Re: X10 Controller Question

["Robert Green" <ROBERT_GREEN1963@xxxxxxxxx>]

"Brian Staff" <brianstaffRemoveMe@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:CFDUh.182392$JN6.136225@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> The hot water re-circulating pump is outside (we live Phoenix, AZ)...

Ah, in the middle of the new dustbowl, or so the nightly news would have us
believe!

> of our
> master bedroom, in the water closet only accessible from outside.. The
pump
> is currently on a timer to come on in the mornings for showers an again in
> the evenings. However, if we want to take a shower in non-normal times,
then
> we either wait for the hot water to arrive at the shower head...which is a
> long time when you're standing naked....waiting<g> or we step outside and
> manually hit the timer ON. Sometimes we get undressed and then realize the
> pump may not be on...my wife frowns on this procedure of having to go
> outside to turn on/off the pump.

OK.  That's a lot more information.  Clearly you want a way to remotely turn
that pump on when you're covered with dust and need to take a shower in the
middle of the day, outside of the normal hot water schedule.  But you've
introduced a bit of new wrinkle, I think.  If you put the pump on X-10, you
would have to account for the timer and that might get sticky.  Power the
timer via X-10, and the timer no longer works correctly, only when the X-10
outlet is powered.  Downstream of the timer and the X-10 remote only works
when the timer is running and there's power to the circuit.  Can you
describe the wiring of the manual switch to us?  That's where you're going
to have to have your remote control active - to mimic the push of a human
finger.

> As an aside, we recently installed an outside pool and the pool light,
water
> feature and landscape lights were all hooked up to a new X10 remote
control.

That's good to know.  You're already into the X-10 line, so it seems logical
to continue along that path.

> So, it crossed my mind that I could control the re-circulating water
heater
> pump with the same x10 controller and dis-connect the time al-together-
this
> I could do now.

And that's probably going to be the best (I use the word loosely!) method
for dealing with the timer v. X-10 issue I described above.  There are any
number of methods for timing X-10 operations, from LED or LCD clock-like
mini-timers to a controller like the CM11A or CM15A that can store commands
(macros) and execute them according to time or even conditions.  I'd go for
the mini-timer for simplicity's sake.

http://www.smarthome.com/1100x.html

I've seen it on Ebay and elsewhere much cheaper and X-10 pro has a new LCD
model that has a much longer lasting battery backup (two AA's instead of one
9v).  Either one will automate your pump for two complete on-off cycles per
day.  No PC, no software required and it gives you manual control of 8
devices right on the clock.

> But the my current controller does not tell me if the pump
> has been switched on/off - so, we would never know if we could get instant
> hot water from the shower.

I'm still keen on a remote sensor thermometer that would tell you whether
there's actually hot water in the pipes.  That's because status LEDs can be
fooled by stray commands and they won't tell you if your wife just had the
unit running.  There's no memory involved in status reporting but there is
memory involved in temperature reporting.  Ideally, you'd want to see
something on a little wall display like alarm systems have that showed the
last time the pump was turned on:

Pump activated at X:XX AM.

> However, if the controller had a LED, even just to say it had been
switched
> on, then that would be sufficient to tell us that someone had previously
> switched it on and by now the hot water would be flowing. If the LED was
> off, then we could switch it on (without having to go outside semi-nude),
> wait a few minutes and then take a shower.

Remote control would certainly eliminate the naked step.  I'm just not sure
status LEDs are going to insure you step into hot water reliably because
there's no way to tell when the pump was last on, only if it IS on or not.

> The reverse of this is also consideration too. If I see the LED ON and I
> know we are not going to require any hot water soon, I can switch if
> OFF...all without going outside.

The X-10 timer also has a sleep mode so that you can turn on a device from
the keypad and then press the SLEEP button -- 15 minutes later the timer
will automatically turn the device off.   That should be helpful in not
remembering to have to shut off the unit.  Before taking an unscheduled
shower, you would just turn the pump on at the clock and tap the sleep
button twice for a 30 minute delay if 15's not long enough.  I don't use the
Leviton unit Jeff's described, but I believe it would be totally compatible
with turning the pump on and off via the mini-timer

--
Bobby G.