Home heating automation

maxamillius

Why does the boiler continue firing even though the set point is at 21 and the room temp is at 21?

Think this is the reason, idiot

https://support.tado.com/en/articles/3387301-why-does-tado-keep-heating-even-after-reaching-the-target-temperature

championc

DrPhilG wrote: »

Also what would you say is a reasonable time frame/rate for the spark to wire up the 3rd stat and fit the control hub?

Day? Half a day? 3 weeks plus overtime lol?

Does your chosen Sparks know about what your plumber is doing ? I would have thought that a decent plumber would know how to wire it all up and then test and have it running the way you want it.

IMO you could be heading for trouble if your sparks and plumber are not working together because the plumber will have nothing to do with it once the sparks "owns" it

DrPhilG

championc wrote: »

Does your chosen Sparks know about what your plumber is doing ? I would have thought that a decent plumber would know how to wire it all up and then test and have it running the way you want it.

IMO you could be heading for trouble if your sparks and plumber are not working together because the plumber will have nothing to do with it once the sparks "owns" it

Nah its all good. They've worked together a lot, at my house and on other jobs. They've been in contact with each other as well as me on this job.

I'm just being over cautious and picking both their brains, wanting to understand it all to make sure it's all smooth.

cuffeb

Hi

Been interested in doing this a while now but need some advice.

I've got a boiler stove which heats hot water first to 60-65 deg. then ground floor then upstairs heating.
Boiler switches off when temperature has been met and is all controlled by a system link.
All this work was done around 6 years ago and we have been in the house since.

I'm looking at upgrading my existing heating controls from an EPH 3 zone to a Drayton wiser
2 zone + hot water.

Is this a straight swap of stats & controller or is there more to it?
I need to be sure it doesn't interfere with the stove's interaction with the pumps when its on.

Cheers

chuck eastwood

cuffeb wrote: »

Hi

Been interested in doing this a while now but need some advice.

I've got a boiler stove which heats hot water first to 60-65 deg. then ground floor then upstairs heating.
Boiler switches off when temperature has been met and is all controlled by a system link.
All this work was done around 6 years ago and we have been in the house since.

I'm looking at upgrading my existing heating controls from an EPH 3 zone to a Drayton wiser
2 zone + hot water.

Is this a straight swap of stats & controller or is there more to it?
I need to be sure it doesn't interfere with the stove's interaction with the pumps when its on.

Cheers

Howdy. I have exactly the same set up with a horstman 3 zone controller but with an oil condensing burner as the second hear source. I actually emailed system link yesterday to ask advice and the engineering messaged back saying

"As long as the smart controls are 230v they should work with the systemlex wiring centre
Low voltage ones cannot be used
I believe several people have used EPH controls successfully if that helps

Regards, "
Hopefully that is of some help to you. Half the battle is getting an electrician who is familiar with modern heating controls. The two I've asked so far won't go near it

cuffeb

Cheers, thanks for that.

Will start checking out Drayton offer on Amazon so

deezell

cuffeb wrote: »

Hi

Been interested in doing this a while now but need some advice.

I've got a boiler stove which heats hot water first to 60-65 deg. then ground floor then upstairs heating.
Boiler switches off when temperature has been met and is all controlled by a system link.
All this work was done around 6 years ago and we have been in the house since.

I'm looking at upgrading my existing heating controls from an EPH 3 zone to a Drayton wiser
2 zone + hot water.

Is this a straight swap of stats & controller or is there more to it?
I need to be sure it doesn't interfere with the stove's interaction with the pumps when its on.

Cheers

Have you two boilers? a stove and an oil boiler? Are there wall stats and hw cylinder stats associated with the zones.

chuck eastwood

deezell wrote: »

Have you two boilers? a stove and an oil boiler? Are there wall stats and hw cylinder stats associated with the zones.

