| Author |
|
krommetje
Super User
Joined: December 29 2004
Location: Netherlands
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 695
|
| Posted: June 18 2005 at 05:14 | IP Logged
|
|
|
Hi all,
I have thought of some more automation stuff... I want that PH has full control over my Central Heating System, but my wife doesn't want to get rid of the thermostat in the living room. The reason why I want that PH has full control is obvious: For security reasons when There is a fire, PH can shutdown the Central Heating System (or when there is Carbon Monoxide) My wife still wants full control with the thermostat in the living room.... Now here is some hardware I have come up with and am curious of your thoughts:
Baiscly I want to Cut the connection from the Thermostat to the central heating system which is a 2 wire cable.
The thermostat will be connected to an SM10 (a universal sender module) which sends it address when a relay closes (which is the only thing a thermostat does) The SM10 sends its address to PH and PH switches a relay which is connected to the central Heating System.... Some macros will make sure that when there is a fire or carbon monoxide alarm the Central Heating System Shuts down...
Could this work?
Peter
Edited by krommetje
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
TonyNo
Moderator Group
Joined: December 05 2001
Location: United States
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 2889
|
| Posted: June 18 2005 at 09:48 | IP Logged
|
|
|
It should, but I'm not sure that you really want a PC and X-10 technology running your HVAC system. What if the PC locks up during a heating/cooling cycle, or an X-10 Off command gets lost?
Unless your PC has never locked up and X-10 has always worked 100% of the time for you... 
Usually, people have stand-alone controllers for something like this and just communicate status info to their PC system.
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
TonyNo
Moderator Group
Joined: December 05 2001
Location: United States
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 2889
|
| Posted: June 18 2005 at 14:53 | IP Logged
|
|
|
I just had a thought. One way to get better reliability from X-10 would be to use two relay modules in series. That way, one stray signal would not be a problem.
You should also add a watchdog timer (more on this in another thread here somewhere) to your PC to reset it in case it locks up.
You may also want to consider UPB modules. These are looking to be much more reliable than X-10. I think Dave said something about supporting these soon.
Edited by TonyNo
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
krommetje
Super User
Joined: December 29 2004
Location: Netherlands
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 695
|
| Posted: June 19 2005 at 05:30 | IP Logged
|
|
|
TonyNo wrote:
| I just had a thought. One way to get better reliability from X-10 would be to use two relay modules in series. That way, one stray signal would not be a problem. |
|
|
In series? Should the actual Switch-part of the relay not be parallel? When they are in series then both switches have to be on in order to have an actual ON....
in series it looks like this:
----___------____-----
in parallel it looks like this:
----__---
----| |----
----__---
it is difficult to draw electrical diagrams with just asci but you'll get the meaning right?
Quote:
You should also add a watchdog timer (more on this in another thread here somewhere) to your PC to reset it in case it locks up. What if the PC locks up during a heating/cooling cycle, or an X-10 Off command gets lost?
Unless your PC has never locked up and X-10 has always worked 100% of the time for you... |
|
|
well, since I first ran PH the PC never locked up... It only locked up one time when I tried to run a formula that didn't comply with PH.... I am pretty confident about that...  I'll make a search on the board and try to find the thread about a watchdog timer.... How should I go around with this? Is this a macro with runs continuously?
Quote:
Usually, people have stand-alone controllers for something like this and just communicate status info to their PC system. |
|
|
this runs on PH already and has been running for 2 months now... I've done this with a virtual-X10 device and a formula which calculates if the temperature is rising or falling and updates the status of the virt.x10 accordingly.... I've also done this with the solar-collector.... It is pretty reliable I'd like to add (tickling myself  )
Quote:
You may also want to consider UPB modules. These are looking to be much more reliable than X-10. I think Dave said something about supporting these soon. |
|
|
Do you have a hyperlink on where I can find info on these modules?
