Hi,
Are there any hardware (zigbee, matter, zwave, network, or USB) devices that connect to HaOS server and control the furnace for heat, cold, and humidifier?
With HaOS and a tablet I don’t see a need for a Nest or other full fledged thermostat with a screen. A local device should be able to attach the dry contacts easily I assume or are the furnace contacts digital signals?
Any devices recommended? (at better price than Nest etc…)
Thanks.
That would depend on your furnace model I guess. However, all you really need are 3 things:
Thanks @ShadowFist.
Is there a low price unit that is used for this purpose usually (including a temp sensor or without)? The furnace I have I think supplies 12v or 24v to Nest currently. I want to get rid of Nest.
I understand it might be better to put sensors all over the house to get reading from different rooms rather than having the temp sensor built into the relay. Is that a better idea?
Also, what temp sensor is available there for matter (preferred), wifi (2nd preferred), or zigbee that I can use? I assume these will be very small cheap devices.
P.S. Is there a safety or feature disadvanage to using a relay/temp sensor vs a full fledged thermostat like Nest? (other than having an LCD screen).
Thanks.
The relay & temperature sensors are two separate devices.
There is no specific all in one unit I can recommend, from both a price and safety aspect. The beauty of HA & generic thermostat is you can choose any relay (with or without safety features) and any temp sensor (with or without a screen).
Just pick whichever ones you like after reading some reviews. They don’t even have to be both using the same protocol. HA will happily handle eg. a WiFi relay with a matter temp sensor & combine both as a single generic thermostat.
Hi, yes understood they are different hardware.
What sort of safety features to look for in a relay for furnace turn ON and shut off purpose so I look for a good device?
Are there any safety built into full fledged thermostats? maybe turn OFF heat when it is 50 degrees Celsius or that is not a requirement of code usually? I am thinking maybe an ESP32 that can act on it’s own as well to shut off the furnace even if Wifi is not working for some reason and gas is detected or smoke / fire…
Any recommended hardware for that or ESP32 would be the best?
Also, a relay that has a manual switch would be nice in case HA fails and heat stays ON or off that the switch can control it.
I’m looking forward to the Honeywell X2S. Supposedly it will be cheap ($80) and will have matter support, so it should allow for complete local control via HA.
Why would that be better than a relay and temp sensors in many places? Also, takes space on wall where a nice tablet can go with more features on it. No?
Hi @ShadowFist is fan controlled by furnace or needs a relay and a method to be turned ON and OFF when needed?
Also, how about humidifier?
Heat, cold, fan, humidifier = 4 channel relay needed?
Sorry mate, I don’t own a furnace. I suggest you look at the manual for your own furnace to confirm.
Yes, you will need a relay for each separately controlled device. Doesn’t have to be a 4 channel relay - if these are separate devices in different rooms, then it would make sense to have separate relays next to each device. If they are a single device, then yes - a 4 channel relay would make more sense.
Note that you will need a separate Generic Thermostat entity for each device type.
From the docs:
“One Generic Thermostat entity can only control one switch. If you need to activate two switches, one for a heater and one for an air conditioner, you will need two Generic Thermostat entities”
I wouldn’t leave any of my critical system to be coordinated/enabled by some DIY things I made.
Personally I prefer pourpose built controls for that, these should be integrable with HA to be made “smart” but the day-to-day operations should run even if I made a mess with HA (it’s sufficient a poorly planned upgrade…)
As already noted you should post here some details of your setup (and btw your geographical region, like US, EU…as there are different standards).
It’s not uncommon that heating equipment have their own bus protocol over 2 wires that are not a simple dry contact. The Nest, with it’s own powerhouse development can take that into account and adapt to different HVAC systems, not so simple with other HW or, for that matter, by a DIY solution
The generic thermostat has an attribute that switches state when cooling is called for. hvac_action is the one to look for. It will be one of three states: heating, cooling, or idle (there are a few more*, but not needed for basic HVAC control).
I had been using the generic thermostat to switch an old boiler on/off with a modbus relay - No reason that it couldn’t use an ESP based relay module, for example: AC220V power supply ESP32 wifi Bluetooth dual relay module_chinalctech