Hope you guys don't mind me jumping in in this. Deezell you have just described my exact set up and I have been unsure of what smart controls might suit so any advice would be greatly appreciated

deezell

chuck eastwood wrote: »

Hope you guys don't mind me jumping in in this. Deezell you have just described my exact set up and I have been unsure of what smart controls might suit so any advice would be greatly appreciated

Its a simple enough install. You could replace the two wall stats with Tado wired smart stats, just set the eph to always on for both CH ch zones, and continue to use it for HW timing only.
Alternatively you could instal Drayton wiser kit 3, its 3 zone receiver is a simple replacement for the EPH. The zone wall stats are wireless, so you can experiment with optimal locations. The old stats are either turned up full or removed and their wires joined and concealed.
The stove boiler part of this system remains the same, it's control is unaltered by changing the controller. It probably has boiler override built in via the wiring centre, where the stove will mute the oil boiler if it had sufficient output.

DrPhilG

Plumber coming today to add the 3rd valve for hot water but the spark isn't here til next week to connect the new controls.

If the plumber adds the Wiser TRVs today can they just function as a dumb system until later when the system is hooked up?

deezell

DrPhilG wrote: »

Plumber coming today to add the 3rd valve for hot water but the spark isn't here til next week to connect the new controls.

If the plumber adds the Wiser TRVs today can they just function as a dumb system until later when the system is hooked up?

Is the plumber fitting TRV valve bodies to the rads? Assuming you only have screw down types at the moment. Once you fit the valve bodies, you van fit the trv heads. They won't be active until you power them up, and the HubR, and pair them to one of the zones, which will allow you to schedule the TRV valve open and closed, but without firing the boiler. until the sparks arrives and hooks the zone valves' relays. Without the TRV heads the TRV valves are open to flow.

DrPhilG

deezell wrote: »

Is the plumber fitting TRV valve bodies to the rads? Assuming you only have screw down types at the moment. Once you fit the valve bodies, you van fit the trv heads. They won't be active until you power them up, and the HubR, and pair them to one of the zones, which will allow you to schedule the TRV valve open and closed, but without firing the boiler. until the sparks arrives and hooks the zone valves' relays. Without the TRV heads the TRV valves are open to flow.

Gotcha. So if he just fits the valves, they're permanently open until the heads go on?

DrPhilG

DrPhilG wrote: »

Gotcha. So if he just fits the valves, they're permanently open until the heads go on?

This is what I have currently.

deezell

DrPhilG wrote: »

Gotcha. So if he just fits the valves, they're permanently open until the heads go on?

Yes. They usually come with blank plastic caps over the valve pin. This can actually be used as a manual valve if it's screwed down on the mounting thread, pushing the pin down to close the valve, so loosen this to keep it open.Edit: you already have TRV vslve bodies I see.

deezell

Your TRVs are just a straight swap for these old heads, they're only held on by the chrome collar nut. Try taking ine off yourself

chuck eastwood

deezell wrote: »

Its a simple enough install. You could replace the two wall stats with Tado wired smart stats, just set the eph to always on for both CH ch zones, and continue to use it for HW timing only.
Alternatively you could instal Drayton wiser kit 3, its 3 zone receiver is a simple replacement for the EPH. The zone wall stats are wireless, so you can experiment with optimal locations. The old stats are either turned up full or removed and their wires joined and concealed.
The stove boiler part of this system remains the same, it's control is unaltered by changing the controller. It probably has boiler override built in via the wiring centre, where the stove will mute the oil boiler if it had sufficient output.

Thanks for your help. Yeah the stove is controlled by an aux contactor in the system lex wiring centrewhich brings in the downstairs zone when the pipe stat hits the set temp so it shouldn't interfere with any smart controls. I can link out the two current zone wired stats back in the box as always on.
The wiring diagram below is the one I used for my current set up

steve584

Just an update...I've installed the Drayton yesterday, thanks to deezell for pointing me in the right direction regarding the wiring.

I actually got the unit last week but had to get some TRV adapters as the Wiser wouldn't fit.

