alex_sh@w wrote in message
...
All of the central heating controllers I have seen are programmable
over 7 days but I could do with one with a 28 day programmer to suit
my shift pattern. Any ideas please?

If your shift pattern consists of 7 day chunks repeating over 28 days (as
opposed to 3 days here, 5 days there etc) then you could consider the quite
costly option of having two timers that you swap at the weekend one
programmed for one type of 7 days and one for another. As long as you choose
a type thats easy to unplug from the backplate (which I think is most of
them) then the you should have no problem.

"John W" wrote in message
...

alex_sh@w wrote in message
...
All of the central heating controllers I have seen are programmable
over 7 days but I could do with one with a 28 day programmer to suit
my shift pattern. Any ideas please?

If your shift pattern consists of 7 day chunks repeating over 28 days (as
opposed to 3 days here, 5 days there etc) then you could consider the
quite
costly option of having two timers that you swap at the weekend one
programmed for one type of 7 days and one for another. As long as you
choose
a type thats easy to unplug from the backplate (which I think is most of
them) then the you should have no problem.


That *sounds* ok - except most of them run on batteries which are kept
charged by being connected to the mains via the backplate. The battery will
maintain the memory contents for a limited period when removed from the
mains. This period may not be long enough!

[Having said that, I've just looked at the spec of my Danfoss Set5
programmer - and that claims to hold the time of day and programmed on/off
times for 16 days when disconnected from the mains - so you may be ok].

Roger

On Fri, 26 Sep 2003 17:23:10 UTC, alex_sh@w wrote:

I have considered 4 x 7 day timers in parallel with appropriate
switching that would not be difficult but its expensive and not a very
elegant solution

Funny, I was thinking about this kind of problem and was going to post
to the NG tonight in any case...then this thread came up...

We occupy the house at irregular (but predictable) times each day. I
wondered if one can get any kind of box that plugs in, in place of a
normal CH controller, that allows one to program a 'calendar' of times
via a PC...indefinitely into the future. Clearly one needs a manual
override and failsafe, but the savings are potentially a lot greater
than the cost of leaving a PC on (especially if it's going to be on
anyway...)

--
Bob Eager
rde at tavi.co.uk
PC Server 325*4; PS/2s 9585, 8595, 9595*2, 8580*3,
P70...

In uk.d-i-y, Bob Eager wrote:

We occupy the house at irregular (but predictable) times each day. I
wondered if one can get any kind of box that plugs in, in place of a
normal CH controller, that allows one to program a 'calendar' of times
via a PC...indefinitely into the future. Clearly one needs a manual
override and failsafe, but the savings are potentially a lot greater
than the cost of leaving a PC on (especially if it's going to be on
anyway...)

Two places to start suggest themselves to me. One is to look at X.10 home
automation controllers: I'm pretty sure the range of stuff includes the
kind of donwloadable programmer/sequencer you suggest. The other is the
user-friendly version of programmable logic controllers, like the
Mitsubishi Alpha and the Siemens Logo! (yup, the bang is part of the name ;-)
which cost about 80quid and have calendar functions as well as all the
ANDs, ORs, timed-delay, and other automation building blocks you could
want for a small setup - allowing you to program your very own flavours
of control suited to you particular "predictable" patterns. See rswww.com
for (full) prices, or the suppliers websites for detailed downloadable
programming manuals.

HTH, Stefek

Bob Eager wrote:
On Fri, 26 Sep 2003 17:23:10 UTC, alex_sh@w wrote:

I have considered 4 x 7 day timers in parallel with appropriate
switching that would not be difficult but its expensive and not a
very elegant solution

Funny, I was thinking about this kind of problem and was going to post
to the NG tonight in any case...then this thread came up...

We occupy the house at irregular (but predictable) times each day. I
wondered if one can get any kind of box that plugs in, in place of a
normal CH controller, that allows one to program a 'calendar' of times
via a PC...indefinitely into the future. Clearly one needs a manual
override and failsafe, but the savings are potentially a lot greater
than the cost of leaving a PC on (especially if it's going to be on
anyway...)

From an earlier reply to the spookily similar thread Thermostat Control

Say really want to go the whole hog and have a fully programmable heating
system you could change your current heating controls to the Honeywell
smartfit system, then connect these via this interface
http://www.home-control.co.uk/produc...d=60&osCsid=44
connected to the Comfort home control system. This will give you the control
you seek plus the option to override programs by phone or optional web
interface. (check this - quite cool really
http://www.home-control.co.uk/images....jpg?osCsid=44 )
If you are really curious, it will phone you up if it gets frosty. The
interface is about £160, the Smartfit around £125, and the complete system
should leave change from £1k.

Toby.

wrote:
In uk.d-i-y, Bob Eager wrote:

We occupy the house at irregular (but predictable) times each day. I
wondered if one can get any kind of box that plugs in, in place of a
normal CH controller, that allows one to program a 'calendar' of
times via a PC...indefinitely into the future. Clearly one needs a
manual override and failsafe, but the savings are potentially a lot
greater than the cost of leaving a PC on (especially if it's going
to be on anyway...)

