Honeywell thermostat

[diesirae7]

yes

correct, in using the switching relays, one would need to set it at what the manufacturer recommends. What make are your zone valves? I've had to replace two of them in a three zone system I service in a large two story home built in 1904, they are Taco brand, they complained of no heat in certain areas of the home, found two bad power heads, they failed in the closed position. This is a hot water system as well, I do service two residential steam boilers, rare these days but very neat to work on, and very HOT heat indeed!

 

[gusherb]

Phil, I'm gonna be studying those catalog pages for awhile, that looks awesome!

To go a bit deeper on heat anticipation, here is an article about it: http://www.carolfey.com/articles/anticipation.html
To match the heat anticipator to the amp draw will give about 6 CPH which is good for older lower efficiency forced air systems. I personally like to go about 3 CPH for forced air, and for hot water anywhere from 1-3 CPH. So to get 3 CPH on a heat anticipator you multiply the measured amp draw by 1.2. To achieve 1 CPH you set the anticipator to its max setting of 1.2 amps.

I would use an amp meter to check amp draw vs going off of the zone valve/gas valve as the real draw can differ from the nameplate. I would also wait til the system has been functioning for a few minutes. For example, on my Trane's, I don't achieve full amp draw until the gas valve opens. They also both draw .7 amps which differs from their recommendation of setting to .4 amps. To get the 3 CPH I want I would need to set the anticipator to .84 in that case.

 

[philr]

There are no zone valves in my heating system, I have two old Taco Perfecta 152 circulators (the one for the garage is a newer and smaller 007).

The 152 circulators are early wet rotor circulators from the late 1950s or early 1960s, they still have a removable back cover and there's also a bleeding screw on this cover. The model 195 that followed still had a bleeding screw but no cover at the back.

https://www.taco-hvac.com/archives/150-152.pdf

 

[diesirae7]

Very nice!

Always nice to see a clean boiler room! There should be a Taco air scoop in a horizontal run out of the boiler to catch air and a self venting brass valve on it. Also a good idea to open the bleeders on the radiators once a season to make sure there is no air in the system.

 

[philr]

Jonathan, I have some Honeywell T-832A round thermostats that have weird anticipators, away from the bi-metal coil. I don't quite understand how they work!

I partially dismantle one to fix the setback timer mechanism and I took pictures of it while parts were removed...

The pictures show two different thermostat, both were new in box. The first one (T832A 1000 in the 3 first pictures) doesn't have a on/off switch and it's anticipator can't be set lower than 0.4 amps. I tried it briefly and my heating system would stop much too late with the anticipator set at 0.4 amps so I replaced it with a regular thermostat and I didn't bother trying the other one once I fixed it's mechanical timer. That one (T832A-1083 in pictures 4-5) has an anticipator that can be set to 0.1 amps. They both have wires that run from the anticipator to the bi-metal coil.

 

[philr]

Troy,
I just replaced the 4 Vent-O-Mist valves this week as some were corroded and occasionally leaking and I didn't trust leaving them open, I added a 9AS automatic shortstop to each.

Pictures 1 to 6 show how it was before and 7 to 11 show the new valves. I don't have a Taco air scoop but there's an American air purger that I guess is similar on the picture 11.

 

[gusherb]

Phil

Those T832A's are fascinating thermostats, looking through those catalog pages I see so many redundant items it would make a bean counter these days cringe. Yet these companies back then seemed to have no issue making a bunch of redundant or semi redundant products. Looking at old Kohler and American Standard catalogs I'd see the same.

I would imagine they're relying on the conductivity of the metal in that thermostat to transfer heat to the bimetal coil. Like the way a cooling anticipator in the T87 works, which is just a resistor in the subbase with a contact that contacts the shaft of the bimetal coil in turn heating it up when the system is in cool mode but not calling for cooling. That leads me to something I noticed when I was trying to use a T87 for cooling, if the room was within a couple degrees of setpoint and I turned the thermostat to cool for the first time in awhile I'd have to wait for that resistor to warm up in order to get the A/C to come on by itself. While the T87, when leveled and anticipator adjusted correctly did a great job with heating, I found it lousy with cooling. It was very slow to react to load changes as the day carried on and sun beat down on the house, it would just let the room temperature climb while not really cycling any longer than at night when it would overcool by a degree or two.

 

[philr]

I meant Maid-O-Mist in my previous post!

As for the heat anticipator, I'm wondering how it works in this T-832A thermostat (which is heat-only) but it certainly didn't work too well in the one I tried! The anticipator not only is located far away at the top of the thermostat, it's insulated from the timer mechanism (in the metal housing) which doesn't even extend below the bi-metal coil. I guess the amount of heat from this that gets to the coil is very small! And since it's wired to the coil, I'm wondering if there's some resistive material that might generate heat on the bi-metal coil itself?

I should try the other one I got with the anticipator that can be set at a lower (shorter) setting but that means changing the mounting plate again as those thermostats are much larger than the regular T86/T87 and they use a different mounting plate. [this post was last edited: 12/19/2017-11:22]

 

[maytagbear]

Oh, I MISS

the heat only Roundie at my previous apartment !!!!! Do not miss the landlord, or the unreliable furnace, but at least the thermostat and I were on good terms!

This place has an electronic programmable by a company I have never encountered before, "PRO." The office manager made a copy of the instructions, but I still do not understand the blasted thing!! I have read the instructions more than once.....

Lawrence/Maytagbear

 

[gusherb]

Pro1 IAQ?

I tried their T701 single stage non programmable. I must've gotten a dud because set to 70 it let the house get to 66 before turning the heat on, then would let it get up to 74 or so before shutting it off. That was the first thermostat I ever got rid of...
I still have a T755S sitting in my drawer that seemed ok though.
The casings seem sturdy but I'm skeptical about the electronics.

Upon testing a few years ago I found many issues with accuracy among various models.
The only two brands that really are acceptable are Emerson and Honeywell, and even then different Emerson models vary temperature readings by a few degrees. I honestly don't know how any variation is considered acceptable considering that they've made some models read inaccurately for years. [this post was last edited: 12/19/2017-14:39]

 

[maytagbear]

That's IT

Oh, how I dislike it!!!

Thank you, GusHerb.

L/Mb

 

[gusherb]

Picked up the new Emerson 80 series thermostat and a Honeywell T4. The Honeywell is shockingly complex for a $40 thermostat, many features for what it is and many installation options. The Emerson has a surprisingly high contrast display, brighter backlight and built in level. They both have quieter relays than older models.

Gonna see how accurately they read temperature...

 

[diesirae7]

Digital has come a long way for sure...

 

[gusherb]

Preliminary results look good.

 

[thespiritof76]

I have this....

Honeywell that has been in my house since the 40's. Its heat only (some of you may remember being introduced to Big Bertha). I love the look of it, I really don't think I would have another.

 

[DADoES]

Emerson

 
We have four Emerson Sensi thermostats at work.  They work pretty nicely.  Support two-stage cool and heat.  The WiFi app allows access to auto heat/cool switching which the buttons on the 'stat itself doesn't.  The only way to program a schedule is via the app.  The app has a keylock function which makes the buttons on the base non-responsive as a security measure.  A new feature added recently is geofencing, which triggers heating or cooling setback/recovery when the homeowner is +/- 3 miles distance from homebase (although it's useless for a business situation).  I'm the only employee who has the app so nobody else has control of the systems.

Dislikes:  Neither the base unit nor the remote app has indication of 1st/2nd stage operation.  They updated the WiFi app recently to force arrangement of the programmed days into alphabetic order instead of as entered, which throws me off kilter because I want them in order of F-Sa-Su-M-Tu-Th which is logical for the business week.  It also now combines days that are the same.  I need them all to remain separate because a couple/few given days may be the same this week but different next week and it's an ass-pain to re-separate them when necessary.  The work-around is to program extra temp points (even if it doesn't involve a change) so all the days are different.  Would be nice if fan on or auto could be programmed on the schedules.

 

[mayguy]

The T87 were good. My parents has one, but over time, it had too wide of a swing, so I repalced it with another one, some off brand digtial in the 80's, and did ok till mid 90's when new Trane was installed.

I have the Honeywell VisionPro IAQ, that controls my Trane XV90 two stage, humidifier, a/c, fresh air damper, and blower speed for dehumid. Been super pleased with that for the last 14 years.

I do the set back at night and when we are away in the day time.. For our Minnesota winter, I only pay a $54 a month budget plan gas bill. I have all gas appliances on the house w/ 3 of us.

 

[philr]

Gas must be really cheap in Minnesota! I pay $262/month (OK that's just Canadian dollars!) on a budget plan (and my water heaters, cooking appliances and dryers are all electric).

Apparently, gas is more expensive here in Quebec than elsewhere in the States or the in rest of Canada. But gas is still supposed to be cheaper for heating than our relatively cheap electricity (85% of households here use electricity for heating vs 3% for natural gas mainly because it's not widely distributed in Quebec). I don't have a very efficient boiler (82%) so there shouldn't be a big difference between gas and electricity in my case.

How much gas do you use during a year?
I used about 3500 cubic meters (or 123601 cu-ft) of gas this year (heating from October 15th to May 15th) to keep the temperature to an average of 65-68° (and I keep my garage at the minimum setting on the thermostat which is 50°).

 

[wayupnorth]

Where I am its only propane and pay thru the nose for it. 4 bucks a gallon to top off my tank which runs 2 gas heaters, used mostly in spring or fall and a gas stove, because I dont use enough gas to get a discount. No natural gas here. I have an oil boiler for heat and hot water with the original Honeywell thermostats set at 55 down and 65 up, never touched and 2 330 gallon oil tanks that last me a full year. Last year it took 570 gallons and I bet this heating season will go up.

 

[foraloysius]

Here's a Dutch ad from 1976 with a semi-automatic Honeywell. It had two temperature options and with the round dial you chose the hours you wanted the lower temperature. IIRC there was a programmable version too.

 

[philr]

This Semi-Automatic Chronotherm is the equivalent of my older Semi-Automatic T-832A thermostats. It has a mechanical 12 hour setback timer for systems that didn't have the required extra wiring to power the electric clock version.

 

[northwesty]

I think

Henry Dreyfuss was the designer of that Honeywell...

 

[philr]

Henry Dreyfuss designed a few things for Honeywell including the round thermostat.

 

[philr]

One of the thermostats I have at home is the early T86 model like the one pictured on the box in my previous post (for the current electronic round thermostats), I also have Tap-Lite switches that were also designed by Dreyfuss, it's shown on their boxes.

 

[supersuds]

I've never seen a Taplite, but they look neat!

 

[circlew]

Henry Dreyfuss' most well known designs are the Western Electric 302 & 500 series telephones.

My house was built in 1952, and I always thought the Honeywell round thermostat was original to it, but above it says it was introduced in '53. Perhaps the original owners changed it out, or maybe my parents did when I was very young (we moved there right after I turned 2). A newer model with sub-base was installed when we got central air in '74.