Hi, thanks for your reply. I had a go with this but still not had any luck.
I have a feeling something else is also wrong with my flow, but you’ve definitely put me on the right track, cheers!
1 Like
More newbie questions on getting started …
So I’m nearly ready to go. I have a HA environment running, and a stack of Drayton boxes. I’ve been reading forums and wikis till my eyes bleed! I just need the plumber to finish some work on my radiators and in a few days I should be ready to get started. Some dumb questions before I get my screwdriver out…
HA Versions: right now, for example, HA is telling me that 2023.6.3 is installed and that 2023.7.3 is available. In general, how would I know that it’s safe to take the update and that this integration won’t break? I can see a reference in github to a minimum HA version but not to a maximum tested version. Or is the preferred approach, once its working, not to take any updates unless you really have to?
Schedules: what’s a sensible order to go about this? I will have 12 “rooms”, and days of the week aren’t really a thing. I think I will want to have a few different seasonal schedules, with different schedules for each room. Do I start with the Wiser app to set up all the gear with one default schedule, and then adjust in the integration? Is that best done through the UI or by editing files?
UI in HA: It’s going to be important to us to be able to make on-the-fly adjustments on a room by room basis (we have a large, old, cold house and the theory is to be heating just the rooms we are actually using, which won’t always follow a timetable). I’ve got as far as customising a dashboard with some other elements in it - but I will want to add room-by-room controls, and schedule switching. Can anyone point me at some worked examples for setting this up? (Yes, I have read Home · asantaga/wiserHomeAssistantPlatform Wiki · GitHub and there’s a lot of good stuff there)
Fallback: in the unfortunate circumstance of my HA box going up in smoke (or any other technical issue that has the same result), I guess I can just fall back on using the Wiser app (assuming that there is enough tech still working for that) - how easy is it from there to tell it to revert to a sensible default configuration, which might not be the same as the last set of instructions from HA?
Thanks!
In general, take the latest version of HA and if there are any issues, we would normally have fixed in a few days and a new version released (the main benefit as to why we use HACs not a core integration).
Most people find it easier to use the UI card to manage schedules rather than the app. However, completely your choice. The UI manages the same schedules as the app and so are interchangeable. You can have schedules that are not in use (not assigned) on Wiser and then assign them for your different seasons. There is a limit to how many (cannot remember what that is though) which is why we then have the file method to store these schedules offline as such, and load them when you want. I would say however, it is much easier to create a schedule in the UI and then save it out to a file than manually editing lots of files.
I don’t have any worked examples but if, when you are ready, feel free to post what it is you are looking for and people on here are always very helpful. A common setup for a number here is to have something like this per room.
with yaml here, which may give you a starting point.
type: custom:stack-in-card
mode: vertical
cards:
- type: custom:mushroom-climate-card
entity: climate.wiser_lounge
name: Heating
show_temperature_control: true
hvac_modes:
- auto
- heat
- 'off'
tap_action:
action: none
hold_action:
action: none
double_tap_action:
action: none
collapsible_controls: false
layout: horizontal
card_mod:
style: |
ha-card {
border-width:0;
}
- type: custom:mushroom-chips-card
chips:
- type: template
content: Boost 1h
tap_action:
action: call-service
service: wiser.boost_heating
data:
time_period: 60
target:
entity_id: climate.wiser_lounge
- type: template
content: Boost 2h
tap_action:
action: call-service
service: wiser.boost_heating
data:
time_period: 120
target:
entity_id: climate.wiser_lounge
- type: template
content: Boost 3h
tap_action:
action: call-service
service: wiser.boost_heating
data:
time_period: 180
target:
entity_id: climate.wiser_lounge
- type: template
content: Cancel
tap_action:
action: call-service
service: wiser.boost_heating
data:
time_period: 0
target:
entity_id: climate.wiser_lounge
alignment: center
card_mod:
style: |
ha-card {
padding: 10px 0;
}
This integration (with the exception of passive mode) only sends commands to the Hub. The hub runs everything. Therefore if you HA instance goes down, your heating will continue to operate exactly the same (same temp settings, same schedules etc). You can then use the Wiser app to control - set temps, change and assign schedules etc. The only thing you may find is that as you get into using the integration, you may create automations that make life a little easier using other devices to trigger them. Ie, many people use the device tracker of the HA app to set their heating to away mode if nobody is in the house. Clearly these sorts of things wont continue without HA.
I hope that helps give you some confidence and how to get started. Using this integration is pretty straight forward and you will find that it adds to the Wiser hub rather than replaces anything about it. Feel free to ask questions here and also sugestions for improvements if you think of any when you start to use. Many of the recent functional additions have come from our community asking for it.
Mark
4 Likes
Hi all,
I purchased a Wiser hub on it’s own without any thermostats. My hope was that through this integration i could control the 3 channel boiler (2 zones plus water) with generic thermostats i had already setup in home assistant. I can turn the hot water on and off but not hte two heating zones. I suspect it’s because the wiser hub needs to be sent the current temperature so it can decide when to call for heat. If this is the case is there any workaround for this to use the hub without any of the wiser thermostat sensors. Thanks in advance.
I think what you want is an automation that detects when one of your thermostats falls below a setpoint, and turns the heating on for the corresponding channel. Then another automation for the thermostat that turns the heating for the channel back off when the setpoint is reached.
As I have a heat hub with a single heating channel I’m not sure that this integration has a service that supports turning on/off one channel or another.
You might try creating a “room” for each channel in the Wiser app. You can then tell each “room” (i.e. Channel) to boost on or off based on the corresponding thermostat values.
