The problem wasn’t the lighting itself.

It was the switches.

They were awkward to get to and positioned out of sight.

So every time the customer wanted the feature lighting on, they had to go to an inconvenient switch location.

What he actually wanted was very simple:

“Can I just ask Alexa to turn the garden lights on?”

Shelly gave us a practical way of doing that.

We retrofitted smart control to the existing garden-lighting arrangement so the customer could use Amazon Alexa voice commands to turn the lighting on and off.

Shelly officially supports Amazon Alexa integration for compatible products, allowing voice control of connected devices.

No unnecessary control panel.

No complicated routine.

The existing lights stayed in place.

We simply gave the customer a much more convenient way of controlling them.

That’s a good smart home installation in my view.

Solve the problem without creating three new ones.

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Our Armley project – six zones of smart lighting

At the other end of the scale, we’ve installed a much more involved Shelly system at a property in Armley, Leeds.

The customer had a large open-plan kitchen and living space with six separate zones of lighting.

All six zones were dimmable.

Rather than treating those circuits as six individual dimmers, we designed the lighting around the way the family actually used the room.

The system was programmed with six scenes:

Dining

Cooking

Cleaning

TV Time

Relax

All Off

Each scene was carefully configured to put the different lighting zones at levels appropriate for that activity.

That’s much more useful than simply telling a customer:

“You’ve got six dimmable circuits.”

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Why lighting scenes make such a difference

Take the Cleaning scene.

When you’re cleaning a kitchen, you generally want plenty of useful light.

So several zones can come up to brighter levels.

Compare that with TV Time.

You probably don’t want the kitchen lit up at full brightness while you’re trying to relax.

The lighting can drop back to more comfortable levels.

The same room.

The same six circuits.

Completely different feel.

Then there is Dining, where the lighting can be centred more around the way the dining area is being used.

And at the end of the evening:

All Off.

One action rather than walking around adjusting six different zones.

This is why we spend time talking to customers about how they use a space before programming scenes.

The names of the products aren’t particularly important to the homeowner.

What matters is whether pressing Relax actually makes the room feel right.

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Shelly Wall Display XL – one place to control the room

For the Armley project, we used a Shelly Wall Display XL as the main control interface.

Shelly describes the Wall Display XL as a 10.1-inch smart home control panel designed to centralise control of devices, scenes and other home functions. It can also provide energy information and media control.

For our customer, it became much more than a lighting switch.

The screen provided access to the six lighting scenes, while also displaying useful information including:

• Live power-consumption feedback
• Indoor temperature information
• Outdoor temperature information
• Local weather
• Smart home controls

It gave the customer one clear place to see what was happening in the space rather than needing several separate switches and apps.

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We also integrated Sonos control

The Armley system also gave the customer access to their Sonos audio.

They could use the Shelly Wall Display XL to control music and access favourite listening options from the same general interface used for the smart lighting.

Shelly currently supports Sonos functionality on the Wall Display XL, including music playback, track control and volume adjustment.

This is where a system starts to feel more joined up.

The customer walks into the kitchen.

They can select the lighting scene they want.

They can see useful information about the home.

And they can control the music.

You don’t need one touchscreen for lighting and another for audio.

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Shelly isn’t just for lighting

Most of the Shelly installations we carry out involve lighting because it’s one of the areas where customers notice smart control immediately.

But the product range can do much more.

Depending on the particular device and installation, Shelly can also be used to control compatible:

• Plug-in appliances
• Fans
• Heating equipment
• Pumps
• Electric loads
• Blinds and shutters
• Garden equipment
• Other electrical devices

Shelly’s professional relay products, for example, are marketed for applications including lighting, appliances and other automated loads.

There is an important caveat here.

We don’t simply make an appliance remotely switchable because technically we can.

The appliance, electrical load and way it operates all need to be suitable.

Something like a lamp is straightforward.

Heat-producing appliances and equipment that could create a risk if energised unattended need much more careful consideration.

That’s one reason we prefer to look at what you’re trying to control before specifying the equipment.

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Shelly is also very useful for energy monitoring

Smart control is only part of the Shelly range.

A number of Shelly products also provide power and energy monitoring.

Depending on the device being installed, this can allow you to see what particular circuits or connected loads are consuming.

Shelly’s Smart Control platform supports real-time power metering with compatible PM devices and can be used to analyse energy usage.

That can be useful if you want to understand:

• What a particular appliance is costing to run
• How much electricity a lighting circuit is using
• Whether equipment is being left on unnecessarily
• Consumption at different times of the day
• Where larger electrical loads are coming from

Energy monitoring by itself doesn’t magically reduce the electricity bill.

But it gives you information.

And once you can actually see where energy is being used, it’s much easier to make sensible decisions about it.

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Shelly can grow into a wider smart home system

This is another reason we like using Shelly.

