Turn thermostat down or leave steady?

Posted by Eric in North TX on October 29, 2009, 12:16 pm

On Oct 29, 7:22=A0am, "Stormin Mormon"

> Please forgive me while I troll for a moment.....
> Is it energy saving to turn the thermostat down, when
> leaving the house? I mean, the furnace has to run to catch
> up when I get home. I have a way of looking at the matter.
> I'll explain my point of view after the argument is
> underway.
> --
> Christopher A. Young
> Learn more about Jesus
> =A0www.lds.org
> .

My experiments say yes. We have 3 zones, and 2 are on setback
thermostats, these 2 parts of the house are the least used, so I use
extreme setback down to 50 on heat and up to 90 on AC. Still when we
use them the unit has kicked on so no inconvenience except on the
occasional trip through during the setback. My savings are well over
the 10% mentioned, and my propane man is getting upset, hardly worth
the stop anymore. (125 gal Feb thru October, mostly used to cook, heat
water, dry clothes. My electric bill is also down over 1/3. I started
this when energy prices spiked last year, and it has worked so well I
will continue. It takes a lot of BTUs to get a room to room
temperature after an extreme setback, but apparently not as many as
keeping it there.

Posted by jeff_wisnia on October 29, 2009, 1:53 pm

Stormin Mormon wrote:

> Please forgive me while I troll for a moment.....
>
> Is it energy saving to turn the thermostat down, when
> leaving the house? I mean, the furnace has to run to catch
> up when I get home. I have a way of looking at the matter.
> I'll explain my point of view after the argument is
> underway.
>

OK, let's have that point of view now.

Poll question:

How many guys here have wives who mistakenly think that when warming up
a cooled down house the rate of temperature increase of a typical home
heating system will be faster if they shove the thermostat setting all
the way up to 90F than if they just move it to the appropriate setpoint.

Then of course they forget to reset it when the place reaches a
comfortable temperature and wait for the man of the house to snarl, "Why
the hell is it so damn hot in here?"

And visa versa for A/C of course.

It can't just only happen to me. <G>

Jeff

PS, I realize there may be some HVAC systems which don't conform to the
above scenario, but they sure aren't in the majority around here.

--
Jeffry Wisnia
(W1BSV + Brass Rat '57 EE)
The speed of light is 1.8*10e12 furlongs per fortnight.

Posted by N8N on October 29, 2009, 2:12 pm

wrote:

> Stormin Mormon wrote:

> > Please forgive me while I troll for a moment.....
> > Is it energy saving to turn the thermostat down, when
> > leaving the house? I mean, the furnace has to run to catch
> > up when I get home. I have a way of looking at the matter.
> > I'll explain my point of view after the argument is
> > underway.

> OK, let's have that point of view now.
> Poll question:
> How many guys here have wives who mistakenly think that when warming up
> a cooled down house the rate of temperature increase of a typical home
> heating system will be faster if they shove the thermostat setting all
> the way up to 90F than if they just move it to the appropriate setpoint.
> Then of course they forget to reset it when the place reaches a
> comfortable temperature and wait for the man of the house to snarl, "Why
> the hell is it so damn hot in here?"
> And visa versa for A/C of course.
> Jeff
> PS, I realize there may be some HVAC systems which don't conform to the
> above scenario, but they sure aren't in the majority around here.

Heh.

Do you have any tips for properly instructing a user of a vehicle with
an automatic climate control system?

I *hate* getting in my old Porsche and driving along merrily and then
suddenly realizing that I'm sweating my cojones off. Takes me a while
to realize that the "thermostat" has been cranked up to some ungodly
temp. because when I was driving the car daily I think I maybe touched
the control twice a year...

nate

Posted by mm on October 29, 2009, 8:22 pm

wrote:

>Heh.
>Do you have any tips for properly instructing a user of a vehicle with
>an automatic climate control system?

I drove my brother's car for two days last week and he has automatic
cc. It was 70 degrees out, and I opened the windows, but I still
wanted air from the blower vents. But afaik, I had no way to set the
air temp like I can do with my simple non-auto heater.

Is there a way to do that. He has a Lincoln.

Posted by dpb on October 29, 2009, 8:29 pm

mm wrote:
...

> ... But afaik, I had no way to set the
> air temp like I can do with my simple non-auto heater.
>
> Is there a way to do that. He has a Lincoln.

Specifically on FMCo products I don't know but GM/Chrysler have a pretty
simple/intuitive interface to set the desired temp w/ a manual/auto
override function...

--

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Turn thermostat down or leave steady? - Page 12