Hello, all.
The compressor and outdoor coil fan of my heat pump were detected (as one device) a couple off days after I installed my Sense system. However, Sense has assigned the indoor fan to “Other.” Obviously, this will spoil any Sense energy calculations for HVAC, so I would like to see that fan merged with the outdoor unit’s 2 loads.
My question is, will the fact that the indoor/outdoor loads operate exactly simultaneously have any effect on Sense’s ability to identify the indoor fan?. It seems to me that should make it an easy ID for Sense to make.
What are others’ experiences with Sense detecting air handler fans in split systems like this?
Sense has detected some of my heat pump, but none of the blower system or pumps. That’s after 2.5 years. I should note that my home is one of those “noisy” environments due to multiple variable speed systems…well, refrigerator, etc.
It’s interesting that modern systems are tending toward variable speed proportional loads, while that’s the very thing Sense can’t deal with…it needs on’s and off’s
My home is quite simple, load-wise. There are no variable speed drives, and my heat pump is not multi-stage. I feel the Sense operating system is inadequate if it is unable to make the simple correlation when a 120-volt load’s activity exactly matches the 240-volt equipment’s starts and stops. It will be quite disappointing to me as a new user if this is the case. It will force me to add a KW metering device to the indoor fan and do energy calculations for AC “by hand.” I bought the Sense system expecting it to at least recognize the major loads and do trends, predictions, etc. off what it found.
I like a lot of things about my new Sense system, but permanently missing the indoor AC/heating fan will be a significant failure of the product, in my opinion; I hope it does not turn out to be true.
@c72rg, you don’t say how long you have had Sense installed. I have my furnace air handlers on smartplugs (the furnaces are 110V), but Sense still had native detections for each of them after 3-5 months…
To: @c72rg
This idea may or may not help you. I had the same problem as you. My outside compressor was detected by SENSE, but the inside indoor fan was not found by SENSE. I changed my thermostat setting from “AUTO” to “Circulate”. That setting on my indoor fan runs the fan every 30-minutes for about 5-minutes each time (regardless of whether cooling/heating is needed or not) . After about 3 months, SENSE found the indoor fan. I have two A/C units and did the same experiment on the other unit and SENSE has now found both the indoor fans. Now sometimes SENSE misses the fan “ON” signal, but most of the time it finds the device. Maybe this idea would work for you. I didn’t try to “train” SENSE, I only increased the number of times the fan ran each day. It’s possible that SENSE found the device because the A/C unit was not running at the same time.
Thanks for the suggestion. Unfortunately, my t’stat does not have a “circulate” setting. I might try just randomly turning it to “ON” and back to auto for a couple of weeks to see if Sense will pick it up, but then it would still require manual calculations to charge its KWHs to AC and heating. I think Sense, not I, should be doing that.