Peter
Edited by krommetje
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
TonyNo
Moderator Group
Joined: December 05 2001
Location: United States
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 2889
|
| Posted: June 19 2005 at 11:53 | IP Logged
|
|
|
krommetje wrote:
| In series? Should the actual Switch-part of the relay not be parallel? When they are in series then both switches have to be on in order to have an actual ON |
|
|
Yes, series. That way, you would send two On's to two addresses. One bad one would not trigger it.
krommetje wrote:
| well, since I first ran PH the PC never locked up... It only locked up one time when I tried to run a formula that didn't comply with PH.... I am pretty confident about that... I'll make a search on the board and try to find the thread about a watchdog timer.... How should I go around with this? Is this a macro with runs continuously? |
|
|
You are having good luck! This is actual hardware that you would create a timed event to refresh, and when the refresh does not happen in time (a lock up), the system reboots.
Quote:
| Do you have a hyperlink on where I can find info on these modules? |
|
|
Here are some UPB Modules.
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
krommetje
Super User
Joined: December 29 2004
Location: Netherlands
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 695
|
| Posted: June 20 2005 at 07:39 | IP Logged
|
|
|
TonyNo wrote:
krommetje wrote:
| In series? Should the actual Switch-part of the relay not be parallel? When they are in series then both switches have to be on in order to have an actual ON |
|
|
Yes, series. That way, you would send two On's to two addresses. One bad one would not trigger it. |
|
|
ah, I get what you mean..... So i'd have to program a macro which sends 2 ON's to 2 addresses... For security reasons, I could do a statusrequest on both addresses as the relais-board (the ri304), which mentioned in another post, supports statusrequests... when the statusrequest isn't correct, a security-shutt-off is performed and then after a waiting-period the macro could be re-run... this would take a lot of programming with jumps etc.
Quote:
| You are having good luck! This is actual hardware that you would create a timed event to refresh, and when the refresh does not happen in time (a lock up), the system reboots. |
|
|
Hmm, I am unfamiliar with this.... I am going to google- around a bit regarding this subject....I could use another form of security which Dave mentioned in another post which he used for creating a motion light which stays on for 15 minutes...that way I could set a maximum-time for the Central Heating system (C.H.S.) when it heats my home.... Again after the C.H.S. is shut-down and no longer heats my home a statusrequest is done to check if everything is OK....Also a temperature measurement could be done when the C.H.S. actually heats my home..if the temp. is above 23degrees celcius e.g. then also shut-down could be performed....
Am I correct to think this is a Can-Bus alike system?
My original Idea is that I use the ri304 board with 4 relays to use:
1 relay as a switch which commands the C.H.S to start heating my home...
1 relay to use in case of fire/carbonmonoxide/overheating so the C.H.S. disconnects from the HVAC
1 relay to use in case of fire/overheating so the Solar Collector disconnects from HVAC
leaves one relay untouched however I like you idea to put 2 relays in series for security reasons so all 4 relays are used...
Peter
Edited by krommetje
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
TonyNo
Moderator Group
Joined: December 05 2001
Location: United States
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 2889
|
| Posted: June 20 2005 at 19:42 | IP Logged
|
|
|
Oh! If you are using a relay board instead of X-10 modules, you would not need to use two. X-10 commands can sometimes "get lost" on the way to modules. UPB is said to not have this problem; they are also reportedly much faster to respond to commands than X-10. Think of UPB as a better version of X-10.
Regarding the watchdog timer, these are used to keep a PC from staying in a locked-up state. Here is a post about them.
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
krommetje
Super User
Joined: December 29 2004
Location: Netherlands
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 695
|
| Posted: June 21 2005 at 04:26 | IP Logged
|
|
|
TonyNo wrote:
| Oh! If you are using a relay board instead of X-10 modules, you would not need to use two. X-10 commands can sometimes "get lost" on the way to modules. UPB is said to not have this problem; they are also reportedly much faster to respond to commands than X-10. Think of UPB as a better version of X-10. |
|
|
I do have to add that this relayboard is an X10-board, so to be on the safe side, I'll use 2 relays, your idea I am going to implement. The server is placed just beneith the Central Heating System and the C.H.S. is on the same outlet as the server and this relayboard so regarding loosing an X10 command together with 2 relays and when I make a temperature-watchdog with a maximum-on-time should be secure enough I think...
