Re: Controlling Hot Water Recirculation Pumps

["BruceR" <razrbruce@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I used to have one of those and it was made by Grudfos - a top brand. It
is designed for continuous operation so that's not a problem.  A timer
would be located either on the pump or where it's plugged in or some
point on the circuit feeding it.  What I did was to simply plug it into
an appliance module.  Doing that it could be controlled as any other X10
device.  When we set the alarm to go out or go to sleep the pump would
turn off.  It would turn on again at our normal wake up time and then
stay off most of the day till dinnertime.

 David White wrote:
> Hello. I just bought a new home that has a recirculation pump located
> near the hot water heater. I am new to all this so I have some
> questions:
> (a) I have looked online and see some of these pumps have timers
> attached so they operate only during expected usage times (not between
> midnight and 5am). Mine does not have one that I can see. Are these
> always attached directly to the pump body or can the timer be located
> elsewhere? If elsewhere, where might this be?
>
> (b) I have read that some of these systems incorporate a temperature
> switch somewhere that shuts off the pump when a pre-set temp is
> reached at some point in the line. What are the signs that mine has
> such a switch?
> (c) Even with a timer as in (a) above it seems potentially very
> wasteful and hard on the pump for it to run continuously as we are
> not big hot water users generally. So is there some simple way -
> ideally using X-10, Active Home, CMA-11 (I think that's it), and
> simple macros (no running computer needed) which I already use - to
> control this pump mechanism at a more granular level?
>
> Thanks,
>
> David