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Smart Heating - your experiences please

A

Amormusic

pfm Member
Hi folks,

I'm looking please for personal experiences of your smart heating...

- What brand do you use?
- How easy and intuitive is the app?
- What functionality do you have?
- Any issues with reliability etc.?

I would like to install smart heating with an app to control from my phone and zonal control so I can heat rooms to varying temps and also have rooms on or off totally - for example just heat my office I'm working in during the day whilst I'm the only person in the house.

We already have Drayton Wiser and recently it's been an unreliable pain in the arse, where it either doesn't respond, or randomly turns on rooms heating when the app says the heating is off, thereby wasting money. Before we get to the next heating season I will get this removed and want to get something else.

Therefore, I'm keen to know of others experiences with different systems.

Thanks in advance!
 
Ok. I’m Hive. Have been for quite a while. It’s pretty good but I don’t have a frame of reference, except the dumb TRVs that were there before. On the heating side, I’m TRVs on every rad except the bathroom ones. The thermostat is in the hallway, which is a good size and the opposite side of the hall from the rad.

It works exactly as you describe/expect. Heating just the rooms needed either to a schedule or as and when if things change. The app is easy enough to use, and you can set it all up quickly. Copying schedules and creating groups is simple. Useful for both rads and lights in the same room. Schedules can be quite granular too, if you need the flexibility.

The downsides for me have been some TRV firmware issues as an early adopter. Long ago sorted. Also, and I can’t blame Hive, it exposed a couple of dodgy radiator valves which caused batteries to expire too quickly. I thought it was the TRVs so went through a process of moving known “good ones” only to find they did the same! Plumber fixed the valves eventually. I also bought into the security which looks like it’s being phased out now. The app has gone down once or twice too, but was back soon enough.

Anyway, if you have a specific query ask away. Happy to help if I can.
 
I have Nest but much preferred Hive for its simplicity. Unfortunately when I had a new boiler installed a. Couple of years ago Hive didn’t comply with something and installing it would affect the boiler warranty. Really cant remember what the issue was.
 
I'm on Honeywell Home, haven't bothered with the App so can't comment on that side.

Wireless TRVs on all radiators so i can set them independently and programme for the week. Wireless control of the hot water the same.

Two main circuits, HW and CH with separate pumps and valves to be sure.

I didn't install any room stats, just look at TRV positioning. One's behind a sofa and one inside a big cover so i set them a bit higher than the desired temp.

The interface is a little screen, really easy to use so no problem overriding as required.

It's made the heating far easier to control and hot water uses far less fuel.

Took a weekend to install as the boiler wiring is slightly complex for an amateur but all worked as planned.
 
Hive here with TRVs and working well. Not all radiators are under control - some rooms are hardly used so the manual TRVs turned down in those is adequate. Hive radiator TRVs were very easy to install and tell you if something needs calibrating, batteries flat, or even if the valve underneath is not closing properly (as one told me only the other day)

I like the over ride feature where you can set up some rooms for force the heating on even if the main thermo is up to temp. My office in the basement is sometimes a bit too chilly but the sitting room thermostat is a south facing room and is switched itself off. Over ride fixes that.

This winter I have save '00s of £ dosh using Hive - so payback and convenience is all great. Self installation to my Bosch system boiler and hot water system was trivially easy (merely replacing a simple Honeywell timer and backplate to existing control wires)

The only mistake I made was not realising that Hive make two controllers for single and twin control systems. Single for combi boilers I suppose - but twin needed for my seperate hot water system.

With 14 radiators around the place I have made a big difference using just 6 Hive TRvs in carefully chosen most used rooms.
BUT if your internet goes down - control carries on but you can'c change anything.
I have set up routines to switch everything off when we go away and can remotely get the place warm as we travel home too.
No lights or security or any other Hive product used - so cant comment on those.
I do not pay the extra for premium, history monitor on the main thermostat is available free and good enough for me.
 
We're on Hive (and with a couple of TRV's in the living room as it's a big room that's not generally used during the day which means I can close the door and turn the temperature in the room down) and that seems fine. It does occasionally need the networking box rebooted but that's the only issue so far.
 
Hive isn't really a Smart Control. It's just a fancy programmable room stat you can use with an app.
You need an Opentherm control (and the boiler to work with it) or weather compensation (and the boiler that will work with it)
Nest is better than Hive if you'd like to compare the two
 
We have 18 wireless TRVs that give us 18 heating zones without any central thermostat. It works in conjunction with a weather compensated boiler and is very good indeed. Saves money and keeps the place warm. No more freezing nor boiling.

