It's past time for me to invest in a programmable thermostat for my home heating/cooling system. I like the idea of checking/changing settings over the net.
I'm thinking on this one:http://www.amazon.com/Filtrete-Wi-fi-Screen-Programmable-Thermostat/dp/B004IFXVHM
Watching this thread as I've been wanting a web gui as well.
It's not cheap, but the geek in me finds the Nest thermostat really compelling: http://www.nest.com/
(no affiliation, no canoe)
The thermostat is the only part of my system that works reliably!
Yeah I am getting a nest when I get a house. They just came out with a second revision of that product. Its really cool I think in the first year it should pay for itself.
Thermostat and Aquastat troubleshooting are on my to-do list for today.
One of my air handlers (hydro-air) kicks on, runs for a minute, shuts off for a minute and then goes back on again. It's infuriating and I was assured that there is no air in the system.
There is a very nice but rather rare feature that caused me to buy the one we have. It's a "I'm Home" button. Push it and it turns on the heat to my default "at home" temperature.
This is important and usefull!
In its default mode, the thermostat turns the house way down during the day while we're at work. But sometimes, we're home. With just a push of that button, it brings up the heat for that time period. Perfect!
Very few have this handy feature. Most make you go through programming contortions to do what this button does.
I was very interested in the Nest Product, thanks for posting that. Yes, at $250 each (and I would need two) they are not cheap but darn sure looks cool.
I followed along on their website; even sent over a picture of my thermostat wiring and called their support. Seems that my electric heat pump system may not be compatible.
http://support.nest.com/#compatibility
foxtrapper wrote: There is a very nice but rather rare feature that caused me to buy the one we have. It's a "I'm Home" button. Push it and it turns on the heat to my default "at home" temperature. This is important and usefull! In its default mode, the thermostat turns the house way down during the day while we're at work. But sometimes, we're home. With just a push of that button, it brings up the heat for that time period. Perfect! Very few have this handy feature. Most make you go through programming contortions to do what this button does.
I bought a cheap 5-2 day programmable stat. It had that. Of course it's just called "Hold". As in you adjust the temperature you want by pushing the up or down arrows and then hit hold, and it will hold it indefinitely. When you leave or want it back on the program, I just hit "Run". No programming... after the initial setup.
Unless you have people in your house with busy fingers, I'd skip the expensive t-stats. Maybe a web gui would be cool if you had a rental house or something, to watch your investment.
I want a web based one as well.
My wife is terrible at turning lights off and/or the thermostat down when she leaves, and she's home way more than me. Often she'll meet me out of town and we'll be gone for the weekend or something, and I'll ask.. "did you turn the heat down?"... which almost always gets the "umm.. probably not" response. It would be nice to jump on the smartphone and crank the thing down to save some loot.
The other big benefit would actually be the opposite. Even if you remember to turn the place down... you can turn it way down when you're gone for a weekend, then on your way home you can phone ahead so to speak and crank the heat (or A/C) back up so it's back to the temp you want by the time you get home. It sucks getting home in Michigan after a long weekend on the road with sleeping kids to get back to a house that feels like it's freezing.
My big complaint with them is they don't follow your instructions all the time. What's the use of having a time table for temperature changes if they can go "IN RECOVERY" at any moment and do what they want to do.
IN RECOVERY is where the thermostat gets to decide that it needs to turn on the heat or AC early so that they can be at the temp you set at X time. So 2 hours early you get hot air. This is a big pain when you are sleeping. I like to sleep cold and usually have the windows open in the winter. The heater kicking in 2 hours early wakes me up 2 hours early.
Just plan better and set the thermostat to change the heat 2 hours later you say? Doesn't work that way. It depends upon how cold the room gets as to when it kicks in so one night it might kick in 2 hours early (night before last) and then like last night it came on about an hour early.
What's the use of going to all the trouble to set times for the thermostat to change the temps if it doesn't follow your instructions.
The HOLD button gets used a lot at our house.
I've got 6 zones so that means I've got 6 of those buggers.
Mine is a Honeywell unit.
A friend just got the Nest about a month ago. He's not having much luck with it either. Unless you have a pretty regular schedule it can't learn how to set temps and you end up doing it all the time, so why spend $250 for a manual thermostat?
I'm not asking for much, all I want is a thermostat to do what I tell it.
RossD wrote: I bought a cheap 5-2 day programmable stat. It had that. Of course it's just called "Hold". As in you adjust the temperature you want by pushing the up or down arrows and then hit hold, and it will hold it indefinitely. When you leave or want it back on the program, I just hit "Run". No programming... after the initial setup.
