Attractive Room Thermostats

[Rex Bigger]

Hi, has anyone come across a room thermostat that is not a white plastic box. Surely someone out there must make nice thermostats.

[Set Square]

Well, I suppose you could employ a pretty girl to monitor a thermometer and turn a switch on and off .

Or you could paint a white one sky-blue-pink if that suits your decor better.

[Dave]

reminds me of the old joke: "darling, turn the light on" "light, I love you" ... sorry, back to reality.

Dave

[Tony Bryer]

I have no personal experience but my married friends tell me that their wives only ever turn thermostats one way!

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Yes. I've often wondered why they are all surface mount. Perhaps to get airflow through them to measure the temperature?

[Alex (YMG)]

There was, I believe, a link to a Siemens branded one posted here a few months ago - someone had seen it at their office or similar and wanted one. It was quite smart IMO.

Sorry I can't be of more help.

Alex

[Andrew Gabriel]

Well, this is a DIY newsgroup... You could spray the white plastic some other colour, add some gold leaf highlights, etc. Heck, with an empty fairy liquid container, empty yogourt pot, and some sticky-back plastic, I'm sure you could disguise your thermostat as a model ICBM.

Having built my own control system, I can set my room temperatures on the home computer (which is not in the living room), so in theory I don't need room thermostats (just room thermometers which don't need to be so obvious/accessible). Having said that, I did fit a dial marked in ºC which is also read by the computer and actioned like a conventional room thermostat as it's rather convenient to have, but it could have been omitted or fitted in a completely different room from the one whose temperature is being set. (Come to think of it, I can also set the room temperatures remotely across the Internet;-)

[Mike]

And if anybody finds a paint that actually sticks well please let us all know. Tried this on a Maplin unit with all sorts of paint types and none failed to flake off.

[Mike]

"Andrew Gabriel"

To save us all rumaging round your website perhaps you should put in a link on the home page so we can have a go as well :-)

[Mike]

That's because they cool the house down by opening a door or window.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Halfords car vinyl paints sticks fairly well - but has a limited range of colours. Perhaps if used as a primer other paints might be ok?

[Tony Bryer]

My dream for our church heating would be to have it monitored like this but with a web server connection to broadband (i.e. always on). Log in from anywhere and check the temp or change the current week's program. What it needs is a very low power computer - low power CPU so no fan needed and no hard disk. Probably all doable now at a price. More simply, perhaps a Honeywell CM67 with an internet connection: log in remotely and read/reprogram it.

[Bob Eager]

at WRAP.

[Andrew Gabriel]

Why? (noise, reliability?) I'm using an old P120 with 128Mb RAM and a 4Gb hard disk. It does have a fan, but it generates so little heat that it runs quite happily without it (I've done this with another identical system when the fan seazed; I didn't notice for ages, and only side effect was the PSU was a bit warmer). Even such a machine is well over spec'ed for the job. It does occasionally get used for web browsing too if I happen to want to look something up when I'm in that room, but mostly it just sits there with the monitor switched off. I got 420 days uptime out of it (number of days between power cuts), but it isn't running anything Microsoft-based. It is also monitored by the burglar alarm, which will dial out if my software (which handles the temperature monitoring and heating control amongst other things) fails to tell the burglar alarm it's running OK on an hourly basis. The burglar alarm can also power cycle the PC if necessary (it never has been necessary to date).

I must admit I don't have a Web interface -- it uses ssh. A web interface would be nice, but any time I get to spend enhancing the system normally goes into extra functionality rather than eye-candy.

[Tony Bryer]

But if you're looking at (say) 100W, that's about £1 per week. The WRAP board at 5-7W looks much better in this respect.

Ah yes, but if you're in charge of church heating remote monitoring and programming would be extra functionality not eye candy!

[Andrew Gabriel]

I just checked a similar P120 system, and it's 40W once it's finished booting and mostly sitting in the idler on a HLT instruction (and about 65W in heavy processing and disk accessing, which doesn't happen in this application).

However, these costs are negligable compared to the ADSL line. If you can find someone nearby with ADSL and WiFi who will let you have some negligable bandwidth for nothing, that might be a good option, even if you have to buy them a wireless router.

Yes, it would need a friendlier front end, and probably some multi-level security.

You might find the congregation checking the church temperature from home in the winter, before deciding if they're going to come along to the service;-) Reminds me when I was at school and we were practicing for the Christmas church services -- I ended up being sent home with hyperthermia after spending the morning in the local church.

[Tony Bryer]

They can drive by first: since we installed the Kestons you can just look for the white 'smoke'

[Bob Eager]

Just stand outside - that should cure hyperthermia!

(I'll get me coat...)

[John]

A thermistor bead is small (pinhead) and should be easy to hide. As long as air can circulate round it and a (hidden) route for the signal wires back to a control unit is available this should give better response than most of the currently marketed units.

[Mike]

Just walk along the street with a directional aerial and you'll usually find an open connection :-)