It doesn’t have to remain a standalone system forever.

For some properties, Shelly itself may provide all the control the customer needs.

For other projects, it can become part of a wider professionally installed smart home.

Shelly currently publishes professional integrations and drivers for several larger control platforms, including Control4.

That means Shelly can work particularly well where a customer wants to start with practical, cost-effective automation now but may eventually move towards a higher-end whole-home control system.

For example:

You might begin with Shelly lighting.

Later add energy monitoring.

Then introduce more rooms.

And eventually bring those devices into a wider Control4 smart home system where appropriate.

We’d still design that integration around the actual products and driver compatibility rather than assuming every device will automatically work with everything.

But it gives us useful options.

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Shelly Plus and Shelly Pro – what is the difference?

We don’t expect customers to know which Shelly device they need before calling us.

That’s our job.

For retrofit work, compact Shelly devices can often be useful because they are designed to fit into existing electrical installations where the wiring and available space allow.

For larger or more structured installations, we may use Shelly Pro equipment installed at the distribution or control point.

Shelly Pro devices include DIN-rail relays, dimmers and energy-monitoring products designed for professional automation installations. Some models also provide wired Ethernet alongside wireless connectivity.

Which approach is right depends on the property.

There isn’t one Shelly product that we automatically fit everywhere.

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Good smart lighting shouldn’t depend entirely on an app

One of the mistakes people make with smart homes is assuming that putting every switch onto a phone automatically makes the system better.

It doesn’t.

The app is useful.

Voice control can be useful.

Automation is useful.

But when you walk into a kitchen, you should still have a sensible way of controlling the lights.

The family should understand it.

Guests should understand it.

And if somebody doesn’t have their phone with them, the house should still be usable.

That’s why we design the physical controls, scenes and smart functions together.

The technology should disappear into the background.

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Common mistakes with Shelly and retrofit smart homes

Buying the device before checking the wiring

A Shelly relay may look simple online, but the existing electrical circuit still needs to be suitable.

We check first.

Ignoring the electrical load

Different devices have different switching and dimming capabilities.

We specify the equipment for the load rather than choosing it because it’s the cheapest module available.

Assuming every LED will dim perfectly

LED dimming requires compatibility between the dimmer, lamp or driver and the electrical load.

We take that into account during the design.

Relying completely on app control

An app should add convenience.

It shouldn’t make basic lighting harder to use.

Creating clever automations nobody needs

A smart home doesn’t need fifty routines to be impressive.

The best automations tend to solve something you actually do every day.

Not thinking about future expansion

If you might want to add more rooms later, tell us at the beginning.

We can take that into account when designing the first stage.

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What happens when you book a Shelly installation with SmartOhm?

We start with the problem you’re trying to solve.

Maybe you want better lighting control.

Maybe an existing switch is awkward to reach.

Maybe you want Alexa control.

Perhaps you want to monitor energy.

Or you’re planning a larger smart home system.

We’ll discuss what you want the finished system to do.

Where required, we’ll survey the property and inspect the existing electrical installation.

We’ll look at things such as:

• Existing wiring
• Lighting circuits
• Electrical loads
• Dimming requirements
• Available installation space
• Network and Wi-Fi coverage
• Existing smart home equipment
• How you’d like to control the system
• Whether future expansion needs to be considered

We’ll then decide which Shelly products are appropriate.

That may include Shelly Plus or Pro relays and dimmers, power-monitoring products, a Shelly Wall Display XL or other suitable equipment, depending on the project.

We’ll provide a written quotation before undertaking the work.

Once agreed, we’ll install and configure the system.

We’ll create the scenes and automations.

We’ll test the electrical installation and the smart functions.

Then we’ll show you how to use it.

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Why have Shelly installed by an electrician?

Shelly makes smart home technology accessible, and some of its products are small enough that it’s easy to forget what they’re connected to.

They’re still controlling mains electrical circuits.

If a relay or dimmer is being permanently incorporated into the electrical installation, the electrical side matters just as much as the smart-home side.

You need to consider:

• Correct wiring
• Circuit protection
• Load ratings
• Earthing
• Equipment compatibility
• Safe enclosure
• Heat and ventilation
• Inspection and testing

SmartOhm combines smart home experience with 21 years of hands-on electrical installation experience.

That means we’re not approaching a Shelly installation purely from the app and programming side.

We look at the electrical installation behind it too.

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Why use SmartOhm for your Shelly installation?

We’ve installed Shelly systems on real projects across Leeds and the surrounding area.

That includes:

Cleckheaton – four areas of lighting brought together for useful scene control.

Horsforth – retrofit garden lighting control so a customer could use Alexa to operate awkward-to-reach feature-lighting switches.

Armley – six zones of dimmable smart lighting controlled through a Shelly Wall Display XL, with six programmed scenes, energy information, temperature and weather feedback, and Sonos control.

