[net.consumers] Smart Thermostats

ijk@hou5e.UUCP (Ihor Kinal) (02/08/85)

The March issue of Popular Science has an interesting article on
this subject.  It covers most of the key points, so look it up
if you're interested.
Ihor Kinal
hou5e!ijk
P.S.  I had a Honeywell setback, with little manual timer stops to
set/raise the temp.  Worked fine, but the clock went out recently
(perhaps a diode in the power supply, or something).  Plus it had
no provision for weekend setting.  So I went out and bought one
of those new smart ones (on sale at K-mart) and had the same
problem someone else did:You can't manually raise the temp.  
(But some fancy ones do alow this).  The other problem is that the
thermostat may be off one way or the other - once you program in 40
different settings, it's rather annoying to go back and raise each
by two degrees. 

The simplest solution may be to get an add-on unit that fits around
(if you have a circular one) or next to a square one.  Then a little
arm raises/lowers the temp control lever.