I replaced my Honeywell Chronotherm III with a GoControl Z-wave thermostat (model: TBZ48). I installed the GoControl with the C-wire, so no batteries, the thermostat works very nicely, was hoping the Z-wave will too, but I was in for some surprises:
When I tried to add the device using the SmartThings app (new version) I found that GoControl is not a brand listed under the supported thermostats
Based on tip from this forum I selected Brand: Honeywell then “Z-wave thermostat” and it paired painlessly (following the pairing instructions on the thermostat from GoControl). After pairing the thermostat tile in the SmartThings app was in “Checking Status” for several minutes, after which the tile promisingly showed the current temp in Fahrenheit however the both the heat and cool setpoints showed zero and used Celsius (see image below). The fan and mode controls worked, however there was no way to set the temp, I tried changing the setting on the physical thermostat to Celsius and tried to update the setpoint from the zero value – but the app shows a “Network error” – my guess is that the thermostat was rejecting the setpoint request.
That screenshot above was taken this morning. This afternoon I opened the SmartThings app, and to my surprise the setpoints had changed to Fahrenheit and were correctly displaying the setpoints on the thermostat, and I was able to change them! Since the picture, I had put the thermostat in Celsius mode again, and changed the temp a few times, and after a few hours changed it back to Fahrenheit mode, I don’t know if this caused the thermostat to send a Celsius to Fahrenheit mode change to the hub/SmartThings app.
Has anyone else had similar experiences? Or were able to get your GoControl TBZ48 to work with the SmartThings app (not classic) with no issue?
Also, if you have in-depth knowledge of what may have caused what I observed, please share.
After I wrote this post I decided to run a little experiment I removed the thermostat from the hub and added it back to see if I can reproduce the problem, and sure enough the set points went back to zero degrees Celsius and were unusable. Next I tested my hunch by changing the temperature for cool using the thermostat buttons and after a few changes on the thermostat the smart things app got an update with the correct set point and also switched to Fahrenheit! The same process to fix the heating set point. I’m really glad that I now know what fixed it last time, which means I can keep this thermostat because now I can control it completely. I bought this thermostat a little reluctantly because of its rather non-fancy looks, however I’m noticing it’s really good at maintaining the temperature in the room, and I like that it doesn’t support any programming whatsoever the thermostat itself which I would have found redundant since I wanted to do it using the hub.
RBoy
(www.rboyapps.com - Making SmartThings Easy!)
#3
It sounds more like a pairing issue, you may want to reset the thermostat and pair again. Sometimes rebooting the hub also helps. Using the C-Wire is a great idea because it also puts the thermostat into active repeating mode instead of using sleepy mode. It also helps to do a Z-Wave repair after pairing the thermostat do it can optimize it’s mesh routes and make it more responsive.
As for programming the thermostat, you need SmartApps which will do that for you (device handlers only allow SmartThings to communicate with the device itself and configure the features).
There are examples of various apps which can do an wide range of things with your thermostat including using remote temperature sensors, using motion sensors to control the thermostat, creating schedule based on modes or times and much more:
