Wireless radiator valves.

[John Brown]

Anyone have any first hand experience of wirelessly controlled thermostatic radiator valves?
The question came up in another thread, but is likely to be lost in the noise.

 

[DBT85]

I have thought about them but not been convinced enough as yet. I know one popular one suddenly changed to a subscription model from being free to use once purchased which understandably put some noses out of joint. Sadly its the way most companies want to go these days to drip you dry.

 

[Gordon Tarling]

Our whole house runs on the Honeywell Evohome system - every radiator has a wireless valve. It now works fine, though we did have a few teething problems, mainly due to positioning of the controller(s) to ensure evrything was getting a good signal. Anything in particular you'd like to know?

G.

 

[John Brown]

I guess the main question is, does it save you money, and if so, what do you reckon the payback period is?
I was looking at the Drayton Wiser system.
My main concern is whether it would be a waste of money if I was unable to train the family to keep interior doors shut.

 

[Just4Fun]

Our whole house runs on the Honeywell Evohome system - every radiator has a wireless valve. It now works fine, though we did have a few teething problems, mainly due to positioning of the controller(s) to ensure evrything was getting a good signal. Anything in particular you'd like to know?

So each radiator has to be within wifi range of a controller? And if this is not true you have to add more controller(s), implying that the controllers "talk" to each other? That is likely to make a larger installation (like mine) prohibitively expensive. It would be neat if the valves communicated in a sort of mesh system. Each radiator is almost certain to be within range of another radiator whilst possibly being a long way from a central controller.

I just looked at the Honeywell site and they have a calculator for a system. It could not cope with my property so I had to lie to get any information out of it. I said I have a combi boiler whereas I have a GSHP. I said I have 12 rooms as it could not cope with more than that. I said I have a home wifi but they didn't ask if it covers the whole house, which it certainly doesn't. It calculated a price of £1842 and has the caveat that "We have made the assumption that our radiator controllers will fit on any existing valves" and I can guarrantee this is not the case. So my conclusin is that unless I win the lottery I can't afford to save money.

 

[Gordon Tarling]

Yes, each rad 'talks' to a controller, though lack of that range wasn't our problem. The controller also talks to the relay units for both hot water and heating, in order to open the appropriate valves as required. Our main problem appeared to be that some foil backed insulation which had been added to our garage wall, was blocking the signal to the relay units that are located in the garage next to the boiler. Our radiator count exceeds the capacity of one controller, so we now have two controllers and we solved our problems by repositioning one of them so that it was closer to the boiler. As for saving money - I couldn't really say, as we've had this system since we moved here, so have nothing to compare it with. What I can say is that being able to control the temperature of each room is the greatest advantage for us. Honeywell do supply adaptors to suit most types of radiator valve, but most of our valves are now Honeywell, so no adaptors required for those. We're running an oil fired boiler with a sealed system and separate hot water storage tank, so I don't know how well it would work with a GSHP.

G.

 

[Just4Fun]

Our radiator count exceeds the capacity of one controller

What is the limit per controller, do you know?

 

[woodieallen]

Why do you need wireless ones? Surely something else to go wrong ?

 

[John Brown]

I don't think it's WiFi, as such. You'd be changing batteries twice a day if it was. I think it's some low power 433mhz link, although the controller connects to the WiFi as well as to the valves.

 

[John Brown]

Why do you need wireless ones? Surely something else to go wrong ?

Because you can set schedules for individual rooms.
I suppose you could walk round the house twisting radiator valves twice a day. Not that I could. My stepdaughter gets cross if we venture over the the part of the house where she and the two grandchildren live...
But it would be much easier if you could set it all up to run automatically.

 

[John Brown]

So each radiator has to be within wifi range of a controller? And if this is not true you have to add more controller(s), implying that the controllers "talk" to each other? That is likely to make a larger installation (like mine) prohibitively expensive. It would be neat if the valves communicated in a sort of mesh system. Each radiator is almost certain to be within range of another radiator whilst possibly being a long way from a central controller.

I just looked at the Honeywell site and they have a calculator for a system. It could not cope with my property so I had to lie to get any information out of it. I said I have a combi boiler whereas I have a GSHP. I said I have 12 rooms as it could not cope with more than that. I said I have a home wifi but they didn't ask if it covers the whole house, which it certainly doesn't. It calculated a price of £1842 and has the caveat that "We have made the assumption that our radiator controllers will fit on any existing valves" and I can guarrantee this is not the case. So my conclusin is that unless I win the lottery I can't afford to save money.

I think a mesh system would be too power hungry. I assume that the valves(which have to be the power conscious parts, as they run from small batteries), wake up at predetermined intervals to listen for packets from the controller, and to report local temperature. They probably have some sort of random backoff and retry system, and settle down after a while to take turns talking to the controller. It's the only way I can think of that they could run for any appreciable time on a couple of triple A cells.

 

[Gordon Tarling]

The rad valves are polled every 4 minutes by the controller (or vice versa) and definitely aren't on the wifi channels, probably the 433mHz as stated by John Brown.

just4fun - I think the limit on the Honeywell system is 12 rads per controller.

G.

 

[Richard_C]

I thought very carefuilly about this earlier this year when I replaced my 35 year old oil boiler, tank, valves etc. Too much work and cost to go to ASHP, house a bit old for modern standards. I ended up with conventional TRVs, timer and one room thermostat. Remote TRVs would have added over £2k to the install.

