Future plans for heating control

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Hi guys,

im planning to automate my heating. I have floor heating all over the place. For now there’s just an analog wall control unit (bi-metal) for every room. Primary I’m just heating the living room. Bathroom has no control at all. I have to enable it at the main controller itself.

I had a look at MAX! which looks pretty good to me. And I’m planning to get my living room controlled first. Maybe I will add another rooms later.

Two Questions:

• Do you recommend max!?
• Do I have to get a Max! Cube? (Currently its about 75€ including Cube & 1 Wallthermostate)

Can the MAX! controll floor heating? In my house I have floor heating too and as I looked at MAX! I see only contollers for radiators.
Maybee I don’t understand the System right.

@V1per I don’t know. I thought the wallthermosate had a relay out

Hello @Partovic ,

Yes the software recommends Max! by the Plugin:
pimatic max plugin

and yes you have to buy a cube.
I solved this expensive part by looking to ebay-kleinanzeigen.de …

you could also use the CUL868 and the Plugin:
pimatic-maxcul

But i don’t have this working at my setup. (just choosed the cube)

@Partovic
Ok, when the wallthermostate has a Relais then it should work, but I haven’t see that.

Thanks to @chris and @V1per. It seems there is no relais out on the wallthermostate. So i cannot simply replace my old analog one with that part…

That would require something like a nodemcu with a relais (have a few of them here) to connect to my old thermostate…

And then react to changes via pimaitc rules

that’s one of my future projects for my floor heating.
I am lready having the heating valves on the distributor (as on every floor heating). they are 230V in my case.
as far as i am into floor heating, the “common” valves have open / close state only don’t they?
so i am thinking to use pimatic on a raspberry pi with a relay board driven over gpio.
then I am able with the gpio plugin to configure gpio switches to openor close the valves over the relais if a setpoit is reached.
for controlling I still need rf thermostats in every room to control the valves. here my max thermostats could do the job since I already have them and they are affordable if i need more.
but I still need the cube or a cul for them.
some rules and devices in the gui and it should work with no big trouble.
finding the best settings for the room tempereature it’s just a matter of calibration then.

all in all you could use the max heating valves for opening and closing the valves on the distributor but not sure if there is enought space to fit the big actors on each valve then.
gonna try it …

@leader21 said in Future plans for heating control:

as far as i am into floor heating, the “common” valves have open / close state only don’t they?

Yes, I think so

all in all you could use the max heating valves for opening and closing the valves on the distributor but not sure if there is enought space to fit the big actors on each valve then.

You think they fit if there is enought space…
But in my case I need then sometimes 2 Valves per room and they have to work syncron. There is the idee with the relay-board better.
But there is one big Problem… the woman acceptance faktor. This works only with a good Interface to controll the heating temperature.

yes, the WAF … therefore a wall thermostate is still needed ^^
ok even if you need 2 thermostats for one room this is should be no problem with the group function of the pimatic-maxcul plugin or with the max plugin and according rules.
as gui you could use the pimatic-thermostat-webapp

Ok, the max n thermostats do not work for me since they are too big of size.
the spaces between the valves are too narrow. the thermostat has a width of 90mm.
maybe the basic thermostats fit, they are only 55mm but i don’t owe these (see below)

max basic thermostat

so in general - as said - a relay board would be the easiest way, since a floor heating controller is nothing else then that

the WAF That’s the whole point. Therefore I’m looking for a wall thermostate too.

@leader21 I didn’t have the idea to use the max thermostats for the valves. Quite a cool idea So sad that it doesn’t fit correctly.
There should be adapters (1 short, 1 long) so get this working maybe someone has to make a busisness plan for that.

@Partovic the idea with the adapters is good! there are 90° adapters available !!
ebay link - click here

@leader21 hey that looks cool could be worth a try

well yes, but the question is about the costs.
much cheaper would be a relay board solution and an esp8266 with espimatic or espeasy attached imho

You’re totally right. The biggest Challenge is still the Wall mounted / WAF approved User Interface to Get and Set temperature states.

For now I’ve flashed One mcu to Get my heating valve opened/closed with a relay. Now comes the WAF part. Any ideas which components to use? Thought about a Small Display Unit like the 0,9" oled devices. And 4 hardbuttons (up/Down/boost/Auto). Think this could be connected to a NodeMCU too. Biggest Thing is the housing to get it relativly Compact

Is it at all possible to control a max wallthermostat’s valves open/close percentages directly? Controlling it on temperature level doesn’t make much sense with floor heating, but i do know when i want the valve opened 30%, for example.