Quote:
Regarding the watchdog timer, these are used to keep a PC from staying in a locked-up state. Here is a post about them.
|
|
|
I've been reading this yesterday, in the time I had my BBS I had a DOS util called autoboot... as soon as the BBS locked up autoboot would restart the BBS... I'll google-around a bit and hopefully there is something similar to this... however, since I have PH on this PIII PH never locked up (glad to say) right now there are other priorities as we found out my wife is pregnant again and our 2nd child will be born in February... so right now we have to start with moving our daugther to her new bedroom so the baby has the room our daugther occupies now, but that is besides the point.
As soon as I have built a housing for the relayboard, and bought the SM10 I can start with programming the macros for this project...
Peter
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
TonyNo
Moderator Group
Joined: December 05 2001
Location: United States
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 2889
|
| Posted: June 21 2005 at 10:31 | IP Logged
|
|
|
Quote:
| we found out my wife is pregnant again and our 2nd child will be born in February |
|
|
Congratulations!
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
krommetje
Super User
Joined: December 29 2004
Location: Netherlands
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 695
|
| Posted: June 21 2005 at 11:01 | IP Logged
|
|
|
TonyNo wrote:
Quote:
| we found out my wife is pregnant again and our 2nd child will be born in February |
|
|
Congratulations! |
|
|
thanks, now we're going to have to find an original way to tell it my Father/Stephmother and my in-laws, i've been thinking of making text on a white t-shirt for my daugther like:
I am going to be BIG SIS! and then hoping they'll read it...
Peter
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
onhiatus
Senior Member
Joined: May 12 2004
Location: United States
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 279
|
| Posted: June 21 2005 at 19:33 | IP Logged
|
|
|
My congrats also!
Back to the problem - it seems like you are making this too complex. Instead of having your PC be controlled by the thermostat and the heater by the PC, why don't you let the thermostat continue to control the Heater. You can have the PC then be able to shut down the heater in an emergency (is your heater gas or electric?), or you could just have the PC interupt the thermostat control line (if it's low voltage a universal module should work).
Both these set ups let the thermostat work the same as always, but just let the PC take over in an emergency.
My thermostat has a "vacation" mode that you are supposed to hook to a telephone so that you can call it and change the status (vacation mode is usually set to just above freezing). Since the vacation mode is triggered by a contact closure I use a universal module to trigger it in reverse from how it was designed. My vacation mode is set to warm (75F), while the normal programmed mode is cooler - the normal mode tries to keep the house tolerable for our schedule (set to 60 when we are normally about to be home, and 50 the rest of the time). When PowerHome sees we're home it toggles to vacation mode bumping the temp up to 75
Also, X10 is not reliable! Anything important should take two commands to trigger. I.E. If you are using a universal module to cut your thermostat out then plug it into an apliance outlet - now to be triggered you have to trigger the appliance outlet on, then trigger the universal module. To be safe, regularly turn off your gating module (the appliance module in my example)
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
krommetje
Super User
Joined: December 29 2004
Location: Netherlands
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 695
|
| Posted: June 22 2005 at 10:11 | IP Logged
|
|
|
onhiatus wrote:
My congrats also!
Back to the problem - it seems like you are making this too complex. You can have the PC then be able to shut down the heater in an emergency |
|
|
that thought also crossed my mind.... It would take the least programming, just add an X-10 Off to the firealarm macro... (and an X10 On when the firealarm has been deactivated)
Quote:
| (is your heater gas or electric?) |
|
|
Central Heating is always Gas (at least over here)...
Quote:
| or you could just have the PC interupt the thermostat control line (if it's low voltage a universal module should work). |
|
|
The C.H.S has 24 volts AC that connects to the thermostat, so a relay on the Ri304 board would be sufficient
Quote:
| Also, X10 is not reliable! Anything important should take two commands to trigger. I.E. If you are using a universal module to cut your thermostat out then plug it into an apliance outlet - now to be triggered you have to trigger the appliance outlet on, then trigger the universal module. To be safe, regularly turn off your gating module (the appliance module in my example) |
|
|
No, I will be using the relayboard to cut the HVAC...also another relay will be used to Cut the HVAC from the Solar Collector... I think I am just going to use the securityfeature and not the feature to have PH run the C.H.S....
Peter
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
Active Topics 
Memberlist 
Search 
Help
Register 
Login
PowerHome Messageboard : PowerHome General
Topic: Hardware advice
