I am trying to install this switch in a laundry room https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B005WM3ALC/

I have used this switch before so I am familiar with its use. As it is, I can hold the main and side buttons to enable the various modes, and I see the orange light at the bottom of the switch flash to indicate the mode changes. I can also hear the "click" of the switch turning something on when I trip the motion sensor, or manually press the button (it's a different click that the click of pressing the button). BUT, the lights in the ceiling just don't light up.

One thing that confuses me is the manual for this switch says there will be 2 black, one bare, and one green wire. But my unit has 2 black, one bare, and one white wire. I've assumed that white wire is still a ground wire, just colored differently. This picture shows how I've wired it.

The ground wire in the box looks like something I haven't seen before...a green nut with a hole at the top to let a longer wire through. I have tied the bare and the white wire to this ground wire. Then black to black. I've left the white wires in the box alone.

I know the lights are fine because I put the original switch back and it works as it did before. Any idea what is wrong with this installation?

 

The "greenie" wirenut allows for a splice with one wire left longer to go to device.

Are you sure you got the "no neutral required" model ?
All wiring diagrams I see and the installation video all show a green wire..... not white with the "no neutral required" model.

 

Well I just double checked and...maybe. I've only bought one of these, and that Amazon link is definitely what I ordered, it's from my order history. But the model number on the device is MS-OPS2, not MS-OPS2-H as shown on the box in the Amazon listing.

In any case I found this from a "specification" document that has more info than the installation instructions. Looks like my box is the "with neutral" scenario, and maybe at one point my white wire had a green sleeve and I just don't remember? I'll try wiring the white into white instead of ground and see if that works.

 

Well, wiring white to white didn't work.

The lights that this switch is meant to control are very new - this laundry room is part of a remodel that finished a couple months ago. They are bulb-less "can" LED lights, some fairly new product. The lights are supposed to last years or something. Is it possible the switch isn't compatible with it for some other reason? The light this switch used to control was a fluorescent tube bulb that have been around for years.

I am positive that the switch itself is getting the power it needs to operate its motion sensor, program modes, etc. The orange light indicator does flash when the buttons are pressed. I am also 99% positive it is sending hot power out when the switch is activated (either by button or motion sensor) because of the very noticeable "click" sound it makes. When the power is off at the breaker it does not make this sound.

I'm familiar with certain switches being incompatible with certain lights (like dimmers and some LED blubs), so is it possible something like is going on here?

 

I suspect you have just a switch leg in that box, which means no neutral.

 

I didn't think the problem thru fully. The ground wire would be basically the same as neutral so both wires connected to the bare ground should make it work. Still don't know why they use white and green.

It sounds like it may be a defective switch.
A click would indicate the relay closing which should bring the lights on.
Since it's a relay.... it will operate any type of lighting.