According to the JJ driver, there are some params that don’t get reset when you factory reset the device. Maybe I have one of those stuck on. Afaik mine has never reported on threshold only.
It’s a rather moot point at this point. I tested the fibaro out with my beam sensor and it works perfectly, so that’s where I’m going to use this device. I’m going to put the qbino on the hot water loop.
Thanks for the write-up. A great discussion here.
I’m a bit confused about the use of the temperature sensor. I understand that it is to test whether or not re-circulation is needed, but what do you practically lose without it?
In my situation, my plumbing is run in an unconditioned crawl space. Even in the summer, I still need to run the hot water some to get it up to temp, so I’m thinking that I’d always want the pump to run when conditionally triggered.
So I am wondering the benefits of integrating the temperature sensor for the few occasions that temperature at the tap would be above the set parameter.
Am I missing something?
Thanks!
yes and to change the set point I have to edit it and remove the qbino and then re add it (maybe zwave tweaker could do as well) but I agree 0.5 is good enough 0.1 would not help that much.
also found this on the qbino site
Parameter no. 120 – Digital temperature sensor reporting
If digital temperature sensor is connected, device reports measured temperature on temperature change defined by this parameter.
Available configuration parameters (data type is 1 Byte DEC):
default value 5 = 0.5 °C
0 – Reporting disabled
1- 127 = 0.1 °C – 12.7 °C, step is 0.1 °C
So it definitely only reporting whenever a 0.5 temperature occurs
@Bry if you have a dedicated hot water return line and a check valve to ensure the hot water does not enter the cold water line then it is not as important but could still be used to conserve power if the line is already heated no reason to continue to run the pump. As it only takes about 25 seconds (depending on how big your house is) to fill the line with hot water.
In my case I could not install a dedicate hot water return line without ripping my whole house apart. I had to connect the hot and cold water line together at the farthest point with a ball valve to return the cold water (in the hot water line) back down the cold water line (reversing the cold water) until hot water (in the hot water line) reaches my farthest hot water tap. (the water in the hot water line and cold water line equalizes so pushing water from the hot water line into the cold water line will not matter )
Timing it I can get very close but if I leave the room and someone else comes in shortly after it would push hot water into my cold water line so when they turned on the cold water tap they would get hot water for a little bit.
Now with a temperature sensor it has a rule not to run the pump or open my transfer valve if the temperature is above a set point.
If the temperature sensor is in the line measuring water temp instead of relying on a set time for the pump to run you can have the pump and valve turn off once a set temperature is reached.
the only thing I have not found north of the wall (Canada) is the stainless barb Amazon.com says it ships to Canada but will not at check out.
Did you use them with pex tubing? maybe just the normal copper pex barb will be fine.
Google search does not show an issue with corrosion between copper and stainless.
Also found a pvc one for cheap pvc fitting
Did I use them with pex? Well that’s the plan, but I haven’t installed yet.
I agree that bi-metallic corrosion between copper and stainless shouldn’t be much of a worry. I have a similar joint between the copper line from my air-separator and the union to the bacoeng pump.
I’m curious how you hooked up your bacoeng pump? Did you use a union? I have a stainless union on mine and the damn thing drips… like one drip a day, not the copper to stainless joint, but the union joint itself. There’s always a little quarter sized (loonie sized?) puddle under it. Not so bad that I can’t live with it, nothing’s going to get damaged by it, but it’s annoying.
Stainless seems more difficult to make leakproof, this could be because its harder than copper, or perhaps it’s not a stainless problem at all- just sloppy machining from bacoeng. Also I suppose the expansion/contraction cycle that the union sees as the return loop heats and cools might have something to do with it.
I’m debating if I should try to fix it or live with it. I had a notoriously difficult time cinching up the bacoeng pump and the amazon reviews indicate that others did as well. I’m loath to touch it.
@Bry my case is a bit different from NoWon’s.
I do have a dedicated return line. I also have a tankless.
The big difference with that is that when the recirc pump runs, my hot water heater actually fires, it’s not simply recirculating back to a tank. So from the point of view of both efficiency and equipment wear, it’s more important to minimize the pump run time with a tankless.
Right now I don’t have a temp sensor installed, and I’m doing all of the pump control with timers in webcore. This works… ok, but it’s not quite as efficient as using the temp sensor.
For example, I have my piston setup to run the pump only on motion events, and never at less than a 15m interval. I also have the pump set to run for 30 seconds. 15m is a pretty good approximation of how long it takes the water in my supply line to cool, and 30 seconds is a decent approximation of how long it takes to get hot water to my furthest fixture, but neither are quite as accurate as with a temp sensor.
You shouldn’t have too much trouble running the pump on motion events. It may be slightly less efficient is all, especially if the pipes are in an unconditioned space. That heat is lost, whereas the heat “lost” from pipes in a conditioned space actually helps heat the house, so its kind of zero sum.
The one thing to be careful with is running the pump continuously forever. I’ve read some horror stories about installs that were setup this way. 10 years down the road and the pipes are wearing through, so be careful not to do that.
@Bryan,
A temperature sensor just figures in to the conditions used to determine whether hot water is (not) needed. Think of it like the thermostat in your HVAC system.
In addition to the temperature of the water at the place(s) of need, you might also use sensors to imply the desire (presence sensors, light switches, flow meters) or demand it with a dedicated switch. What you do when the conditions of need are expressed (or not) depends on your system (turn on/off pump, open/close valve).
