Landlord thermostats?

Pretty Mouth · Oct 26, 2022

Customer lives in an old farmhouse, part of which was converted into 2 B&B apartments. The owner has had 2 additional zones added to the main house central heating system, a zone for each apartment. The plumber has done his bit, and installed zone valves onto the pipework, but not connected electrically. Now I need to install thermostats in the apartments, wire it all up to get it all up and running.

The owner wants to have exclusive control of the target temperatures in each of the apartments, with the guests being unable to override this. Ideally the owner would be able to operate this remotely from the apartments.

Does anyone know of a product that will achieve this?

davesparks · Oct 26, 2022

Yes, you can get thermostats with wired remote sensors for this kind of application.

IIRC danfoss make them

mattg4321 · Oct 26, 2022

You can connect a remote air temp sensor to Heatmiser Neostat

brianmoooore · Oct 26, 2022

There's nothing unusual about a room 'stat that uses a remote sensor, but I'm not so sure about one that uses a remote sensor that is mounted in a suitably decorative wall mounted ventilated box.

loz2754 · Oct 27, 2022

The Timeostat is designed for landlords to not allow the tenants to tamper with it.

TIME:O:STAT - Landlord thermostat for HMO, student and holiday homes

NEW Time:o:stat 3 now available Many HMO landlords find that the heating bills are not their tenants top priority. The problem being, the heating is left on high while the tenants are out. Time:o:stat central heating controls will cut heating bills dramatically. Time:o:stats are an easy to use...

timeostat.co.uk

Pretty Mouth · Oct 27, 2022

Thanks for your help with this guys.

I had a look at the Timeostat and the heatmiser neostat, but these may be a little complicated for my customer. I'm considering very simple heatmiser dial thermostats installed in the main house, with the thimble sensors wired in the apartments. My customer (and I) like this idea as it's very simple and doesn't involve apps, hubs and other things that old folk (and I) seem to struggle with. They are happy that the heating schedule will follow that of the main house.

Room Thermostat & Underfloor Heating Controls | Heatmiser

Heatmiser are a UK leading Room Thermostat manufacturer. We supply many of the UK's underfloor heating manufactures and are the preferred choice with heating engineers.

www.heatmiser.com

http://heatmiser.com/brochures/thimble_sensor.pdf

Data sheet for the thimble sensor says the cables can be extended by 20m. I'm expecting the run to be slightly longer than this, about 25m, so I contacted Heatmiser technical for advice. They replied:

"The cable I would use is BELDEN 8541 or equivalent, the longer cable run may affect the temperature readings but the real issue is induced voltage or spikes in the cable make sure you earth the cable at one end and route the cable away from mains cables you can cross them at 90 degrees just don't run the cables parallel.
We have only tested to 20m so cannot guarantee it will work at 30m."

The easiest, most direct route for the cables is clipped to the outside of the building, so I can easily route them away from mains cables, however the recommended cable is for indoor use. Does anyone know of an equivalent that is suitable for outdoor use? And can anyone see any problem with routing the cables to the apartments together, or are they likely to interfere with each another?

https://catalog.belden.com/techdata/EN/8451_techdata.pdf

brianmoooore · Oct 27, 2022

Wonder how long it'll take the tenants to work out that they can turn up the heating by cooling the sensors.

Jim_e_Jib · Oct 27, 2022

Pretty Mouth said:
Thanks for your help with this guys.

I had a look at the Timeostat and the heatmiser neostat, but these may be a little complicated for my customer. I'm considering very simple heatmiser dial thermostats installed in the main house, with the thimble sensors wired in the apartments. My customer (and I) like this idea as it's very simple and doesn't involve apps, hubs and other things that old folk (and I) seem to struggle with. They are happy that the heating schedule will follow that of the main house.

Room Thermostat & Underfloor Heating Controls | Heatmiser

Heatmiser are a UK leading Room Thermostat manufacturer. We supply many of the UK's underfloor heating manufactures and are the preferred choice with heating engineers.

www.heatmiser.com

http://heatmiser.com/brochures/thimble_sensor.pdf

Data sheet for the thimble sensor says the cables can be extended by 20m. I'm expecting the run to be slightly longer than this, about 25m, so I contacted Heatmiser technical for advice. They replied:

"The cable I would use is BELDEN 8541 or equivalent, the longer cable run may affect the temperature readings but the real issue is induced voltage or spikes in the cable make sure you earth the cable at one end and route the cable away from mains cables you can cross them at 90 degrees just don't run the cables parallel.
We have only tested to 20m so cannot guarantee it will work at 30m."

