adding a room thermostat to my heating system

loracan1

david29dpo wrote: »

Depends how competent you are. Can you wire a plug? if so should be no problem.

But fitting a wireless thermostat involves removing the frontplate off your boiler doesn't it? I don't consider that to be equal to wiring a plug - I've wired light fittings, sockets and rewired plugs - they're all 'like for like' but I'd not consider myself competent to fit a wireless room thermostat.

fletch_4

want2bmortgage3 wrote: »

I currently have a condensing combi boiler supplying my radiators with heat and this is controlled by a £60 drayton programmer, where i can set the timer or just have it on or off.

in the freezing cold weather, i've left it on permanently and controlled the rooms with TRVs. this worked ok, but yesterday it warmed up a bit outside and i felt the system was running unnecesarily.. costing money.

so i thought if i connect up a room stat to the programmer and set it to say, 15 degrees, then my system will shut off above this and not run unnecesarily?

i can then leave the trv's on the highest setting so it doesnt interfere with the stat? do u think this would solve my probs?

To my mind if you already have stats on each rad! why do you need to install another one?? they are expensive and a waste of time, they only control the ambient temperature of the room where it is fitted, i found the easiest and cheapest way to save money is to balance your heating system all you do is turn your boiler off let it cool down, turn off trv's (thermostatic radiator valve) and turn off all return valves (clockwise) on the other end of the radiator, open return valves to one full turn and set trv's to 3 or half way, bleed all rads, turn heating on rush around like a maniac to each radiator and check they are all heating up at the same time, if they are wd you are finished if not read on, if one or more rad doesnt seem to be heating up open the trv fully and see if the pipes are getting hot if they are the room is already up to temp where it has switched the trv off, if not open the return valve half a turn until the pipes start getting hot, hopefully your bathroom radiator or one of them wont have a trv on it, if they all have i hope you have a bypass loop fitted. close all doors and windows in the buillding obtain a thermomenter and measure the temperature of every room if one is cold or 2 hot adjust the trv to desired temp, if you have a combi boiler dont touch the central heating pump, if you have a gravity fed type ( small feed and expansion vessel in roof space) turn the pump down to number one, if you find the downstairs rads dont work this usually means the pump is worn so flick it onto number 2 or 3 or 4 lol the idea is to slow the water down as much as possible through the boiler, it cant be re-heated if its bombing around at 100mph, one problem that you may come across is when you adjust return vlaves they sometimes leak out of the top gland nut, get a spanner and tighten them clockwise until it stops, if it keeps dripping it will have to be replaced. regardless if your rad valves are thermostats or not this can be done on every type of valve, just find out which valve is flow pipe and which valve is return pipe ( feel pipes as the system is heating up, the flow pipe will always be the hottest, now youv'e all been running around like a load of loonies, turn yer heating off for a few more hours and cool down, that in itself has saved you money, at some point dig out your old fuel bills and compare the difference over this coming year, you will be shocked at how much you saved, good luck.

silvercar

The first winter in our house we didn't have a room stat (TRVs on nearly all rads), the next winter we had a room stat fitted; our gas bill dropped by 20%.

Without a room stat the boiler comes on even if no rads are calling for heat. So the boiler fires up and the pump circulates the hot water, even if no rads are calling for heat.

With a room stat, if the temp is at or above the set temp the boiler doesn't fire up.

For the boiler to fire the timer has to show heating to be on and the room stat show temp below the level set.