Godalming is a beautifully rural part of Surrey, UK. This house in located in an isolated position, and was purchased by the present owners a couple of years ago. One of the things that had never been successful with this lovely house was the heating. Radiators worked, then they didn’t work at all, seemingly at random. There were a few electric and LPG heaters evident when I did the home survey – it was a cold house.
Our customer is a senior creative figure in the electronic gaming arts industry, and he wanted to have zone based control of the heating system in the house, with the ability to add an internet and iPhone control capability later.
He found our web site and liked the look of what the Honeywell Hometronic system could do. We looked at the existing radiator system, this had been installed in the last 6 years using plastic pipework. Unfortunately some basic installation principles had been ignored by the original developer’s heating contractor; in particular the pipework had been laid loose in roof areas, and the header tank was hardly any higher than the pipes.
This was causing ‘pumping over’ of the system water into the header tank, causing premature rusting of the radiators. It was also causing persistent airlocks in the pipework.
The solution was to pressurise the radiator system as an alternative to the tank fed arrangement, which would reduce airlocking and hopefully prevent the introduction of air.
We carried out the necessary works, the slightly higher pressure did prompt a few small leaks which were easily dealth with, including 14 in the airing cupboard alone.
All the radiator valves were changed for Honeywell VH200 units, and HoneywellHR80UK Hometronic actuators were fitted onto each radiator, 20 in total.
When addressed by the Honeywell Hometronic Manager these modifications allowed us to split the house into 16 separately controllable zones of heating – without changing any of the pipework. The controls wiring was changed by us to enable Hot Water control from Hometronic too.
We’re pleased to say that the customer and his wife are very pleased with Hometronic; this is a product which consistently delivers or exceeds customer expectations. It really is a superb product, and has proven reliability, having been in production for 10 years after being launched by Honeywell Germany.
There is a page on our web site specifically dealing with Honeywell’s zone control systems, Hometronic and EvoHome, if you would like further information. If you live in a larger house and seem unable to curb energy consumption without cladding the outside with insulation, or just live in a cold house this may be what you have been looking for. Every one of our customers with this product has offered to spread the word, it is that good.
I should know, I’ve got one in my house.