Hunter Fan Company 59485 Romulus Ceiling Fan

7 reviews for Hunter Fan Company 59485 Romulus Ceiling Fan

1. 

   Rated 5 out of 5

   Reign of Crows – February 20, 2023

   Update November 2021: I bought a second one; updated thoughts are at the bottom.Original review from late 2020:Ceiling fans are incredible for heat control. My home came with three different ceiling fans, and one of them – a Minka Aire Lightwave (around 54″?) – seemingly needed to run on medium or high speed to have any cooling effect. Building an Apple Homekit-enabled “smarthome” meant it was ripe for replacement with a HomeKit-enabled fan, for which Hunter is just about the only option, and the Romulus is only one of two choices that come with fan blades getting you to 60″.I’ll include some tips about my setup experience at the bottom of this review.Briefly, what I love about the fan: great airflow; nice technology integration; easy to set up (and I say that as someone who isn’t overly handy, and who had never swapped out a ceiling fan before); nice appearance. 5/5 from me on these aspects. Using a ladder, a combo drill/driver to speed up inserting screws, a small pliers, and regular scissors (for cutting the wire to length and gently removing part of the wiring insulation), I was able to do the install in just a few hours.If I were to rate purely based on the letdowns it would be 3/5, to give a sense of how severe (or not) the issues are:1) The LED light refresh rate is low. Go ahead and wave your hand in sunlight; now come indoors and repeat that in an area illuminated only with artificial lighting. If your hand’s motion appears a bit choppy, you have lighting with a slower refresh rate. This isn’t necessarily unexpected with dimmable lights, and may represent an unrealistic expectation on my part (I’m not an expert), but I had expected it to be flawless.2) The remote control, while sleek, isn’t overly useful. My other fans allow you to set the speed with a single button, and some even have timers. This fan remote has four buttons: light; fan; up; down. Granted, it’s a “smart” fan and I only touched the remote when setting the fan up (I’ve done all of my other controls through HomeKit), but for the cost I would have expected more.3) The fan blades looked and felt cheap up-close. They look fine when they’re mounted, and from a practical standpoint it doesn’t really matter (and it makes sense to have lighter blades), but be prepared for this if you’re installing it yourself: they almost feel like they’re made of foam, and the wooden print looks a bit sad when it’s in your hand.4) The light does not seem to come on even after power is cut to the fan. Pretty much all of my other fans will at least function like a light if you cut the power to them and then turn it back on, which is a useful thing. The Hunter fan seems to keep the light off if it was last in an off state, even if you cycle the power. Less of an issue given that it has more connectivity options, but it would be nice if this behavior were at least programmable.Maybe the most telling thing is that, if and when the time comes to replace the ceiling fans in my other rooms, I would definitely consider getting this same model as a replacement, and I would consider doing the installation myself again. I guess that’s the best endorsement of the fan that there ultimately is: if I would buy it again, I can recommend it to others.Lastly, some tips for people who already bought the fan, or who may be having some questions about the setup:DO I NEED THE APP EVEN IF IM USING HOMEKIT?Yes, if you want to silence it or run a firmware update (my fan came already up to date), otherwise the app does not seem to offer any benefit.DIGITAL SETUP:Overall pretty easy, but not flawless. I had to repeat things twice: I added in HomeKit first, and the app threw an issue over it; I renamed the fan and that seemed to cause another issue in the app. Just set up through the app first, don’t rename anything during the initial setup, and it seems to be fine (or maybe everyone has to do it twice). I renamed the fan once it was set up and the app didn’t have an issue.HOW DO I ENABLE DIMMING?Puzzling to me is the fact that the dimmable light seems like a major feature, yet out of the box the light is either off or on. This feature can’t be enabled through the app. Website instructions aren’t 100% clear. Hold the up and down buttons on the remote at the same time (the entire button depresses) and it enables. I needed to cut power to the fan with my wall switch and then turn it back on for dimming to be recognized in the app and HomeKit. This was the only time I absolutely needed to use the remote for anything.HOW DO I DISABLE THE BEEP?Use the app, tap on the small “i” on fan speed, tap on “Features,” and there is a little toggle button for “Audio feedback.” Enjoy the silence!UPDATE November 2021:My original fan is working about the same as when I bought it – there are no issues with disconnects. Siri control is a bit temperamental, which is something that seemed to develop later; some devices can control the fan perfectly by voice, while others will report that they’ve changed the setting but nothing actually happens. Control via the Home app or widgets is always flawless, though, and I have not touched the remote since the initial setup.I liked it enough that during a brief price drop on the fans I bought a second one. Hunter has made some under-the-hood changes since the first one; the manual indicates a fan weight that is about two pounds less compared with my original. The setup process can now be completed entirely through the app and does not require the remote control at all. Firmware on the new fan indicates a very different version number, and it’s unclear to me if this means that firmware updating is broken or if the underlying hardware on both fans uses different firmware versions.The way that the fan behaves in HomeKit is also a bit different. With the original fan, Homekit used a ceiling fan icon, and by default grouped the fan and light control together. Fan and light controls are still grouped by default with the newer version, but the fan icon is now a standard fan (which may be something on my own HomeKit setup; unfortunately it seems Apple may have removed the ability to easily change the icons). With the older model you could set the fan speed to any percentage and it would presumably choose one of the six speeds based on what was closest to the number you had set, but the newer fan will seemingly forcefully change the fan speed to the speed numbers in the Hunter app (which, confusingly, seem to go roughly by 16). This has led to some frustrating situations where you set a number below 16 (usually by accident), the toggle moves itself as if the fan is shut off, but the fan remains spinning. In this regard it feels as if there has been a regression in HomeKit performance, at least a little.That said, it still performs well and I value being able to control it through HomeKit. With further price drops I’d still buy more of them to replace some other ceiling fans that I own, but my conclusion remains the same as before: if there were another company making fans with flawless HomeKit support I wouldn’t replace the Hunter fans with them, but I would use them to replace my current “dumb” fans instead.
   