That's a lot more steps. With mine, you poke one button, one time, and you're done for the duration.
One thing I read doing research, and can confirm with experience - if your house is well insulated, you're better off not having more than a couple degree temperature differential throughout the day. However, if you have an older/uninsulated house, you will realize savings by setting a wide temperature difference - assuming the house is vacant for 5+ hours during the day.
It's weird how much home technology there is that seems like it came straight out of Fahrenheit 451.
petegossett wrote: One thing I read doing research, and can confirm with experience - if your house is well insulated, you're better off not having more than a couple degree temperature differential throughout the day. However, if you have an older/uninsulated house, you will realize savings by setting a wide temperature difference - assuming the house is vacant for 5+ hours during the day.
My physics class taught me otherwise.
while good insulation will minimize the effect... the example I've been given goes like this.
Heat transfer occurs similar to water leaking out of a bucket with a hole in it. The differential of the amount of water in the bucket is similar to the differential in the temperature inside your home vs. outside. Your house is always leaking heat, similar to the bucket with a hole always dripping water. If you run a very low water level in the bucket, it will drip out at a lower rate. If you fill the water bucket up to the top, it will piss out much faster. Heat transfer works the same way, higher differential = greater loss/transfer.
So, if you start with a full bucket in the morning, and try to keep it full all day, it will take more water to keep the bucket full due to the higher quotient of loss. If you allow the water level to drop to a smaller quantity, it won't leak as fast, and it will take less water (energy) to maintain that level throughout the day, even if you fill it back up to full at the end of the day when you come home.
In reply to xflowgolf:
i think what he's getting at is that if the home is well insulated, you won't see as much savings with the wide temp swing as you would in a less well-insulated home. basically you stop saving more money if the bucket doesn't go empty before you get home.
for example, in your poorly insulated house, normal temp is 70, and in 2 hours the temp drops 10 degrees to 60 where you have the thermostat set, and kicks on 4 times in 8 hours while you're gone.
during that same time in the well insulated house, it never gets down to 60 degrees, and only comes on when its set to change back to 70 after 8 hours.
in this situation, there is no more money to be saved by changing the programed low temp during the day any lower, as its not turning on when set at 60 anyways.
that said, my issue with the Nest was that you have to change it in order for it to learn. my thermostat is upstairs, and the master bedroom and we spend most of our time downstairs. we don't want to go up and down to change the thermostat all the time, which is why the programmable tstat that i can adjust through the alarm system online or my phone works great. when i'm out of town if i forget to change it, i just pull out my iphone and adjust the set temp. its been great for the last almost 3 years i've had it, the only complaint i've had is that it goes through batteries faster than i'd like.
I spent $24 on mine (5/2) and its probably not the only thing making a difference, but my bills have been 50-60% of what they were the same time the previous year. Been up and running 11-12 months now. Love it! Would pass on anything more expensive. I just set it and forget it. If I am home early it's real easy to tell it to be a little cooler and then it will switch back the next cycle.
Woody wrote: Thermostat and Aquastat troubleshooting are on my to-do list for today. One of my air handlers (hydro-air) kicks on, runs for a minute, shuts off for a minute and then goes back on again. It's infuriating and I was assured that there is no air in the system.
My apologies for the thread hijack, but it looks as if this may have been solved with a simple aquastat adjustment. Total cash outlay: $0.
Yay!
I've heard 2 schools of thought on thermostat settings. one saying you can really save by having it set lower while you are away (like at work). the other saying if you just leave it set constantly at a reasonable temperature, its easier for the system to hold that temperature. and the savings from the former is really not that great because of the system having to work harder when the temperature gets bumped back up. I know if there is more than a few degrees difference ours goes into "HIGH" heat mode. (heatpump)
This time of year we keep our "warm" setting at 67 degrees. and quite frankly its been at that since we turned the heat on this year. ours is a programmable 5-2 deal.
Our windows suck ass anyways and don't help in either situation.
My tstat has a hold and a temporary override. Hitting hold, holds the temp indefinitely. Other wise you can adjust the the dial up or down, and it will hold that temp until the next programmed interval.
Normally it does 62 overnight. 68 early morning, back to 62 while we are away at work, then 68 for when we get home until the overnight cycle. If I'm home during the day I just turn up the dial for the day portion.
The main thing I liked about ours was a feature that turned the fan on once an hour for 5-10 minutes. The heat sources are concentrated in certain areas and stirring the air in the house around every so often kept the temperatures much more consistent and close to the desired setting.
I run a cheapy I bought at HD 6 years ago... down to 63 at night and when I am at work.. 73 when I am home
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