We also use the supplied app so that all 18 zones can be set/configured on a smart phone/iPad. Its this that requires an Internet connection as the server is at a remote site. It makes life easy and as already been mentioned you can boost the temp in a single room you are using. You can do this without an app by going to each TRV in turn when the server/internet connection breaks.

Our stuff is by Vaillant but it only works with their own boiler and ebus.

Its not perfect and has its foibles but you learn to live with them.

I tested the Honeywell system when it first came out several tears ago and its similar to our current Vaillant but could at the time be used with any unintelligent boiler.

DV
 
Ellenor said:
Hive isn't really a Smart Control. It's just a fancy programmable room stat you can use with an app.
You need an Opentherm control (and the boiler to work with it) or weather compensation (and the boiler that will work with it)
Nest is better than Hive if you'd like to compare the two
Click to expand...
Had a read up. That’s interesting. It seems to avoid the heat/cool thing that goes on as a rad reaches temp and shuts off. I can’t quite work out the weather compensation feature but I presume it modulates for cooler/hotter days somehow?

In reality however, because we have control at each rad then you generally find a happy medium and can quickly adjust on the exceptional days. One question, how is Nest better? I’ve never tried it.
 
Nest is a dead end option imo, Google stopped supporting it a few years ago, and the one I had couldn’t maintain a steady room temp due to the on/off temps being about 1.5C apart. In reality that meant the actual room temp varied by about 3C, which meant you either felt too hot or too cold, it could never maintain an even spread. The only thing that was ‘smart’ about it was that it could ’self set a schedule’ based on a weeks worth of you manually setting the temp, and it ‘guessing’ an average of those.
Couldn't wait to get back to Hive tbh
 
Jubal said:
Had a read up. That’s interesting. It seems to avoid the heat/cool thing that goes on as a rad reaches temp and shuts off. I can’t quite work out the weather compensation feature but I presume it modulates for cooler/hotter days somehow?

In reality however, because we have control at each rad then you generally find a happy medium and can quickly adjust on the exceptional days. One question, how is Nest better? I’ve never tried it.
Click to expand...
Weather comp uses an outdoor sensor normally mounted on a north facing wall. Radiator temperature adjusts according to outdoor temperature.
Nest is better because it has 'Opentherm' built in. Opentherm will reduce radiator temperature as the room temperature nears the set point to smooth things out and cut down on the on/off cycling. So many houses reach room stat temperature, switch off and an hour later after the radiators have gone cold start up again. A lot of energy is used just warming up the radiators from cold
 
If you're a gadget type, then you'll probably be satisfied with all that's out there. My own smart system, includes a constant low temperature(40/45oC) through the winter months supplied from a "low loss header". Then a wood burning stove to up the temp in the TV room. I use a lot less oil now, and the house never has cold spots. All houses have different requirements obviously. Oh loads of fibreglass in the loft
 
wammer said:
Nest is a dead end option imo, Google stopped supporting it a few years ago, and the one I had couldn’t maintain a steady room temp due to the on/off temps being about 1.5C apart. In reality that meant the actual room temp varied by about 3C, which meant you either felt too hot or too cold, it could never maintain an even spread. The only thing that was ‘smart’ about it was that it could ’self set a schedule’ based on a weeks worth of you manually setting the temp, and it ‘guessing’ an average of those.
Couldn't wait to get back to Hive tbh
Click to expand...
That might be true for Nest Secure but the rest of the Nest family, including thermostat, seems to be alive and well.
 
Ellenor said:
Weather comp uses an outdoor sensor normally mounted on a north facing wall. Radiator temperature adjusts according to outdoor temperature.
Nest is better because it has 'Opentherm' built in. Opentherm will reduce radiator temperature as the room temperature nears the set point to smooth things out and cut down on the on/off cycling. So many houses reach room stat temperature, switch off and an hour later after the radiators have gone cold start up again. A lot of energy is used just warming up the radiators from cold
Click to expand...
Thanks. For the record, Hive is pretty quick to open the TRV if the temp drops below target. Or vice versa. You only really notice on the coldest days in my house, in one room where the rad is slightly too small IMO. I’m not a fanboy, just sticking my experience out there.
 
Hive here with smart TVRs throughout and Home Assistant as well. All works well. Have not researched if I saved any money with the smart TVRs which have been in for a winter.
 
In my Kendal pad (170 miles from home in the midlands), the only fuel choice is electricity. I currently have storage rads which as you can imagine do not want to play with my Nest… the Nest was installed to control the hot water and to be there for when I eventually find a heating solution which is both cost-effective and Nest-controllable. That has so far eluded me. Watching the thread with interest then, even though as expected oil and gas dominate.
 
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