I reckon it will take me a few days to play around with schedules and temperatures to get the benefit of the system compared to the old way we were heating the house, however already the house does feel more comfortable! Whether that's got to do with the mild weather is yet to be seen!

Thanks again to Deezell for your help.

deezell

No bother. It's my Bob Geldof moment in life, like 'Smart aid' or 'Heat aid'. Anyone want to write a song? What rhymes with Tado....

Clareman

deezell wrote: »

No bother. It's my Bob Geldof moment in life, like 'Smart aid' or 'Heat aid'. Anyone want to write a song? What rhymes with Tado....

Oh what's to do......

chris_ie

Had the plumber out today. He’s going to move the downstairs valve so that it won’t always heat downstairs when back boiler is used.

I mentioned adding new valve for hot water and he reckoned there wouldn’t be much point as most of the time you’d want water heating along with central heating. It was something I always wondered about too. If we want to heat water but not house, then two zone valves closed would do that. What scenario would you want to heat house but not water? Most of the time if we need heat on, we want hot water too. Am I missing something?

deezell

chris_ie wrote: »

Had the plumber out today. He’s going to move the downstairs valve so that it won’t always heat downstairs when back boiler is used.

I mentioned adding new valve for hot water and he reckoned there wouldn’t be much point as most of the time you’d want water heating along with central heating. It was something I always wondered about too. If we want to heat water but not house, then two zone valves closed would do that. What scenario would you want to heat house but not water? Most of the time if we need heat on, we want hot water too. Am I missing something?

No, it's ok, HW will heat to the temperature of the circulation water, which may be lower than required by the cylinder stat while all rads are open, but equally could be higher than required, especially if the CH zones have trvs and with say only a few rads open the circulation water could be close the the boiler limit setting. This is often 65-70°, which may be too hot for your cylinder max.
If the cylinder stat is set for 55°, this will only be possible during a HW only event. You can turn the max flow temperature of the boiler down, this will in effect cap the HW temperature to a lower safer level, but may prolong CH heatup response times as the boiler might be prevented from working at full output if its circulation water is limited to the mid 50s.
A HW zone valve ensures full temperature independence of the HW.
One other issue that arises with a permanently open cylinder coil in a single pump circulation system is the lack of circulation pressure to distant radiators due to the open large bore cylinder circuit, especially if the cylinder is adjacent to the boiler, or is tapped straight accross the flow and return prior to distribution to the radiators. There are lots of variations on the plumbing of cylinders, valved, open pumped fed, open gravity fed, limit valve on the coil to increase rad pressure, a venturi tee, to prevent reverse flow and cooling of HW by the returning pumped cooled CH water. I'm not going to explain or debate these. Suffice to say that all of these plumbing layouts and other boiler temperature control and priority winkles become irrelevant if a full s plan zoning is implemented., but you probably would hardly notice it.

chris_ie

deezell wrote: »

No, it's ok, HW will heat to the temperature of the circulation water, which may be lower than required by the cylinder stat while all rads are open, but equally could be higher than required, especially if the CH zones have trvs and with say only a few rads open the circulation water could be close the the boiler limit setting. This is often 65-70°, which may be too hot for your cylinder max.
If the cylinder stat is set for 55°, this will only be possible during a HW only event. You can turn the max flow temperature of the boiler down, this will in effect cap the HW temperature to a lower safer level, but may prolong CH heatup response times as the boiler might be prevented from working at full output if its circulation water is limited to the mid 50s.
A HW zone valve ensures full temperature independence of the HW.
One other issue that arises with a permanently open cylinder coil in a single pump circulation system is the lack of circulation pressure to distant radiators due to the open large bore cylinder circuit, especially if the cylinder is adjacent to the boiler, or is tapped straight accross the flow and return prior to distribution to the radiators. There are lots of variations on the plumbing of cylinders, valved, open pumped fed, open gravity fed, limit valve on the coil to increase rad pressure, a venturi tee, to prevent reverse flow and cooling of HW by the returning pumped cooled CH water. I'm not going to explain or debate these. Suffice to say that all of these plumbing layouts and other boiler temperature control and priority winkles become irrelevant if a full s plan zoning is implemented., but you probably would hardly notice it.

