Common Smart Thermostat Issues

A smart thermostat comes with a variety of useful features that increase the comfort of your Broken Arrow home and help lower heating and cooling costs. However, even though it contains the latest technology, you may experience some problems when using it.

Here are a few smart thermostat issues that you may encounter.

Software Glitch

A number of homeowners have had their smart thermostats go offline unexpectedly due to a server outage or software bug on the part of the manufacturer. Consequently, they're not able to set the temperature remotely as advertised.

If you're planning to be away from home for a significant period, you may want to have an HVAC technician wire in a failsafe thermostat. That will prevent a failed smart thermostat from wreaking havoc on your property while you're not around.

Malfunctioning HVAC System

Older HVAC systems don't provide a common ('C') wire for thermostats. The C wire is a 24-volt supply that's dedicated to charging your smart thermostat. Power stealing smart thermostats can work with the older HVAC models without needing a C wire. They do so by "stealing" power from your system's existing circuits.

Your HVAC circuits aren't designed to power anything. Therefore, your smart thermostat can cause your HVAC system to malfunction as it steals power. To solve the problem, let a technician add a C wire for you.

Dead Batteries

If your smart thermostat is unable to steal enough power, its battery can go dead. You can solve the problem by using the more reliable C wire.

A failed update could also cause your thermostat's battery to behave erratically. If restarting the device manually doesn't help, you may need to contact a pro to check if you have a wiring problem.

Whether smart or normal, any thermostat can fail and cause damage to your HVAC system and property. Whenever you encounter smart thermostat issues that you can't fix yourself, contact an HVAC professional as soon as possible.

If you're in the Broken Arrow area, solve any of your heating and cooling problems now by contacting the HVAC pros at Air Assurance.

How to Adjust Your Thermostat for the End of Daylight Saving Time

With Daylight Saving Time over, you'll need to set back all your clocks by an hour. For peace of mind that your HVAC can provide optimal comfort and energy savings throughout the winter, you can use the fall time change as a reminder to adjust your thermostat in the following ways:

Check That the Thermostat Clock Changes

If you own a programmable thermostat, it probably makes automatic clock adjustments twice a year, at the beginning and end of the daylight saving time period. To ensure that your programming stays on schedule, it's good to verify that this time change was made so you can adjust it manually if necessary.

Switch to Heating Mode

If your HVAC is still in cooling mode, now's the time to make the change over to heating so your home stays comfortably warm and cozy.

Recheck Your Programming Schedule

When you've made the switch to heating, you should look at your programming schedule and make any necessary adjustments to maximize your comfort and energy savings. You should set a personalized schedule to match your family's usual routine, but you can also follow these basic setting tips:

• Make overnight temperature setbacks. At night when the family is sleeping, schedule 10--15-degree temperature setbacks.

• Set weekday temperature adjustments. If the house isn't occupied on weekdays when everyone off to school or work, program setbacks of up to 10 degrees.

• Prime your setback periods for savings. To reap the greatest energy savings, aim for eight-hour setback periods each day.

• Allow ample time for warming up the house. When you're programming your setbacks, don't forget to factor in warm up periods so the house reaches your target temperature when you normally get up and arrive home.

Replace Your Thermostat Batteries

When you're at the thermostat making necessary adjustments for daylight saving time, take a few extra moments to put in fresh batteries so you know the device will stay working reliably all through the winter.

For more advice about adjusting your Broken Arrow home's thermostat for the end of daylight saving time, contact us today at Air Assurance.

Our goal is to help educate our customers in the Tulsa and Broken Arrow, Oklahoma area about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems). For more information about other HVAC topics, call us at 918-217-8273.

Daylight Saving Time and Your Programmable Thermostat

Your programmable thermostat gives you an easy way to set up a daily schedule of energy-saving temperature setbacks, without the inconvenience of making multiple manual adjustments.The one-hour change that occurs in early November with the end of daylight saving time can throw off your established schedule, though, unless your thermostat's internal clock is equipped to automatically “fall back.” If your model doesn't include this feature, you'll have to change the time for each scheduled temperature setback so your thermostat works accurately during heating season.

Additional Thermostat Recommendations for the Winter

While you're making needed scheduling changes on your thermostat to reflect daylight saving time, it's a good opportunity to make any necessary adjustments to the various temperature settings you've programmed in, to ensure your family's comfort throughout heating season.Here are some suggestions for beneficial changes:

• Set a temperature of 68 degrees for the usual time your family wakes up each morning.

• Program in a 10-degree temperature setback for the daytime periods when family members are away at school or work, and your home isn't occupied.

• Set the thermostat to raise the temperature up to 68 degrees again at the time when the first person usually arrives back home each day.

• For nighttime periods when your family is usually sleeping, program in a temperature setback of 15 degrees. Setting daily eight-hour temperature setback periods generate the greatest energy savings, according to the U.S. Department of Energy.

• If it's necessary to change your normal routine on occasion, simply use the thermostat's override feature instead of making manual adjustments, so it can automatically revert back to your established schedule.