In my system, turning on my pump will have no effect if a temperature sensitive return valve is not opened so I use a temperature sensor to imply that.
As far as that pvc fitting goes. That would work, and there’s nothing wrong with plastic fittings.
I’m my area, all the pros use Uponor style pex. It’s the kind where the tubing is pex-A and you expand it with a mechanical expander, then insert the fitting and the tube shrinks back down around it. All of those fittings are plastic. When I plumbed my place I assumed the metal fittings where better, but it turns out that this isn’t necessarily the case. Google pex and “dezincification” some time. It sounds like that problem was due to a manufacturing defect that was hopefully solved by the time I did my place, but its not a worry at all with plastic parts.
no union just a 3/4" pex adapter on each end.
no leaks/drips that would drive me crazy.
I didn’t install a tankless water heater as my old style tank heater is only 5 years old and they wanted $5,000 to install a tankless heater (heater was under $2,000 and $3,000 installation) total rip off. They are easy to install just hooking up the gas you need a licence. When my tank gets a little older I will replace it with the tankless.
I did mine just before Christmas. My old tank was a 14 yr old electric and one of the elements kept burning out. Also I have plans for my basement, and have been working towards moving all of the mechanicals out of there for a couple of years now, and the hot water heater was the final piece.
It’s temperate enough where I’m at that I could do an external tankless mounted on the back of the house, so that was what I chose. The water heater was $899 online, plus I paid a buddy about $1800 to help me install it, including replumbing the whole house for both water and gas. We tore out all the old piping that hung below the basement ceiling- both galvanized water and black iron gas pipe- and replaced with pex and CSST routed in the joist bays and crawl space. Now I can put a new ceiling in the basement without pipes hanging beneath it.
We were probably not supposed to do the gas work ourselves but what the city doesn’t know won’t hurt them. I read all the codes and I’m confidant everything is compliant. I’ll probably go ahead and get the job permitted and inspected this summer. I didn’t do it at the time because I didn’t want to get red tagged over something and have no heat for christmas. I pressure tested the gas lines, so I know there are no leaks, and everything is bonded to ground as per code.
Heh. I guess I’m still kind of proud of this job so I want to tell everybody about it. It still makes me happy every time I take a shower!
I understand now. Thanks for clarifying. In my case I’m going to run a return line, particularly now that I understand about the implications of the crossover valve and the end of the run.
what DH are you using for the qbino? Ah… nevermind.
Here’s the pinout for the qbino:
This coupled with the brewpi pinout for a standard pots jack:
Black - unused
Red - 5v
Green - GND
Yellow - Data
means
qbino black -> pots green
yellow -> yellow
red -> red
Seems to be working great!
thanks I hadn’t sat down and figured out the qbino ts pinout yet still waiting on my brewpi sensor to arrive.
I actually just used this device handler found at The smartest house website where I bought the qbino. But that one is likely the same.
interesting. That’s a different DH entirely. A few months newer than what I’m using. The erocm123 DH above reports in fahrenheit, which I thought I remembered you saying your qbino didn’t do.
Maycock seems to be using the ST “composite device” DH model, which he explains at this link:
Dunno which one is better. I just realized however that I can use this device as both a temp probe and a switch. I have a little 2Gal electric hotwater heater as a buffer in my hotwater line that’s right at the location of the temp sensor. I’m using a ge-zwave switch to control it right now but i think I can do both jobs with the single qbino device and use the GE switch elsewhere. So, the qbino has paid for itself already!
yes mine is reporting in Celsius I played with erocm123 DH but I am running my setup on my Hubitat and I was not able to convert his DH to work I think due to his using child devices but I have not spent much time with it.
Is the hubitat ST DH cross compatible? Is it faster to respond that ST?
you have to make a minor name change mod in the code to most DH to make them work with Hubitat.
it does not like DH that uses child devices but they are working on fixing that.
As all custom code is run locally it is faster.
In Hubitat the only things that use the cloud is stuff like Alexa, Ring doorbells, Sonos or networking to the SmartThings hub
Hubitat when first pairing a device does not see devices as fast as SmartThings (it might take an extra 30 sec - minute) but they do pair.
SmartThings is more polished but with running all the custom code and my presence sensors on the cloud vs locally made me add the Hubitat.
SmartThings was also limited to 32 zigbee devices and I was already past my limit where as Hubitat does not appear to be limited to 32 zigbee devices.
Is there a rules engine for it? How do you program it? I’m pretty deep into webcore is there anything like that?
it has an app called rule machine which was on SmartThings a year or 2 ago but the developer pulled it and is part of the Hubitat group now.
Rule Machine is more basic than webcore not as many options but basically the same
Others have converted Webcore for Hubitat but I have not tired it i think there are still a few bugs in it.
I am just moving everything I can run locally over like my locks, garage doors, alarms, lights and presence sensors and then run cloud based devices like my Sonos, doorbells and nest off SmartThings.
One thing Hubitat still does not have is a remote app you have to be connected (wifi or hard wired) locally to the same router the Hubitat hub is connected to. So you have to view/control it from home, although you should be able to remote in to your home computer to view/control the hub and it’s devices if you home computer is on. I just have not gotten around to setting that up.
You can see most devices in the Smartthings app when you network Hubitat with SmartThings they show up as virtual devices in SmartThings. That requies a community created app
Hubitat is working on an official remote android/ios app and a direct connection app to SmartThings but neither has been released yet.