This is for a forced air gas furnace--single zone.
Now the operation. The system will attempt to have the temperature AT 68
degrees by 5:00 PM. It 'learns' how early to start the furnace in order to
do that. So, the 'anticipator' is dynamic and built in. OTOH, the 68
degrees will be maintained right up to 10:00 PM, and then basically the
furnace shuts down until the temp falls below 62. That doesn't happen
except in the coldest months--but it does happen in Northern Indiana.
There is another thing that this thermostat does (and I think the previous
one did as well) but older ones did not. A couple minutes after running the
burners and the fan, the fan runs again for about 15 seconds. That is
somewhat irritating to me (I still hear pretty well and the one-speed fan is
reasonably loud). But I think the reason for that is to clear out any
uncombusted gas from the burner section. Again I'm speculating, but I
suspect that is a function added with the advent of more and more electronic
ignition systems. With an always on pilot, uncombusted fuel would not
really collect--it would be burned off--but with the electronic system, if
one collected too much uncombusted gas you might get a nice little bang--up
to a mildly destructive explosion!
Anyway, it would be nice to eliminate that morning ramp up, but we find it
too uncomfortable to get up and prepare for work at 62 degrees. I'm trying
the lower (66) temp this year using the 'bathroom trapping' of heat I
described earlier. [In fact, I've been lowering the upper temps about a
degree a year for the last few years, although I am probably really being
CHEAP here since our monthly bill in 2004 was $66 for heat and hot
water--and that's with a 3000 square foot house, well a townhouse with one
common wall! Electricity was $56/month.]
Rick
*********************************************************
Richard W. Tarara
Professor of Physics
Saint Mary's College
Notre Dame, Indiana
rtarara@saintmarys.edu
********************************************************
Free Physics Educational Software (Win & Mac)
Animations for Lectures
Photo-realistic Lab simulations
Energy management simulations
www.saintmarys.edu/~rtarara/software.html
Energy 2100--class project
www.saintmarys.edu/~rtarara/ENERGY_PROJECT/ENERGY2100.htm
********************************************************