Programmable thermostat?

[LSMFT]

I want to have my circulator come on for 3 minutes and off for 15 minutes as long as the thermostat is calling for heat. Will a programmable thermostat do this?

[Jim Elbrecht]

I would say no. All the thermostat does is call for heat.

You could put a timer on the circulator-- but I doubt that is a good idea. Why do you want to do this?

I suspect the current setup allows for the most efficient use of power-- your proposition totally ignores how hot the water is. It seems to me that water temp is of utmost importance.

Jim

[LSMFT]

It's a wood boiler and I do it that way manually now and it works great. The problem is that when the fire goes down the circulator runs all the time unless I shut it off.

[Jim Elbrecht]

-snip-

I'd be leaning towards a thermostat on the boiler that circulated whenever the water was above 'nn' degrees. With nn= As cool as it can get and still feel warm as it re-enters the boiler.

But then I've never played with a boiler- so I might be all wet.,g>

Jim

[Ed Pawlowski]

Sounds like you need an aquastat to control the circulator. It will shut off below a set water temperature.

[Ed Pawlowski]

************************************************************* How would air flow to the boiler control the circulator?

[George]

That could be easily solved by installing an aquastat but not commonly done because if the fire goes out the circulating water may save some piping.