2. 

   Rated 5 out of 5

   Jaime – February 20, 2023

   I really like the fan. I’d even buy it again for another room. My complaints:The app kind of sucks.The device response is a bit slow in general. It doesn’t matter if you use the app, integrations, or the remote. You hear the beep almost immediately, but the fan takes a moment to start up/speed up/slow down. It’s fine once you are used to it.The Alexa integration sometimes stops working.Overall, it’s fine and it is connected most of the time. I’d definitely buy another one.
   

3. 

   Rated 5 out of 5

   Biscuit – February 20, 2023

   Quiet motor, and nice look, but nearly sent it back after getting it installed and finding the remote would not pair. I followed the instructions to a T and got no beep (indicator of a successful pairing), nor would it add into Homekit. It took multiple power cycles and much frustration, before a miracle occurred (i.e. I heard a beep). Still not sure what made it decide to work, for it seemed to have a mind of its own in this regard.
   

4. 

   Rated 5 out of 5

   Bill Berrios – February 20, 2023

   Pros: Received promptly, instructions were clear. Great looking. Plenty of light and airflow.Cons: remote and app have significant delay time, difficult to install fan blades while on a 9’ ft ladder and line up the holes. Need a better design for this.
   

5. 

   Rated 5 out of 5

   Doug B – February 20, 2023

   I bought it based on Alexa integration, it shows up in Alexa but Alexa is unable to manage it correctly. Alexa has no idea if is on or off and has no ability to change speed or dim light .. the fan is very quiet , makes almost zero noise. That’s great . We have smart home and this is a disappointment.Review update : I filed a support request, they responded after a few days and asked some questions then stopped responding all together. Buyer beware
   
   

6. 

   Rated 5 out of 5

   D. McIver – February 20, 2023

   ** updated from 3 to 1 stars 10/20 – based on total lack of support!! ***Like SO many other reviewers, you, too will have problems with the Hunter app or HomeKit or whatever you use. You’ll find the fan(s) randomly drop / disconnect from the app – or that one function stop while the other appears to work for a few days longer (e.g. light is controlled but not speed). You’ll be frustrated that you can’t figure out how to delete / remove the fan from the app and re-pair it / add it again.You’ll likely open a support ticket, only to go back and forth a few days where they seem more interested in gathering non-pertinent info / details for marketing rather than even a basic troubleshooting recommendation being presented.God help you if the fan is hard wired (e.g. no light switch) and the only method to reset is flipping the breaker — that’s me, it really sucks!On a positive note, the fans do look very nice, they install painlessly – they include enough wiring to install a 6′ drop pole if needed. The LED light kit is not something you can swap out bulbs or similar, it’s always going to be a Hunter LED light part – but we found the light of normal “color” whiteness and sufficiently bright. Not amazingly bright, but sufficiently bright.overall, the gripe is strictly around the crappy support for their app / homekit support — so plan on using the included remote and not having smart fans!*** update 10/20 ***STILL going back and forth with customer support – for 2 weeks now about the fans dropping off the Hunter app. They persist in coming back to needing my name, phone and address to better provide support — rather than actually troubleshoot the problem. Their script is horrifically outdated, asking about what version of the app I’m running – v1 or v2 — of which, the newer is over 6 months old (I’m using v3.5.4!!!).Finally called in for support to learn that the person helping me via email is actually a “supervisor” — WOW, they must really be hurting for qualified support!
   

7. 

   Rated 5 out of 5

   Nabeel Nizar – February 20, 2023

   Our electrician installed it and it seemed pretty easy and straightforward.Running this on my iOS 13 app and all works well with Siri and my HomePod.Very quiet.