I recently had a new Trane heatpump/furnace system installed that’s controlled by one of their smart thermostats. I’m skeptical that Sense will detect the heatpump because it’s infinitely variable and slowly ramps-up to its selected speed, anywhere from 30-100%. The thermostat communicates all of this over WiFi, so it’s plausible that Sense would be able to correlate the usage with the thermostat.
Until that happens, I’d love a smart monitor for hard-wired devices. A Wemo with induction clamps.
We have the same ramping on our Carrier ( Infinity ). Goes per the manual 40-100 percent. Most of the time it runs around 40 percent. Starts at 65 percent for less then a minute… Burner only. Then the blower kicks in. Cold mornings it will run around 65-70 percent for a half hour of so. Have stepped the temp 3 times. 66, 68 71. 60 while sleeping. Sense has not found it yet. been over 8-10 months. Even in the summer where the blower runs a the same speed.
I think you are right on the induction clamps - most of these fancy new high efficiency AC systems have a double whammy making detection of the full usage harder:
A little off-topic, but my dream is to meld an HS110 with a non-invasive current clamp.
The love child would be able to clamp over any current carrying leg and report it back to Sense.
My idea is to condition the signal from the clamp and inject it where the voltage from the shunt resistor is normally generated. I’m a PE in EE, so I have a reasonable chance of figuring this outt
Since this is the “Product Wishlist” forum for smart thermostats, I would like to see this model added to the list.
Please consider adding this SENSE interface to all the other requests for links that interface thermostats. Thanks
I’m very interested in this thread. I installed sense 10 days ago. So far, the only ‘major’ devices identified are one of two water heaters. Appliances identifed are two refrigerators, a microwave and some minor consumers.
Two Trane heat pumps with electric auxiliary heat show up as other along with a second hot water heater. Although the two hot water heaters are different sizes, they have the same heating elements. I am sure they are not lumped together by looking at the consumption patterns.
I thought, until I read hoveringuy’s post, that the heat pumps might be identified early. They are different size (3 ton and 2 ton equivalent from the cooling side). One has three heat strips, the other has two. Both have their own ComfortLink Thermostat. No luck so far. It would be nice if it were possible to be able to add devices to the list, even if they are not picked up by Sense, so that I could keep tabs of usage versus scheduled performance and outside temperature.
I’ll follow this thread with interest.
Keeping the thread alive. My interest is in the smart thermostats (Nexia branded) that support Trane/American Standard variable speed heat pumps that are becoming much more common as efficiency expectations increase. Being able to keep tabs on HVAC is a key component of monitoring home energy usage and native detection is known to be difficult, especially for the variable indoor and outdoor fans/motors.
Here is another request. I too have a variable speed Carrier Infinity that Sense has not detected in 10 months of use.
IMHO a whole-hou$$$e heat pump System running all year warrants either spare DCM (Flex sensors) or the purchase of an additional dedicated Sense monitor. The signature complexity of variable speed DC motors and a lot of pumps and electronics makes for very difficult detection. Even if Sense could manage 95% accuracy I’d still want ground truth from DCMs.
Hell, Nest or thermostat manufacturers, or dare I say HVAC manufacturers, should wise up and build Sense into their devices, or at least talk Sense like ecobee.
FYI: switching your thermostat to an ecobee could help …
And one last thought: I think the next big thing in device monitoring of heat pumps is going to be for refrigerant leak detection. The climate impact of leaking refrigerants is astounding and any form of early warning is very significant technology. Sense ground-truth data could well deduce a leak. My bet is we’ll see mandates in places like Berkeley and then soon-after, globally.
According to my HVAC company I cannot use Ecobee with my Infinity.
First - A lot of HVAC techs recommend against Nest and Ecobee. You either get a company that likes them or hates them.
Second - A lot of the Infinity systems have variable fan speeds and per this link, Ecobee doesn’t support them.
Third - Likewise with their humidity controls. Ecobee has the ability to control stand alone humidity systems but the integrated system with Infinity it does not.
Anyone feel free to correct me if I’m wrong, but that’s what I recall as being the issue with the Infinity Systems.
The smart thermostats all use “legacy controls” they can control multiple speeds, multi stages, multi fuels but until a hvac comes out / releases a protocol for their variable speed stuff… the legacy controls (G,W,W2,W3, Y,Y2,Y3 and O) can’t make your infinity compressor run at 52%
I am surprised at this day and age there isn’t just a cat5 you run from outdoor to indoor and to the thermostat with some sort of open forum communication protocol between all the units. HVAC is well behind the curve in this aspect.
Thanks for clarifying @DevOpsTodd and @ccook.
I spaced on VRF/VRV and variable everything control and “smart” thermostats. That comes from living with an oil boiler.
I think Mitsubishi has BacNet but yes, smart thermostats are only smart about the old stuff!
I suppose there are reasons why standardizing controls and creating open protocols is quite complicated when the underlying hardware is not exactly standardized. I assume, for example, the motor ramping is not necessarily linear and refrigerant pumping is all over the place depending on temperatures and pressures and refrigerant type and it’s tricky to obfuscate for a smart system.
Nope - what you say is all true @DevOpsTodd. It’s either stick with simple HVAC systems and be able to use universal thermostats, or go with a more advanced system and commit to proprietary control.
Well the crappy part about the whole hvac world is there is 6 companies that make / own 180 brands of residential hvac equipment. However unlike bill gates in the 90’s these brands don’t work together when it comes to most the communication systems between each other. Most of them have 2 wire communication systems but even though the same company made both in the same building on the same day. The thermostats that control them are incompatible with each other. Most the variable speed units run on proprietary coding controls that will require a $500-1200 thermostat that has no geofencing or remote access that looks like an antique. But you can buy a touch screen/ WiFi / smart/ motion sensor / location services/ scheduling/ humidity control that you can speak to it and tell it to order you a pizza for $100 at lowes now that will work the legacy controlled units (including 3 speed heat/ cool)
The technology is obviously out there that these brands (many the same company) refuse to come out with a standardized control system for their variable speed units.
The optimistic view is that this attitude accelerates the development of sophisticated domestic robots with dexterous, even environmentally sensitive, fingers. How’s that for legacy controls!