There may be a better way to do it than this. You would certainly need logic to handle different temperatures for each of the thermostats in rooms heated by the same channel.
I want to create a holiday schedule for Hot Water - the idea is to run the hot water for an hour a day while I am away to prevent legionella bacteria growth. During winter holidays a schedule might also help protect my hot water pipe from freezing. The big idea is to toggle this schedule along with other things using an “On Holiday” button in Home Assistant, or link the schedule to Wiser’s Away mode.
To do this I create a new OnOff schedule using the Wiser Schedule card. I am unable to select the hot water for assignment - it only allows me to assign to smart plugs. Using the wiser.assign_schedule service I should be able to assign the schedule as follows:
service: wiser.assign_schedule
data:
to_entity_id: select.wiser_hot_water_mode
schedule_id: 1001
However I am unable to confirm whether this worked or not. The Wiser app will not show the schedule applies to Hot Water, and I can’t find an entity that shows which schedule is assigned to Hot Water. The Wiser app still shows the Hot Water as using the standard Hot Water schedule, as does wiser.get_schedule.
Is it currently possible to assign a different schedule to hot water using this integration?
I suspect you will have problems getting it to work that way.
In a regular Wiser setup each room has a provider of temperature data (roomstat or iTRV) on which the hub acts. However on a 2 or 3 channel hub, one of the channels looks after hot water and is a simple on/off switch. The Wiser hub has no knowledge if the boiler is running as this is controlled by the tank thermostat. You could probably turn the pseudo “hot water” channel on or off to fire the boiler and that channel is your central heating.
Managing the genuine CH channels without a temperature source would I think be impossible. Another circumvention would be to use an iTRV which is not actually connected to a radiator as the thermostat. A iTRV is half the cost of a roomstat unless you can find some of those French roomstats that are less expensive. The automation can then turn the iTRV up or down which will then fire the boiler for the channel to which the room is linked.
I don’t think so. I’m fairly sure you can only have one hot water schedule. As such, you may want to consider a slightly different approach and use the services wiser.get_schedule and wiser.set_schedule to save the schedule to file and then load it from the file to modify the hot water schedule when going into “On Holiday” mode and return it to normal when coming out of it.
Did anyone else get the email survey from Drayton asking questions about smart homes and potentially trialing new products yesterday?
The questions seemed to be related to the extra features that are in the Gen 2 hub that’s not available in the UK yet. I’m hoping this might mean it’s on it’s way and we can use the headless temperature sensors.
Yes I got it and responded to it.
If it was setting the scene for a Gen2 Hub then that would be welcome.
However some of the questions seemed to me to be about functions we already have using HA, it felt like Drayton is pondering creating a new smart home ecosystem. Which I personally don’t need.
Especially as they were phishing for responses to a subscription model.
Doesn’t the Gen 2 Hub already support all of those functions they were asking about though? Things like blinds etc.
I gave that a try. It works, but I had a few issues using wiser.set_schedule.
If I try to use wiser.set_schedule with a smart plug that doesn’t have a schedule already assigned, it doesn’t seem to do anything. If the device has a schedule assigned, then the changes are applied except the Name for the schedule in the yaml is ignored - the old schedule name remains.
It seems that set_schedule can’t be used to create a new schedule, only edit one that already exists. This was pretty confusing, and perhaps I haven’t understood it quite right still.
Taking a different approach: if your concern is managing legionella then, at least in winter, if you are away for a while then your best bet might be to just let the “hot” tank cool down to below 20C and stay there. If you keep boosting it somewhat then you risk just warming the water up to the range where legionella can thrive - you need a sustained period over 60C to kill it.
https://www.hse.gov.uk/healthservices/legionella.htm
Granted that stopping pipes freezing is a different issue, but for that a quick burst on a heating circuit might be enough. Summer time is a different matter again, of course.
1 Like
Cheers for the replies. Currently I have an esp32 hooked up to a set of 3 electronic relays ( upstairs, downstairs and hot water tank). I have bluetooth battery based thermostats which i’m able to compile the firmware for and have full control over and this works perfectly. However I was looking for something more professionally manufactured to operate the actual boiler and i was hoping the wiser could have done this for me. Not really too fond of buying new thermostats as it would be a step backwards IMO. There just doesn’t seem to be something on the market that is easy to control and uses a universal backplate for a boiler. Thanks for your replies.
This article states that 60°C for half an hour kills all legionella in the tank.
It also goes into some detail about the risk that makes me question why I would bother with a special summer holiday schedule over just turning the heating off, then enabling my normal schedule when I am on my way home.
Nothing I do with my heating system will kill any legionella in my shower heads anyway…
In winter I need to avoid freezing and mould.
Yes, I did the survey because they promised to send a 30% discount code as a reward. No code has arrived so far. Did you get one?
I got a discount code but its not worth much when I can buy room stats etc for less then on the SE shop even with the 30% off.
Yes, I received it. It’s a generic code [SURVEY30%] for the Schneider Electric Online Shop. However, as @DavidHT says, it’s not really that useful, as you can buy most of the products cheaper elsewhere anyway even with the 30% discount.
1 Like
Thank you for that. The discount code brings the price of the Wiser plugs down from £42/each to £29.40/each including delivery. I haven’t seen them cheaper than that elsewhere recently.
According to CamelCamelCamel the lowest price Amazon has offered them for is £20.99 back in 2019, and since then they haven’t often been on sale often for less than £40. So seems like a good opportunity to buy network extenders. They do also monitor power use through them so Insights+ and Home Assistant can tell you how much the connected devices cost to run.