Home heating automation

Tado

People who have installed Tado smart thermostats , are you happy enough with it ?

I plan to replace my APT timer with the following -

https://www.screwfix.ie/p/tado-v3-wireless-heating-hot-water-smart-thermostat-starter-kit-white/141kt

I assume it should be a straightforward enough to swap over .

All I need is temperature control and app control for when we're not at home .

I don't have any TRVs , but will probably install some at a later stage .

Thanks

The switch beside the APT timer powers a circulation pump .

With the switch in the "off" position , the boiler only heats the water , with the switch in the "on" position , the boiler heats both water and the radiators .

Brilliant,

Thanks 😊

I'll probably order the Tado system in the next few days.

I had a heatmiser SmartStat in my previous house, and really miss the convenience of the app ( and the temperature control)

Thanks for the installation instructions .

I picked up the Tado starter kit today .

I'll probably ask a friend to help with the wiring (he's an electrician) rather than risk making a mess of it .

The current setup is that the APT timer turns on the boiler (firebird , outside in a metal enclosure) and a circulation pump which heats the water only .

The switch on the right turns on or off a second circulation pump which heats the radiators .This second pump doesn't get any power unless the APT timer is set to ON .

Does it still sound like a straightforward swap over to the TADO to you ?

I replaced an APT timer with a Heatmiser unit before but it didn't have any zoning , it was just a straight swap .

Thanks for your help (sorry for the late reply )

So I am pretty sure I can adjust the rate at which my boiler burns. I'm using a 3rd party controller and it lets me adjust a whole bunch of things from the burner power to hysteresis to the boiler pump mode.

I have adjusted the burner max power down to 10% as a test and it definitely didn't heat the water up as quickly compared to 100%.

Thank you very much for your help ,

my friend the electrician will be down in a couple of weeks , and we'll swap over from the APT timer then (peace of mind)

Thanks.

Are many using Matter yet? I'm yet to invest in a dongle/bridge.

Users; I know that all or most vendors are bringing out devices to support Matter, I was just wondering what the general experience is with them and whether it's better than Zigbee or z-wave overall.

In so far as the MATTER bridge can't see the existing Tado 6LoWPAN network, and vice versa, but at the network level above, the App(lication) level, theres scope for connectivity. TAD0 currently integrates with Home, IFTT, etc anyway, so both can be seen by these through their respective bridges If Tado creates an APP that can find both bridge connections (V3 and Matter), the only thing preventing integration would be strategy, not technology. It may not be in that interest to prolong the use of the older kit.

Great timing as I only bought the V3+ starter kit a couple of weeks ago 😅

It'll still do the job for me though , not too keen on the look of the new kit , the V3+ looks more understated 😀

Agreed. The range is not yet launched in the UK, and by extension (kit, or lack of it?), it's not launched here other than from .de sites. All the main retailers here are UK based, Screwfix, Currys, Amazon, and even Tado's /ie site has been a fork of their UK site, even listing Irish prices in £, despite protest from ie users.

There is no extension kit mentioned in the new X range, which begs the question as to how you implement wireless stats if the only actual relay is in the stat itself. The ext kit for UK and here also contained the extra relay for HW zone control, again there is no apparent hard relay receiver.

As Tado X used the thread and matter protocols, it's probably easy to find a mains relay receiver which can be controlled by a Tado X stat installed without a wired path to a zone valve or boiler. The single stat wireless capability of the V3 Tado was also a source of annoyance to adopters and installers, as three zone timer only CH installations, (Upstairs, Downstairs and HW), could not be easily upgraded as at least one of the two CH zones required a wired route for the thermostat, not a trivial job in an existing house, and a clear competitive disadvantage compared to the Hive or Drayton Wiser all wireless stat design.

( I note the new X heatpump bridge may well have 2 mechanical relays, it has a display which announces heating and hot water.)

Final observation, this all new range allows Tado to revisit their subscription model for the tastier features, a model which fell flat on its face for V3, when V2 users had full feature access for life without a sub. If you recall, they even upgraded the app for V3 users only, V2 could either retain sub free original features on the old app, or pay a once off (€40?) to get the new app with the extra V3 bits. Eventually, running two versions of their app proved impractical and they just hoisted V2 users onto the V3 app fir free. This time they've done their homework, and you might be facing an end of life announcement much further down the road for V3, I wouldn't worry too much tbh.

By the way deezell. As the resident expert around these parts on home automation, did you ever encounter or figure this one out? Posted it in another thread but be interested if you have any thoughts....

I have a pretty standard 190l cylinder with gas as the main heating source - then your bog standard dual immersion which is top entry. I'm about to switch to an EV electric plan and was thinking of using the immersion during the EV rate window - cost per KW is cheaper during that window for electricity than for gas with the added bonus, as I understand it, of pretty much 100% efficiency.

However, much like the above discussion, what I'm seeing in practice is that the immersion is having zero impact on the temperature probe which controls the call to the gas boiler. That probe is in a thermostat pocket about 1/4 or 1/3 up from the bottom of the cylinder. So clearly the immersion coil ends above that probe. But if I do use the immersion for the 3 hours of the cheap EV electricity, my expectation is that the gas boiler will still receive a call for hear - that controller is a Sonoff which calls if the cylinder is below 40 degrees between 6.45am and 8.30am. Getting the sonoff and having two separate systems came up ages ago here.

So I'd imagine I could heat using the immersion from 2 to 5am on the cheap EV rate - but at 6.45am the gas will still be called as the water at the probe level will still be below 40c. So it seems similar to the above discussion and wondering, other than a destrat pump or a willis, does anyone have practical experience of solving the riddle....?

Thanks

The gas will only have to heat the water under the immersion, so will be on fir a lot less time, thus saving you about 5c for each kwh already heated by the electricity (assuming ev 5c, gas 10c per kwh). If your cycling immersion was a 2.5kw element, and the cylinder is large and completely cold, you may get to pull the maximum of 7.5 kwh from the ev 3 hour window, and save 37.5 c each day. Realistically, most of the water above the immersion will probably be decently warm still, maybe 40 - 50° at the top third/quarter, so an injection of a few kwh might be enough to turn off the immersion thermostat, saving you maybe only 10c in total at night. Turning the gas timing off completely, then slowly introducing it when the electrical heated water runs out might be a better strategy move the gas probe to the tank top outlet and set it relatively high, say 55° if there's no higher cylinder probe spot, it can be clamped to the hw exit pipe.

Maybe, maybe not. If one is to believe the hype, Matter heralds the dawn of a new age where all Matter enabled devices can be seamlessly added to any smart home ecosystem/fabric. This is certainly the ideal and would greatly improve adoption and functionality.

Maybe I'm being too cynical, but I don't expect this to happen. There is simply too much money at stake. Because Matter based devices are intrinsically secured using a Public Key Infrastructure, this opens up the possibility of tightly controlling access. Time will tell.

At 8c the savings are trivial, and non existent if you consider the higher day/peak rate you're paying for other household electricity. That said, if there's fun to be had messing with schedules and stats and automation and probes, then go for it. Is your tank a solid (green) foam encrusted one? You can cut this away a get the probe above the immersion element.