• Klimax (unregistered)

    That's funny. I was solving similar problem in one of the houses recently. Temperature sensor or its controller si malfunctioning and is sending wildly bad data (while outside temp is about -5°C, it would report in span of seconds 24, 4, and 7)

    Solution was fristly similar. Switch off temp sensor until service can fix it. Local termo regulators can still be used to regulate.

  • COBOL Dilettante (unregistered)

    That setup reminds me of an office where I once worked where the intake for the air-con was right next to the exhaust pipe from the backup diesel generator - thus ensuring that if ever the mains power went down, everyone could enjoy a roomful of diesel fumes

  • (nodebb)

    As an European I was wondering what it is doing in an wooden shack and then I remembered, pretty much everything they call houses over there is made out just wood and paper. And now I have totally forgotten what the actual WTF build on papier-mâché was actually about...

  • my name (unregistered)

    I once wanted an ppointment with my bank adviser, unfortunately the AI to make such appointments was terrible, i got slightly ennerved and shouted which immediately resulted in connecting me to a real person, perhaps that could have worked as well

  • (nodebb)

    Heat pump should have no problem whatsoever operating below 40F/4C. Most can provide heat down to 0F/-18C, some can go even colder. A good thermostat will supplement the heat pump with aux heat so both run only as much as they need to. That is a common mistake installers and factory defaults make, even Ecobee defaults to locking it out at 35F. I set the lockout to 0F and it still stages everything properly.

    This sounds like the reversing valve was never connected properly, meaning the heat pump was stuck in cooling mode. That happened to me when I got my system replaced, additionally, they did not connect the aux heat. Cooling worked but I had no heat at all come winter. Easy enough to fix myself, but really guys? You are literally matching wire colors and terminal names. W gets the white wire, O/B gets the orange or blue wire, Y gets the yellow wire, G gets the green wire, R gets the red wire...

  • (nodebb) in reply to COBOL Dilettante

    That's a feature not a bug. Olfactory alert you are on generator power.

  • (nodebb) in reply to Coyote

    That's a feature not a bug. Olfactory alert you are on generator power.

    I guess we won't mention the potential for doses of diesel fumes (unburnt and half-burnt hydrocarbons and/or combustion products, notably NOx, CO2 and, probably worst of all, CO). Don't forget that the diesel plant itself probably gets run up fairly infrequently, and might or might not get sufficient test runs and maintenance.

  • (nodebb) in reply to Coyote

    W gets the white wire, O/B gets the orange or blue wire, Y gets the yellow wire, G gets the green wire, R gets the red wire...

    Whoa whoa whoa slow down there, you're going a mile a minute.

  • (nodebb) in reply to my name

    I have also noticed that the bank AI immediately gives up if you call it stupid. I once had to deal with it, and it kept coming back with the same question, which I had already answered. Then I called it stupid, and got a person right away. I couldn't shout, it was a prompt.

  • (nodebb)

    This physicist/engineer nerd recently got a similar hybrid system put in. The first thing i did was watch the installer set up the thermostat, so I knew the 'secret' access to deep settings. The next thing I did was RTFM front to back. Then I clicked on every menu and submenu to see what was there and whaat the settings were. To my knowledge, all hybrid systems have a "Gas furnace only" setting.

  • Dev tool guy (unregistered)

    If you are adventurous enough, you can get most heaters to run by just hard wiring the correct low voltage control terminals together and then manually unhooking that when things get warm enough. I wouldn't suggest that as a good idea under most any situation, but if the alternative is thing getting cold enough to do permanent damage to something that costs more than the heater, then it might be a less bad idea. (And that's not likely to happen any time soon if the outside air temperature is above freezing.)

    I had to do something like that to get the fan to run continuously (for reasons) without heat a few months ago.

  • A Human (unregistered)

    Technology connections mentioned!

    (I loved that video)

  • (nodebb) in reply to Dev tool guy

    cold enough to do permanent damage to something that costs more than the heater

    Probably your entire house, when the cold (if cold enough) causes pipes to freeze... (Moer precisely when the ice melts a bit later.)

  • 516052 (unregistered) in reply to MaxiTB

    Same here. I'll newer understand why and how the richest country on earth builds most of its homes out of materials that we would only consider fitting for use in those temporary partition walls you put up in a rented office space. Like, basically one step up from cubicles. And people live in that. It's wild.

  • (author) in reply to 516052

    When it comes to home construction, most of it is done by development companies who want to build the building as cheaply as possible, sell it for as much as possible, and turn over all the maintenance of the entire development over to a HOA that will go bankrupt within a decade. It's less about construction models than it is development models: there's an ever-expanding wave of sprawl as developments fail and newer, "nicer" developments pop up just beyond them. And like, even the purchaser isn't planning to ride the building into the ground- they're planning to live there for a decade at most, but hope to "upgrade" before long.

    // My current home is an 80s era townhome that is ridiculously overbuilt where all exterior and inter-unit walls are 4 stories of cinderblock stabilized with like 24" steel i-beams running the building's length on 3 of the four floors; it's basically a bunker

  • (nodebb) in reply to COBOL Dilettante

    I once worked at a site where the air con intake was next to a convenient piece of hard standing. Allegedly (this happened before I worked there) somebody parked van outside and left the engine running. They nearly killed everybody in the office.

  • TechHound (unregistered) in reply to 516052

    516052:

    I'll newer understand why and how the richest country on earth builds most of its homes out of materials that we would only consider fitting for use in those temporary partition walls you put up in a rented office space. Like, basically one step up from cubicles.

    If you honestly believe that homes in the US are built like office cubicles, then you have just demonstrated that you know absolutely nothing about how houses and similar buildings are actually constructed. You have wood frame homes that have been standing for over 100 years, some even going back as far as the American revolution on the east coast. Please try to do some actual research about the subject.

  • Kiwi (unregistered) in reply to COBOL Dilettante

    Late last year neighbours complained about the noise of our generator (in a city business area), so the electrical techs extended the exhaust and pointed it away from the complaining residence - right at the aircon inlet. First generator test and we were all choking. Pipe now extended above the roofline...

  • (nodebb)

    Makes me glad that here in Australia, the HWS (Hot Water System) is outside the house :)

Leave a comment on “WTF: Home Edition”

Log In or post as a guest

Replying to comment #:

« Return to Article