On Nov 15, 10:36*am, Harry K wrote:
On Nov 15, 2:50*am, ransley wrote:

On Nov 13, 7:04*pm, Mikepier wrote:

Put it in an apartment in a locked box.-

Thats something I wanted to avoid.
If it was a tenant I could trust and who was knowledgeable about
heating and maintenance, then maybe.

I cant put one in the hallway, its not well heated. I cant trust
tenants either but *have one that it works. Years ago I bought a
thermostat with a remote *sensor and did not tell the tenant they had
the thermostat and that worked. Best is one that averages several
apartments with remote sensors

How about isntalling thermostates in each apartment that aren't
connected to anything? *Gives teh tenants a thrill thinkng they are in
control *I have often thought of doing that in my house to cut down
on some of the "disagreements".

Harry K


Because WHEN, not IF the tenant's eventually figure out who to
complain to in the government (in my area it is the local board
of health) and an inspector comes out to check on the situation
and your fake thermostats and the psychological manipulation
of the tenants resulting from their installation will likely serve to
increase whatever fines and penalties result from the units
which are not maintaining the required temperatures deemed
necessary by the AHJ in the minimum standards for human
habitation...

Installing fake/false/dummy thermostats is a giant red flag
which says "i am a giant douche and rather than fix the
actual problem i am going to install a shiny toy on your
wall and make you think that you have some control over
your environment when in fact you do not"...

Either modernize the central heating system in your old
apartment building with a new control system which
allows you to have temperature sensors in all of the units
but allows you to retain control of the set points as the
landlord -- OR dump your old system and install electric
baseboard heating in all your units and let the tenants
pay to heat their rooms to whatever temperature they
desire...

Having a whole building heated off ONE thermostat
is insane... It DOESN'T account for the temperature
changes outside like a weather responsive controller
would NOR does it account for the fact that one side
of the building will be cooler than the other depending
on which way the wind is blowing...

You could covert your old single pipe steam system
into a hot water zoned system where each radiator
is it's own zone and could therefore have its own
thermostat in that room/space using a new controller
and some Pex piping...

Whichever way you choose to resolve this situation,
I would choose one soon and deal with it in a significant
way because the tenants can have you over a barrel
if they complain enough to the local AHJ which could
impose fines on you for your substandard system and
demand that you bring the system up to current codes
in a very rapid period of time in order for you to keep
collecting rent on what are essentially un-rentable units
because your heating system does not properly maintain
the temperatures in the habitable areas of the building...

Look at this symptom as an opportunity to invest in
your property and upgrade the heating system to be
more efficient... You choosing one setting where the
heating system maintains that temperature for one
area of the building where people are not living and
sleeping will definitely get you into trouble eventually...

~~ Evan