So do we, in commercial stuff. 24V ac power is fairly standard for motorized valves, damper actuators and such like. You can get 24V power heads for the usual Honeywell domestic zone valves, but I've never seen one on a domestic system.
230V on a wet heating system's controls is fairly daft.
Can't just have that, you must have yellow and brown as well.
Don't forget the LGB&T community. You'll need some blue radiators which only accept male fittings, some pink radiators with female-only fittings and some pink radiators with male fittings that used to be female and vice-versa. And a half-pink, half-blue radiator with gender-neutral fittings.
ICBA to plough through all their many, many variations to work out which one you have suffice to say the prices would have me reaching for a Raspberry Pi. At least the thing would do what I wanted it to do.
And presumably a static public IPv4 address at that, bet it's not IPv6 capable. Controlling via WiFi from your iPhone over your LAN shouldn't be a problem. The DHCP allocated address from your router will almost certainly behave as if it's static. If not just assign it one within the LAN subnet but outside the DHCP range.
The biggest snag is that it will then probably be behind NAT in the router. You'll have to punch a hole through the firewall (port forwarding) so stuff "out there" (ie your iPhone or anything else...) can connect to it. I'm not sure I would be happy having essentially an unknown device on my LAN that can be accessed from the 'net. It really needs to sit in a DMZ, ie between the ADSL router and your LANs firewall.
Blimey - I had no idea what I was letting myself in for wanting a wifi-controllable heating system!
Particularly since the security on such devices ("SCADA") is generally very poor.
valves, damper actuators and such like.
But it's a replacement for a domestic room thermostat/programmer. That's their explanation anyway. Apparently coming to the UK this year:
and some with t*ts...
Many routers can upload their currently allocated IPv4 address to DynDNS and similar services, which means that externally you can still address the system by name and get directed to the (current) correct address even with dynamic IP.
There are other things you could do to mitigate... a router that allows VPN termination would make it secure.
Failing that, things like port triggering supported on some routers can also be used to make remote access less easy to exploit (so you app attempts to make connection on a particular port, which apparently does not respond, but that triggers activation of another port that will for a short window of time. Thus defeating port scans etc).
Once you have packets arriving at the pi it can be locked down to only accept ssh connections for example. It could also have ip tables entries to drop any incoming connections that were not from appropriate address ranges (i.e. the netblock owned by your mobile operator)... and so on.
You could take an alternative approach. Have the actual control interface for your system on a public web (or FTP or IRC etc) server (hidden behind password access and SSL etc), and also have the pi based controller reach out to the same place to post its stats, and collect its instructions.
valves, damper actuators and such like.
I think (not 100% sure) that it's just the UK that uses mains voltage controls. The Yanks (some of them) have wet 'hydronic' heating systems.
I believe most of the EU uses 24V. If you want to use S-plan 240V zone valves with a Vaillant (German?)Ecotec boiler you need to use their UK-specific VR65 interface gadget, a PCB with relays.
Thermostats are heat-activated switches, it's the display and any similar electronics that needs a LV power supply. ON/OFF thermostats are ancient technology anyway.
I'll be converting my Ecotec/VR65 back to sensible controls in the near future and dumping the VR65 and 240V zone valves..
Some days I intend to come home at a certain time and then decide to finish a couple of hours earlier or later and it would be handy to be able to adjust the CH so as to neither waste fuel nor come home to a cold house. It's certainly not worth spending a lot on such a facility though.
SteveW
In message , Mentalguy2k8 writes
And radiators that need bleeding at the same time of the month otherwise they display PHT
I think you meant nipples there, dear boy
So get married then. The CH will self adjust whilst you are at work and if you arrive back late from work then expect a frosty reception.
Actually, on second thoughts those remote devices do look cheap.
I prefer to use the router's ability to recognise a MAC address and always allocate it the same IP address from within the DHCP range, so I can still configure all my PCs and devices to use DHCP.
SteveW
valves, damper actuators and such like.
but I've never seen one on a domestic system.
Indeed, we have timer/stats in each room and a motorised valve for each
- costs wise I had to have 230V valves (they were being sold off at less than half price), but I control them via relays from a 12V control system. That meant that I could install all the timer/stats close to doorframe edges and the like and "hide" alarm cable up the edge for a low disruption install. They can all be sunk in over the coming years as each room comes up for redecoration.
SteveW
I accept that any port and communication LAN side is a potential hazard, but in this case a basic TCP client running a very basic system on a micro, I wouldn't have thought it would be an issue.
Mind I guess it could well be a full blown ARM Linux system!!
The Router is a far better place to hack than a thermostat! Manufacturers like Netgear even publish their source code.
You should be fine using dyndns.
I am married, but she works some days too. She never finishes early and frequently later than me - usually because some patient is going through a crisis.
Definitely! The three kids are even worse money sinks than she is!
SteveW
You can usually get round that by signing up for a free dynamic dns account.
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