Why Use Zones And The Smart Thermostat?
Having tried to read up on zones and the features of Tado, its my understand that there are a lot of overlapping features to try and cover a number of potentially scenarios but I’m struggling to work out which one best suits me.
I have a smart thermostat when I bought the starter kit. We were having work done on the house so the new boiler needed a thermostat. This is located in the hall and is assigned as the zone controller and I have since accumulated smart radiator thermostats for most of my radiators.
Downstairs smart radiator thermostats: kitchen/ diner, living room and hall.
Uptairs smart radiator thermostats: Bedrooms 1, 2 and 3.
Dumb thermostats: downstairs utility, upstairs bathroom.
My current setup is that the smart thermostat is assigned as the zone controller and each smart radiator thermostat is independent and will call here where required. As I have so many smart radiator thermostats in the important areas that can call heat does it not leave the smart thermostat in the hall redundant because its not controlling the heating of the main areas and is it therefore ok that I set that to a constantly low temperature so that it doesn’t interfere with the rest of my setup?
Would it be beneficial for me to set up zones for say downstairs and upstairs and if I did set up a zone, what benefit would that give me as the smart radiator thermostats can call heat independently (which helps due to say bedroom temperature variations)?
If I were to set up a zone, how would I determine which is the best smart radiator thermostat to choose as the zone controller?
Thanks.
Comments
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My understanding is that the smart thermostat is the unit which communicates with the boiler to switch it on and off. The smart TRV's communicate with the smart thermostat and effectively 'ask' the thermostat to turn the boiler on. I don't think you could have a set up which was just TRVs because they cannot communicate with the boiler.
Zones (as far as I understand) are piped loops which operate independently. If you have one wall thermostat it would indicate that there is only one zone (i.e. the whole house). A more common set up would be two zones (loops) one upstairs and one down. You would expect to see two wall thermostats in this case, one upstairs and one down. Also you would be able to identify a motorized valve for each zone (loop); the thing which opens the valve to allow the water to circulate.
A word of caution - you must have at least one radiator in each zone which has no TRV on and is permanently open. This is to ensure that if all the other TRVs are closed, any pumped water is able to return to the boiler.
Hope the above helps.
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Paul, your setup is similar to mine, I have smart trv's in most rooms but as smart buggy mentioned which is what you have you must have at least 1 radiator fully open ( ie your downstairs utility ) do not set this to anything other than open the reason if Tado thermostat in your hall calls for heat and all areas are at temp and therefore closed the boiler will have to send the heat/pressure around the pipes which could be an issue. Some modern boilers do have a bypass for overpressure issues.
All your TRV's can call for heat via the extension kit connected to your boiler they do not communicate via the smart thermostat in your hall. I have my smart thermostat in my hall with a fully open radiator so if any room calls for heat the rad in the hall gets heat regardless of smart thermostat on wall and the thermostat is just set to a low temperature. I use apple HomeKit to control zones so I can press a button to set any combination of rads, ie downstairs / upstairs / living area etc
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