Two places to start suggest themselves to me. One is to look at X.10
home automation controllers: I'm pretty sure the range of stuff
includes the
kind of donwloadable programmer/sequencer you suggest. The other is
the user-friendly version of programmable logic controllers, like the
Mitsubishi Alpha and the Siemens Logo! (yup, the bang is part of the
name ;-) which cost about 80quid and have calendar functions as well
as all the
ANDs, ORs, timed-delay, and other automation building blocks you could
want for a small setup - allowing you to program your very own
flavours
of control suited to you particular "predictable" patterns. See
rswww.com for (full) prices, or the suppliers websites for detailed
downloadable programming manuals.

Presumably X10 can be set up with an incoming phone line and a programmable
thermostat so you could knock off early one day and still come home to a
toasty warm home and a tank full of hot water for the bath, I think I'll
have to look at this a bit more.

--
James...
http://www.jameshart.co.uk/

On Fri, 26 Sep 2003 19:00:13 UTC, wrote:

In uk.d-i-y, Bob Eager wrote:

We occupy the house at irregular (but predictable) times each day. I
wondered if one can get any kind of box that plugs in, in place of a
normal CH controller, that allows one to program a 'calendar' of times
via a PC...indefinitely into the future. Clearly one needs a manual
override and failsafe, but the savings are potentially a lot greater
than the cost of leaving a PC on (especially if it's going to be on
anyway...)

Two places to start suggest themselves to me. One is to look at X.10 home
automation controllers: I'm pretty sure the range of stuff includes the
kind of donwloadable programmer/sequencer you suggest. The other is the
user-friendly version of programmable logic controllers, like the
Mitsubishi Alpha and the Siemens Logo! (yup, the bang is part of the name ;-)
which cost about 80quid and have calendar functions as well as all the
ANDs, ORs, timed-delay, and other automation building blocks you could
want for a small setup - allowing you to program your very own flavours
of control suited to you particular "predictable" patterns. See rswww.com
for (full) prices, or the suppliers websites for detailed downloadable
programming manuals.

Thanks - I thought of X10 but understood that it's not so satisfactory
this side of the 'pond'. But I'll look around...


--
Bob Eager
rde at tavi.co.uk
PC Server 325*4; PS/2s 9585, 8595, 9595*2, 8580*3,
P70...

On Fri, 26 Sep 2003 19:48:13 UTC, "Toby"
wrote:

From an earlier reply to the spookily similar thread Thermostat Control

Thanks...must have missed that on a day when I was speed reading the NG!


--
Bob Eager
rde at tavi.co.uk
PC Server 325*4; PS/2s 9585, 8595, 9595*2, 8580*3,
P70...

"Roger Mills" wrote in message ...
"John W" wrote in message
...

alex_sh@w wrote in message
...
All of the central heating controllers I have seen are programmable
over 7 days but I could do with one with a 28 day programmer to suit
my shift pattern. Any ideas please?

If your shift pattern consists of 7 day chunks repeating over 28 days (as
opposed to 3 days here, 5 days there etc) then you could consider the
quite
costly option of having two timers that you swap at the weekend one
programmed for one type of 7 days and one for another. As long as you
choose
a type thats easy to unplug from the backplate (which I think is most of
them) then the you should have no problem.


That *sounds* ok - except most of them run on batteries which are kept
charged by being connected to the mains via the backplate. The battery will
maintain the memory contents for a limited period when removed from the
mains. This period may not be long enough!

So he could hang on to the backplate which comes with the second
timer, and install it as a 'dummy' alongside the 'real' timer so that
the second backplate also receives power, but doesn't do any
controlling - that way he just swaps the timers over as needed, and
both receive power 24/7.

David

alex_sh@w wrote:

All of the central heating controllers I have seen are programmable
over 7 days but I could do with one with a 28 day programmer to suit
my shift pattern. Any ideas please?

Alex.


Hi Alex

What sort of shift pattern are you trying to accomodate, and are you
looking to control HW and CH?

If you work one of 3 shifts for a few days, then move to the next (days,
afters, nights type pattern) then you might be able to make something
workable using just a single 3-channel programmer. Horstmann do one, and
maybe others. Honeywell didn't last time I looked.

Use channel 1 for days, channel 2 for afters and channel 3 for nights.
When you're on days manually turn off channels 2 and 3, and turn channel
1 on. Then do similar for the other shifts.

There are other variants on this theme where you might use channel 1 for
'middle of the day' and 2 and 3 for morning and evening, say. You might
then leave channel 1 on all the time, and simply turn 2 and 3 on at the
right time depending on whether you're in the house in the am or evening.

You should be OK commoning up the three outputs, since although this
will present 240V to the 'off' channels this shouldn't be a problem
electrically for the components.

You could then drive just the CH from the output and control HW via
different means, or drive both HW and CH from the output. In the latter
case you'd want an additional switch (a light switch would be fine) in
the line from the contoller to the CH part of your circuit so you can
turn it off in summer.

I realise that isn't as automated as you might like, but it might just
get the job done. Let us know if you have other things that need to be
taken into consideration to make something workable for you.

HTH
IanC

PS: Sorry if anyone sees this teo or three times. I seem to be having
posting trouble.



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