Re: Recommendation needed: Monitor vacation home, detect outages

["sprgns" <sundancekid@xxxxxxxxxx>]

It wouldn't necessarily be cheap but HAI (www.homeauto.com) makes home
automation systems that you can call that can tell you what the status of
the power is, temperatures (indoor, or outdoor) humidity, HVAC (if you use
thier thermostats) and any other things that can be monitored by a simple
contact closure.  You could also have it log power outages, or call you when
the power is out.


"Crewzer" <crew327@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:c6Wdnb8RZvP5bJXeRVn-jQ@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> We recently purchased a vacation home.  It's in a fairly rural area.  In
> spite of the best efforts of the local utilities, from time to time we
> lose power, and telephone service is, well, not exactly "first world"
> calibre. There is no cable, dsl, or even cell phone service available.
>
> I'm looking for two sets of advice.  First, when the power goes out for
> some time, the stuff in the fridge could go bad.  Then the power comes
> back on, and cools every thing off.  We come back, are unaware the power
> has been off long enough to harm food, and either take a chance on
> poisoning ourselves or we toss out perfectly good stuff.  There must be a
> better way.  Does anyone know of an instrument that can tell us how long
> the power has been out? Using an old fashioned mechanical electric clock
> helps, but doesn't go past 12 hours and doesn't tell us how long the
> longest outage was.
>
> Second - any ideas for inexpensively monitoring the property?  It might be
> nice to know the status of the HVAC, water pumps (run and temperature in
> pump house), inside temperature, and maybe even an inside camera.  It
> would all have to be done over a very slow phone line.
>
> I'm just starting to think about this.  Clueless how to set up and hook
> up. Are there any references one can read?
>
> thanks
>