Heating controls

We currently have a mixed heating system comprised of 2 boilers, an air source heat pump, a wood burning stove and range cooker.
Radiators are controlled via thermostatic radiator valves.
I'm a bit of a gadget fan and like the idea of a smarter heating system.
Does anyone have hive / nest or smart radiator valves? What is your experience of these technologies ?
Currently I'm thinking that a hybrid mix which includes smart TRVs is the way to go. My reasoning is that you tend use different zones of a house at different points in time. A timer or indeed hive / nest does not offer such zoning. E.g. In the evening I would be mostly downstairs and therefore could defer the heating of the upstairs rooms until later, kids rooms might get a preheat followed by an increase 1 hour before they go to bed (there are several playrooms so I don't see much need to heat the bedroom when they won't use it)
Interestingly any modern home of 150m2 or more is meant to have multiple heating zone according to part L of the building regulations. My property is considerable larger than this but less sophisticated controls.
I think smart TRVs are a simple way to achieve such zones.

Does anyone have smart controls. I'm not that bothered about internet connectivity in fact that could be seen as a week point. If I was to go down that route I would probably use a relay switch from a low voltage input to a mains voltage device, using my own server to achieve this; rather than trusting security to others.

Lucy said:

my OH is currently building one, intercepting the signal from the wireless thermostat. The company I work for has a share in Tado, which is definitely better than Hive, but I haven't seen a comparison to Nest. As we have oil we can't have it though. Building one ourselves means we'll get to add the TVRs into the network too.

Click to expand...

Interesting, is the thermostat 433 MHz ? You could intercept that for about £1 with an ardunio or raspberry pi using the gpio ports.

Is he just going to use this interception to power on / off the boiler ? Its not clear what his intention is ? If he is interested its very easy to connect a temperature sensor to a boiler and turn on / off using lightwaverf signals. I'm currently creating a hybrid plug which monitors temperature and humidity levels and based on these determines the risk of mould. If it considers mould will be a risk it will activate a dehumidifier or heater (depending on the dew point). Just a toy project but only takes a few hours of effort to build the electronics and write the code.

bpelectric said:

Pegler do a smart TRV cost about £25 each model i30 how long the battery's last i've no idea but offer Up to 6 Temperature Settings per Day

Click to expand...

Thanks I will investigate these further.

Lucy said:

The company I work for has a share in Tado

Click to expand...

I have just dug out an old soak away and rerouted the drainage for this. In doing this task I discovered that my oil line was joined under the ground, which should not have been done and does not adhere to best practise. So I will undertake some more digging and replace the line.
I figure whilst I'm going to all this effort I may was well add some chemical cleaners to the central heating and flush out the entire system to remove any sludge. I will probably remove every radiator so I can hit them with rubber mallet and remove as much magnetite as possible.

So I figure now is a good time to upgrade the TRVs and provide smart zonal heating. I'm mostly interesting in being able to turn off all upstairs radiators in the day time to save a few quid, but using smart controls being able to create virtual zones

@Lucy have you encountered and issues with the Tado TRVs such as leaking batteries ? I was thinking about using z-wave controls and the Danfoss LC13 was looking reasonable however it seems some users have had issues with the battery leaking and ruining the circuit board.

captainpish said:

Can you not just use mechanical 2 port zone valves to control each zone and a room stat? or are you not able to do so? You may have to drag some cable depending on where your junction box is but its far nore reliable than some of the extortionatly priced tat out there at the moment.

Click to expand...

Thanks for your recommendations / comments.

I was hoping to get a fine level control over the heating and would need to install several 2 port valves to get them same amount of granularity that would be available with smart TRVs. Whilst it would be possible to use 2 ports values there would be a fair amount of plumbing, wiring and redecoration required to ensure everything was neat and tidy.
The appeal of the smarter controls is the fact that TRV valves generally have a universal body so installation is simple without the need to cut into pipework, run cables, chase out walls and make good afterwards.

e.g With a smart TRV system. I might have something like the following
- Heat master bedroom + bathroom and daughters bedroom and bathroom each morning from 6am - 8am on weekdays. All other radiators off
- Turn off all heat to all bedrooms, landings, bathrooms during the daytime regardless of day of the week.
- Turn on heat to playroom at 4pm turn off at 6pm.
- turn on heat to lounge at 7:30pm turn off at 8pm (will use stove afterwards - so just quick temp boost to make warmer initially)
- turn on heat to daughters bathroom and bedroom from 6pm - 8pm.
etc...
- enable occasional heating of the kitchen between March - May if the temperature drops to 18c (normally heated between November - March by aga which due to warmer days is turned off in spring)

I was planning on leaving the traditional TRVs in the rarely used rooms alone, since these rooms are generally left on the frost setting with the valve opened manually if we are having guests over or will be using those rooms for some other purpose.

Guess it might be best waiting a while to see if any clear leader emerges in this space whilst technology issues are ironed out.

@Lucy - Looks good.

I'm assuming the combo box for the study temperature is just picking the first value rather than the current room temperature.... However I know in the past you have talked about lime mortar and the like so I guess you also have a period / historic property.

It might be worth factoring in both the temperature and humidity of the rooms and making an intelligence decision based on these factors. There is a handy website on preservation metrics (dpcalc.org). I know of several people who are frugal with their heating and have developed issues with mould / mildew growing on fabrics of sofas etc...

Have a play with the site - generally best to click degrees C and solve for Dew point. If your study temperature was 12C (unlikely for this time of year) then a humidity of 78 would result in mould being visible in 25 days time - realistic humid for this time of year)... Note if you enter the risk period is a bit too late the spores have started to multiple at this point.

This site has a piece of javascript present which calculates the risk of mould / mildew and the number of days before it is visible (note at this point it is too late the spores have already started to increase). The logic is very simple and is basically a few lookups in some arrays which are present in the client side code.