There is no single right answer though, it depends on your lifestyle.

You can have no local control, conventional TRVs, stand alone programmable TRVs, the full internal remote system that you are asking about, or a full on remote smart control so you can rule your universe from your phone on the train on the way home. Each has its + and its -.

Here's my own answer. Now the offspring have left (one comes home for a few weeks at a time when he has work near here) there is just the 2 of us: we have predictable lives an mostly are 'in' - I am part retired and part working from home. The sitting room and kitchen are the places we want to be warm all the time the heating is on. Mostly we eat in the kitchen - and its no great effort to turn the TRV up in the dining room when you lay the table for Sunday dinner or guests. Everything else has TRVs set to 2 for a bit of background heat so we don't get massive heat loss from the rooms we do use. The one exception is the main bedroom, which ideally you would want to warm up a bit late evening. I plan to get a stand alone programmable TRV head for that, not cheap at about £80 I think but far far less than a whole remote system. It can open about 10 pm each night to save heating the room before that. I don't think a full on remote systen would do much for me or get me much energy saving for my £2k+. Except in very cold weather (rare), the house goes from standing start to comfortable in about 30 minutes, and individual room much less than that if the But it might for someone else.

In different circumstances it could be great. 40 years ago, pre children, my wife and I travelled a lot for our jobs, sometimes at very short notice, and had erratic or no arrive home times. A full on geo-fenced remote system theat knew when you were half an hour from home and switched stuff on on cold nights would have been brilliant - but the technology didn't exist and we didn't have smartphones or anything like it. maybe for a big family wanting different rooms warm at different times it might make sense.

We need to make our own choices based on how we live.

 

[Ollie78]

Aren`t TRVs already wireless and automatic, I just turn them to the temperature then leave it alone.

In all seriousness though is this a case of technology for the sake of it ?
I have yet to be persuaded by hive or any such systems either. Why I need to control my heating when I am out is beyond me.
My washing machine has a phone app to download wash cycles?! It provides zero advantages, they could just include the programme in the beginning, its getting silly.

I am not luddite and think technology is great in general but this one doesn`t seem worth it to me

Ollie

 

[paulrbarnard]

We have the Tado system in our house. All the radiators (except the ones in the bathrooms) are controlled by the system. The house is three stories and the controller is on the ground floor.
It does all kinds of smart stuff like knowing when you are at home and turning the heating off if you go out. Coincidently I'm travelling for work at the momenty and in the US but my wife is at home and she just texted me to change the schedule for the heating in our bedroom as she is getting up earlier while I'm not there. I was able to change the schedule on my iphone from the US.
I really like the system.
Edit to add that the system has been in place for four years now and apart from battery changes nothing has gone wrong with it.

 

[John Brown]

Aren`t TRVs already wireless and automatic, I just turn them to the temperature then leave it alone.

In all seriousness though is this a case of technology for the sake of it ?
I have yet to be persuaded by hive or any such systems either. Why I need to control my heating when I am out is beyond me.
My washing machine has a phone app to download wash cycles?! It provides zero advantages, they could just include the programme in the beginning, its getting silly.

I am not luddite and think technology is great in general but this one doesn`t seem worth it to me

Ollie

Suppose you have four bedrooms. They're not occupied in the daytime, so you really want a comfortable temperature at bedtime, a lower temperature while sleeping, a comfortable temperature again for the morning, and then a much lower temperature during the day.
The living room, in the other hand, or your home office, will have almost opposite requirements. As mentioned, you could run round the house twice a day turning thermostatic valves up and down, but realistically, that's unlikely.

 

[Ollie78]

I guess you have a more complex heating requirement than us, we just set the downstairs off most of the time as we have a woodburner, the bedrooms set to comfortable and thats that. System turned on or off by a moveable thermostat on the landing, so it doesn`t get confused by the woodburner.

For small fluctuations I pretty much put on or take off my jumper.

Ollie

 

[John Brown]

Book

I guess you have a more complex heating requirement than us, we just set the downstairs off most of the time as we have a woodburner, the bedrooms set to comfortable and thats that. System turned on or off by a moveable thermostat on the landing, so it doesn`t get confused by the woodburner.

For small fluctuations I pretty much put on or take off my jumper.

Ollie

Great.
So, without wishing to be impolite or ungrateful, you don't actually have any first hand real world experience of wirelessly controlled thermostatic radiator valves.
We, on the other hand, have crazily high heating bills, and are looking at possible ways to reduce them.

 

[John Brown]

I have thought about them but not been convinced enough as yet. I know one popular one suddenly changed to a subscription model from being free to use once purchased which understandably put some noses out of joint. Sadly its the way most companies want to go these days to drip you dry.

I believe that was Tado. Put me off. That's why I was like looking at Drayton Wiser.

 

[paisawood]

Plus one for Honeywell. I installed the system about 5 years ago and have been very pleased with it. The controller is in the centre of the house (13 rooms) and gives good coverage. We chose not to install honeywell valves in the spare bedrooms and their en-suite where we leave the original thermostatic valves turned right down (with the doors closed) except when we have visitors.

Savings on the gas bill are in the order of 10% so payback period is pretty long but comfort levesl are much greater than previously. Also, we can turn the heat up in one room for a while with the knowledge that it will be turned back down automatically at the next switching point. AA batteries in the thermo valves need changing annually but the controller tells you when it is required so no problem.

HTH

David