Those are three very different projects.

And that’s the point.

Shelly isn’t one fixed type of smart home system.

We can use it where it makes sense for the job.

SmartOhm Electrical and Smart Home is also:

• NAPIT Registered – Full Scope
• TrustMark Registered
• A Which? Trusted Trader
• Rated with more than 85 five-star Google reviews
• Backed by 21 years of electrical and smart home installation experience

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Shelly smart home installation across Leeds

SmartOhm installs Shelly smart home and smart lighting systems throughout Leeds and surrounding areas.

We work across areas including:

• Leeds
• Armley
• Horsforth
• North Leeds
• Alwoodley
• Roundhay
• Wetherby
• Cleckheaton
• Wakefield
• Harrogate
• Huddersfield
• Surrounding towns and villages

You don’t need to know which Shelly relay, dimmer or controller you need before getting in touch.

Tell us what you’re trying to achieve.

For example:

“I want these four lights controlled together.”

“I want to ask Alexa to switch my garden lighting on.”

“I want six different lighting scenes in my kitchen.”

“I want to see how much energy this circuit is using.”

That’s enough for us to start.

Talk to us about Shelly

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Frequently Asked Questions

Do you install Shelly smart home equipment in Leeds?

Yes.

SmartOhm installs Shelly smart lighting, automation and energy-monitoring equipment throughout Leeds and surrounding areas.

We’ve completed Shelly projects in areas including Armley, Horsforth and Cleckheaton.

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Is Shelly suitable for an existing house?

Often, yes.

Retrofit is one of the areas where Shelly can be particularly useful.

Some Shelly devices are specifically designed to be incorporated around existing switches and circuits, subject to the wiring, available space and electrical installation being suitable.

We survey the installation before deciding which approach to use.

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Do I need to make my whole house smart?

No.

You can start with one circuit, one room or one particular problem.

The system can then be expanded later where appropriate.

Our Cleckheaton installation, for example, only needed control of four lighting areas.

A useful smart home doesn’t have to be a whole-house automation project.

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Can Shelly control my garden lighting with Alexa?

Yes, compatible Shelly devices can integrate with Amazon Alexa.

We’ve used this approach ourselves on a project in Horsforth where the customer’s existing switches for garden feature lighting were awkward to access.

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Can Shelly dim lighting?

Yes.

Shelly manufactures smart dimmers for both retrofit and professional DIN-rail applications.

The important bit is making sure the dimmer and lighting load are compatible.

We’ll check that as part of the design.

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Can Shelly control Sonos?

The Shelly Wall Display XL currently supports Sonos audio control, including functions such as playback, track changes and volume control.

We used this on our Armley installation so the customer could access Sonos alongside the lighting controls.

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What is the Shelly Wall Display XL?

The Shelly Wall Display XL is a 10.1-inch wall-mounted smart home control panel.

It can provide central access to Shelly devices, scenes, energy information and other functions, with support for features such as audio integration.

We use it where a customer would benefit from a permanent, easy-to-access control point rather than relying purely on an app.

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Can Shelly monitor electricity consumption?

Yes, where compatible power-monitoring devices are installed.

Shelly offers smart relays, plugs and dedicated energy-monitoring products that can provide real-time power information through the Shelly platform.

The exact information available depends on the devices being monitored.

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Can Shelly control appliances?

Potentially.

Shelly products can control suitable electrical loads and compatible appliances, but we assess the appliance and electrical requirements first.

We wouldn’t recommend remotely energising equipment simply because it is technically possible.

The appliance must be appropriate for unattended or automated control.

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Does Shelly work with Control4?

Shelly currently lists Control4 among its professional smart home integrations and drivers.

This can make Shelly useful as part of a wider high-end Control4 smart home installation where the relevant devices and drivers are compatible.

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Is Shelly expensive?

Shelly can provide a cost-effective way of adding smart control, particularly where we can work with an existing electrical installation rather than carrying out a major rewire.

The final cost depends on the number of circuits, equipment required, electrical work, control interfaces and level of programming.

We’ll provide a written quotation before undertaking the work.

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Looking for a Shelly Installer in Leeds?

If you’re considering Shelly smart lighting, retrofit automation or energy monitoring in Leeds, get in touch with SmartOhm Electrical and Smart Home.

It can be something as small as making an awkward lighting circuit easier to use.

Or it can become a multi-zone system with:

• Dimmable lighting
• Programmed scenes
• Touchscreen control
• Alexa
• Sonos
• Energy monitoring
• Integration into a wider smart home

The best place to start isn’t by choosing a Shelly product.

It’s by telling us what you want the house to do.

We’ll look at the electrical installation, explain the sensible options and provide a written quotation before carrying out the work.

Send us a photo or give us a call.

Discuss your Shelly project