Heating Controls with Optimised Start

Robin9

Nest does but I find it a bit of a pain - setting it for say 0700 and 19 deg it comes on at 4 or 5 . 

[Deleted User]

There are a lot of claims about smart heating control savings that refer back to experiments in a test house in Salford that started off with no heating controls. This is the latest test evidence that I can find:

BUFF

Qyburn said:

Hi, I was wondering which of the current heating control systems offer optimised start, and also any comments from users on how well that works for them.

Not to teach anyone to suck eggs but I refer to systems where you set a target time and temperature, and the system decides how long before that time it needs to bring the heating on.

I believe Hive doesn't, or possibly the guy I was speaking to didn't know how to enable it. It would be possible, although fiddly to create the same effect with a series of time/temperature ranges. That would be OK if you don't often change requirements but a pain if you do.

What boiler do you have? This may have an impact on which controller is best (e.g. if it is a Vaillant, Viessmann or Worcester it is likely to be their own as they use proprietary communications protocols for advanced modulation).
Even some nominally Opentherm boilers are not as open as you might have thought (although workarounds are usually found) ...

Qyburn

It's an oil boiler, which I think is basically On or Off, no modulation and I don't think it can do variable temperature either. Grant Vortex Pro outdoor.

BUFF

OK, next questions:
do you have any zone valves in the ch system?
are you all radiator or is there underfloor?

re. variable temp (obviously if it can't modulate it can't do this on the fly) does it have a thermostat control (see fig 1-1) https://www.grantuk.com/media/3675/grant-vortex-outdoor-module-user-uk-doc-0158-rev-1-0-july-2020.pdf

kuratowski

Robin9 said:

Nest does but I find it a bit of a pain - setting it for say 0700 and 19 deg it comes on at 4 or 5 . 

I had the same problem at first; you can modify that behaviour in the settings (max duration setting).

Qyburn

BUFF said:

OK, next questions:

All radiators, heating is a single zone. Pipe routes and building structure wouldn't make splitting it up easy, probably impractical.

My thoughts would be individual radiator control for eight rooms. Common area hallways and landings can be left on normal TRVs set low, as those areas aren't really heated at the moment.

The boiler has a manually adjustable control stat.  There's not much wriggle room if you keep low enough to condense while also above the minimum return temperature. In a dream world where that could be automated then I'd so so, pushing it up above condensing regime only when necessary.

jennifernil

Qyburn said:

Thanks. Do you use their radiator controllers? If so then do they fully interlock with the boiler - ie boiler goes off if none are calling, or back on as soon as one does? Irrespective of any system wide timing.

We also have a Tado system, we bought the starter kit with the Smart wireless thermostat and added 12 Smart TRVs.  If you have more than one radiator in a room, you choose one to be the temperature monitor.

You set up a Smart Schedule with individual times and temperatures for each room and each TRV or thermostat can operate the boiler when calling for heat.  If no heat is being called for, the boiler will be off.   There is also a schedule for the hot water if you have stored HW.

The schedule can  be different for different days of the week if required.  There is no system wide timing  the way we operate it, which was why we chose this system.