The easiest, most direct route for the cables is clipped to the outside of the building, so I can easily route them away from mains cables, however the recommended cable is for indoor use. Does anyone know of an equivalent that is suitable for outdoor use? And can anyone see any problem with routing the cables to the apartments together, or are they likely to interfere with each another?

https://catalog.belden.com/techdata/EN/8451_techdata.pdf

You could try contacting Canford Audio or Van Damme cables, they may have something appropriate that's suitable for external use.

Canford - Professional audio, video and broadcast equipment

Everything in pro audio and video from cable to connectors, microphones to mixers, media to multitrack, tannoy to talkback, if you're in broadcast, theatre, education or industry Canford is THE source™

www.canford.co.uk

Van-Damme | Audio & Video | Precision Cable Engineering

The Van-Damme audio and video range is exquisitely designed for an array of studios, screens, and audio. The finest cabling collection and the number one choice.

www.van-damme.com

brianmoooore · Oct 27, 2022

The sensor will only be a thermistor - a resistor that changes value with temperature, so it doesn't require anything too sophisticated in the way of cabling. Any screened two core will do, and I doubt there would be many problems if it wasn't screened.

brianmoooore · Oct 27, 2022

From a link in another of tonight's threads: THERMOSTOP Large Thermostat Cover Extra Keys (Pack of 2) | SSP Direct - https://www.securitysafetyproducts.co.uk/security/protective-covers-cages/thermostop-large-thermostat-cover-extra-keys-pack-of-2.php

Pretty Mouth · Oct 28, 2022

Jim_e_Jib said:
You could try contacting Canford Audio or Van Damme cables, they may have something appropriate that's suitable for external use.

Canford - Professional audio, video and broadcast equipment

Everything in pro audio and video from cable to connectors, microphones to mixers, media to multitrack, tannoy to talkback, if you're in broadcast, theatre, education or industry Canford is THE source™

www.canford.co.uk

Van-Damme | Audio & Video | Precision Cable Engineering

The Van-Damme audio and video range is exquisitely designed for an array of studios, screens, and audio. The finest cabling collection and the number one choice.

www.van-damme.com

Thanks, I recon this should do it:

CANFORD FST-HD - FOIL SCREENED STRANDED CONDUCTOR TWIN CABLE Heavy duty

This D'n'A series (Digital and Analogue) cable is designed to be suitable for both digital and analogue audio signals, with an impedance of 100 ohms which has been proven to be suitable for AES/EBU…

www.canford.co.uk

Pretty Mouth · Oct 28, 2022

brianmoooore said:
The sensor will only be a thermistor - a resistor that changes value with temperature, so it doesn't require anything too sophisticated in the way of cabling. Any screened two core will do, and I doubt there would be many problems if it wasn't screened.

Same as UFH floor sensors? I did wonder if that would be the case. The resistance of these is measure in thousands of ohms, so presumably the resistance of the cable, a couple of ohms isn't really important?

Jim_e_Jib · Oct 28, 2022

Pretty Mouth said:
Thanks, I recon this should do it:

CANFORD FST-HD - FOIL SCREENED STRANDED CONDUCTOR TWIN CABLE Heavy duty

This D'n'A series (Digital and Analogue) cable is designed to be suitable for both digital and analogue audio signals, with an impedance of 100 ohms which has been proven to be suitable for AES/EBU…

www.canford.co.uk

That was the one I'd looked at too

They also have this, but it's double the price:

CANFORD HST-R - HELICAL SCREENED STRANDED CONDUCTOR TWIN CABLE Ruggedised

This is the same construction cable as standard HST, but with a matt black polyurethane jacket – incredibly tough and resilient, and remains flexible in sub-zero arctic conditions. Ideal for on-stage…

www.canford.co.uk

Avo Mk8 · Oct 28, 2022

Pretty Mouth said:
The resistance of these is measure in thousands of ohms, so presumably the resistance of the cable, a couple of ohms isn't really important?

From memory the resistance is 10k at 25degrees, so cable resistance is indeed irrelevant!

just looked it up - see below!

[ElectriciansForums.net] Landlord thermostats?

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davesparks

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loz2754

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