I shut all of my vents in my basement and most on my main floor in the summer and my upstairs is still hotter. I don't know if there's much else you can do but it does help
New Furnace/Air Conditioner
- Thread starter CloneFan85
- Start date
I shut all of my vents in my basement and most on my main floor in the summer and my upstairs is still hotter. I don't know if there's much else you can do but it does help
I had to close 1/2 of my downstairs vents to get things dialed in a little better, but I'm also 99% sure I don't have an upstairs "return duct" either, which is pretty lame for a 10 year old house.
Edit: reading hvac forums now (just got a new AC unit this spring) and it sounds like leaving the fan on all times helps a little bit too.
Last edited:
Sidebar: Anyone have experience with things like Nest and other high tech programmable thermostats? Worth it? Any issues?
I've had a Nest since basically the first day it hit the market. Operationally, it's been great.
Just looking at it surface level as I wait to close on a house, it seems like a slam dunk choice, just some up front cost.
I can second this. We have had a Nest for 3 years. Haven't had a problem. Love being able to adjust temps from the couch, or car. Also is pretty easy to get your program down. I am sure newer models are a little better than what I have. But I can't complain.
This is the one I have. You can add all sorts of other accessories to it.
http://www.nexiahome.com/compatible-products/trane-xl824-control/
There is but we also got a $50 rebate at the time from the energy company.
My main problem was that at the time my basic Honeywell thermostat didn't have a control wire run, it was only a 4 wire cable to the furnace board. Since I was a VERY first generation Nest person, they didn't know at the time that it was a necessity that to have a control, they thought it would get enough power just thru the 4 wires. The unit is very low voltage, like 3.8 or something.
Nest sent me a resistor to bridge on the furnace board to help with it but it never really did much help. I decided that I should just run new 8 wire, so now wire 5 is the control, and I have 3 spares. Been 100% rock solid for years since then.
I have this with a sensor on each floor (2 story w/ walkout basement): https://www.ecobee.com/
It helps the problem outlined in a few of the previous posts about temperature on different floors in a single zone: if you set the temperature it tries to balance that temp against whatever sensors you setup as active
i.e. if you set it to 74 with your main floor at 74 and upstairs at 80, it would keep running the A/C until those averaged closer to 74.
It helps the problem outlined in a few of the previous posts about temperature on different floors in a single zone: if you set the temperature it tries to balance that temp against whatever sensors you setup as active
i.e. if you set it to 74 with your main floor at 74 and upstairs at 80, it would keep running the A/C until those averaged closer to 74.
How does that happen with one main duct off the furnace and not having adjustable dampers?
If you upsize the system you may have too big of a system for your air return. This would force it to pull too hard and in some situations can almost make you think a train is near.
It's not doing anything special: it just keeps running the HVAC until it meets whatever temperature for what sensor(s) you've set. In that previous example if you say at night you only care about the upstairs sensor and you want it at 74 degrees, it'll keep running until it hits 74 degrees upstairs, even if the main floor is well below that temperature
Went from thinking a wifi unit would be an "unnecessary toy" to "Holy crap I want one." TIA.
Same here. I have a four level split, and it goes from ice cubes to Amazon from basement to top level. I have shut off some vents around the house, and that made it a little better. I talked to someone about putting some zone heating ducts in that distribute the air differently, but never got an estimate.
I have tried the fan on suggestion myself, and I do think it helps even out the temps between floors. That said, I have also read about potential issues with the coil icing over if the fan is running while the compressor unit is not, so I haven't had the guts to run with the fan on approach for a long period of time.
I used to notice the temp change just walking upstairs, not as much now. I did notice the blower seems to put out more CFM than our old one. I also closed the vents down stairs and we do run just the blower. I also try and keep the humidity at around 50% and keep by dehumidifier running year round. I also notice that the fan on the AC unit only has two blades so it does seem to keep the noise level down.
I have (had) this one too. The Ecobee 3.
There was an issue around Christmas where my furnace wouldn't heat for more than a few minutes at a time, and the house got quite cold as a result. The HVAC guy suggested I "throw that damn fancy t-stat in the garbage where it belongs." I didn't do that, but just to humor him I did put the old one back on . . . warm house again.
I haven't put it back on to see what the issue was, but I'd like to figure it out because it was a pretty sweet device :yes:
It just runs longer. The equivalent of you setting the temp to 72, making the house 74 on average.
Thanks BC. Good call. We live about a mile from the train through Ames and at first I wondered if I was hearing a train. We did go from 80k to 90k because we have finished much more of the house now. Anything you would recommend?