So it’ll be fine without it? Or should I insist on having it added? I couldn’t disagree with him at the time as it made sense what he said I don’t have a cylinder stat at the minute. Only stat we have is on the back boiler pipe.

deezell

chris_ie wrote: »

So it’ll be fine without it? Or should I insist on having it added? I couldn’t disagree with him at the time as it made sense what he said I don’t have a cylinder stat at the minute. Only stat we have is on the back boiler pipe.

No it'll be fine without. Get him to add a cylinder stat maybe, if you want accurate temperature when heating HW only in summertime.

DrPhilG

Tomorrow is installation day!

Plumber was out last week disconnecting the slack burner (sold and collected last night). He added a 3rd motorised valve for the hot water.

I/the spark now has 2 choices, run a 3rd cable up and over to the controls in the kitchen, or ditch them and put a new location in the hot press beside where the valves are.

I'll probably keep them in the kitchen. Taking a cable up and over isn't a big deal in a bungalow.

I splashed out a little of that slack burner money on 3 more Wiser TRVs. That gives me 5 in total. I'll be putting 2 in the living room, probably the other 3 in some of the less used rooms, as shown here, (blue spots are wiser TRVs.



Its mad, I was watching second hand TRVs on ebay and they always end up selling for around £40 inc postage.

That's not overly expensive, except they're on Amazon for £40 brand new...

DrPhilG

On a side note (and not automation related) does anyone have a solid fuel stove? I had one put in to replace the open fire a few years back and the installer put in a vent out behind the stove. I get that there needs to be air flow but doesn't this entirely defeat the purpose of closing up the open fire in the first place? There is a noticeable cool draft when the stove isn't lit.

chris_ie

DrPhilG wrote: »

On a side note (and not automation related) does anyone have a solid fuel stove? I had one put in to replace the open fire a few years back and the installer put in a vent out behind the stove. I get that there needs to be air flow but doesn't this entirely defeat the purpose of closing up the open fire in the first place? There is a noticeable cool draft when the stove isn't lit.

Yeah we have a solid fuel stove. Never had a vent when we moved in but had to get the chimney rebuilt a few years back and as part of that they had to put vent into the room with the stove due to the current regulation. Brave bit of cold comes in through it!

deezell

DrPhilG wrote: »

On a side note (and not automation related) does anyone have a solid fuel stove? I had one put in to replace the open fire a few years back and the installer put in a vent out behind the stove. I get that there needs to be air flow but doesn't this entirely defeat the purpose of closing up the open fire in the first place? There is a noticeable cool draft when the stove isn't lit.

If the inside end of the vent is visible and accessible, fit a shuttered vent cover over it. That's what I done when I chased in an underfloor vent to the side of the internal chimney breast where my stove is.
In the first house I built back in '80, I had channelled the exterior vent to appear right under the door of the inset Parkray stove, which was elevated above the hearth. A small 4 by 1 slot in the facing. Unfortunately, a mouse was able to squeeze in past the exterior ground level grating, and would pop his head out through the slot from time to time while we watched the telly. Best of luck with the install

DrPhilG

deezell wrote: »

If the inside end of the vent is visible and accessible, fit a shuttered vent cover over it.

Yeah it's accessible. I'll get a shuttered one.

Also need to address the water that's dropping down into the cavity behind the stove which is a more pressing concern!

deezell

DrPhilG wrote: »

Yeah it's accessible. I'll get a shuttered one.

Also need to address the water that's dropping down into the cavity behind the stove which is a more pressing concern!

Yikes. Lead flashing on the stove chimney? If it is a chimney, or is there just a stove flue pipe exiting through the wall above the stove?

DrPhilG

deezell wrote: »

Yikes. Lead flashing on the stove chimney? If it is a chimney, or is there just a stove flue pipe exiting through the wall above the stove?

It's a chimney.