sonic30101 Posted January 26, 2017 Share Posted January 26, 2017 Not exactly pushing the envelope, but I have a friend that likes my C4 system and wants to put one in at his vacation house and asked me a weird question that I wasn't sure what to tell him. Since he wont be there full time. He wants to be able to integrate the water heater for energy saving purposes. So is there anything that you guys know about that will let c4 interface with it? If so: 1- would there be 2 way feedback 2- if not is there a solution just to be able to use relay contacts for away/home mode to trigger the thermostat in the water heater to switch to different temp set points Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
turls Posted January 31, 2017 Share Posted January 31, 2017 Look at options from GE that are compatible with IFTTT, which means with Chowmain's driver it can be integrated with C4. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alanchow Posted February 1, 2017 Share Posted February 1, 2017 We did something with relays and temperature sensors to integrate this for an energy trial in New Zealand. Worked well. We had time of day conservation, holiday mode and also boost on high PV generation. You also need to make sure that the relays you use are fail close in case of communications failure. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sonic30101 Posted February 1, 2017 Author Share Posted February 1, 2017 Thanks, I was hoping there would be a slick interface to use like software style thermostats with the zigbee card access temp sensor and a relay output like either the https://www.houselogix.com/shop/generic-thermostat-driver or https://www.houselogix.com/shop/software-thermostat and be able to throttle the high voltage contactors powering the heating element based on the setpoint but since they are in celsius only and more importantly cap out at 30 degrees since they were not designed to be for a water heater. Would probably end up going a custom button style approach like this. Still playing with the programing to make sure it is closed loop on my system but it should work with a 4-6 hour timer added that upon expiring it turns the element back on to force a degree change in case the programing in the image gets off for some reason, then stops/resets/then restarts the timer Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VINCELdUB Posted February 1, 2017 Share Posted February 1, 2017 Thanks, I was hoping there would be a slick interface to use like software style thermostats with the zigbee card access temp sensor and a relay output like either the https://www.houselogix.com/shop/generic-thermostat-driver or https://www.houselogix.com/shop/software-thermostat and be able to throttle the high voltage contactors powering the heating element based on the setpoint but since they are in celsius only and more importantly cap out at 30 degrees since they were not designed to be for a water heater. Would probably end up going a custom button style approach like this. Still playing with the programing to make sure it is closed loop on my system but it should work with a 4-6 hour timer added that upon expiring it turns the element back on to force a degree change in case the programing in the image gets off for some reason, then stops/resets/then restarts the timer There is definitely a way to accomplish this. I will reply back later with that work around. Happy Automating! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zaphod Posted February 2, 2017 Share Posted February 2, 2017 I have a small 120V water heater in my pool cabana that plugs into a regular household socket. But the outlet switches can't handle the load of this type of device so I used a CardAccess unit to flip a relay. The CardAccess unit died recently so I replaced it with an old HC-300 that I got an ebay for a good price. So that can do a very simple on/off but that is not as sophisticated as what you are looking for. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bsanf3 Posted April 11, 2017 Share Posted April 11, 2017 I use the CardAccess Heavy Duty Relay on my water heater, I hadn't thought of doing tempature control too. Card Access InHome Heavy-Duty Power Controller Installation (PDF) Card Access InHome Heavy-Duty Power Controller Quick Start and Installation Guide (PDF) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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