• Once you've made all your needed scheduling and temperature adjustments, it's the ideal time to put fresh batteries in your thermostat. Tackling these thermostat-related tasks is also a good reminder to test and replace the batteries in each of your carbon monoxide detectors, so you know they're ready and able to protect your family throughout the coming heating season.

For help changing the thermostat programming in your Broken Arrow home at the end of daylight saving time, contact us at Air Assurance.

Our goal is to help educate our customers in the Tulsa and Broken Arrow, Oklahoma area about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems). For more information about programmable thermostats and other HVAC topics, call us at 918-217-8273. Credit/Copyright Attribution: “thatpalletguy/Pixabay”

Where It Pays to Have a Wi-Fi Thermostat

Thermostats have come a long way in the last few years. They've progressed from manual to programmable, and now Wi-Fi enabled devices. With the ability to connect to a home's wireless internet connection and remotely change the temperature, a Wi-Fi thermostat can do a lot for your homes – especially vacation and second homes.Let's take a look at how this thermostat can benefit you:

Comfortable Home Upon Arrival

A vacation home that hasn't been used for months will have stagnant, stale air. Walking into such a home can quickly dampen your spirits. A Wi-Fi enabled thermostat offers the convenience of adjusting your vacation home's temperature from wherever you are. You can turn on your heating or cooling system using your phone or tablet just before you arrive, and the home will welcome you and your family with the pleasant ambiance you desire.

Peace of Mind for the Traveling Homeowner

If you travel frequently, you should get a Wi-Fi thermostat to keep tabs on your home. You can monitor your home's environmental conditions and change the settings from anywhere as long as you have Internet access. In the winter, you'll be able to control your furnace to prevent issues like frozen pipes and water damage. You'll have peace of mind while you're away, knowing you won't come home to a disaster.

Planning Assistance

The mobile app of many Wi-Fi thermostats provides the latest local weather information. You can easily view the current temperature of where you're going to and get a good idea of what to carry with you to your vacation home.

More Savings

A Wi-Fi thermostat allows you to easily change the temperature settings of your second home when it's not in use. That saves you money not only on energy bills but also on expensive maintenance fees because it reduces the wear and tear on your HVAC system.

Upgrading to a Wi-Fi thermostat helps you gain more control over your home than ever before. For more information on Wi-Fi thermostats, please contact us at Air Assurance. We've been proudly serving the Broken Arrow area since 1985.

Our goal is to help educate our customers in the Tulsa and Broken Arrow, Oklahoma area about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems). For more information about wi-fi thermostats and other HVAC topics, call us at 918-217-8273.

Programmable Thermostats Can Save Your More Than Money

The primary reason that most homeowners buy a programmable thermostat is to save money on their energy bills. This is a great reason and is why programmable thermostats often pay for themselves relatively quickly. However, there are also some other ways that this type of thermostat can benefit you that you should consider.

How Programmable Thermostats Save You Money

A programmable thermostat allows you to schedule changes in thermostat settings ahead of time. For example, you can have the temperature setting rise during the day when you are out so that you aren’t wasting energy to cool a house when nobody’s there. Programming your thermostat for the main periods of the day will result in large savings over the course of the summer, and will be equally important during the winter.

How Programmable Thermostats Give You More Than Savings

There are multiple ways that programmable units are better than their traditional counterparts. Consider that once you program your thermostat, you typically don’t have to adjust it often. Instead of having to constantly tweak your thermostat back and forth, it will do it automatically for you, the ultimate convenience.

Secondly, programmable thermostats allow you to achieve those aforementioned savings without interrupting your comfort. With a traditional thermostat, if you want to come home to a cooled and comfortable home, you would need to keep the temperature down all day. With a programmable unit you can have it set to lower the temperature of your home 30 minutes to an hour before you arrive so you walk in to a comfortable home.

If you’re looking for even more benefits from your thermostat, you could consider upgrading another step to a WiFi thermostat. A WiFi thermostat is a programmable thermostat that allows you to connect and change its settings remotely.

If you have any questions on what type of thermostat is best for your Broken Arrow home, please contact the experienced professionals at Air Assurance.

Our goal is to help educate our customers in the Tulsa and Broken Arrow, Oklahoma area about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems). 

Image courtesy of Shutterstock

The Well-Designed Zoning System: Key Principles

Homeowners with multiple-story or larger houses can benefit greatly from a well-designed zoning system. These sophisticated home temperature-control systems allow you to divide your home into separate areas, or zones, that are controlled by individual thermostats. A series of motorized dampers in the ductwork system opens or closes the ducts to provide heating or cooling as desired within each zone.Here are some key principles for designing and implementing a well-designed zoning system in your home:

• Keep zones to an area no larger than a single floor: Zoning systems work best in smaller areas such as individual rooms. If you put more than one floor of your home in a single zone, you'll lose the primary benefit of the zoning system as rising warm air and sinking cool air will continue to cause inconsistent temperatures.

• Put newly constructed or remodeled rooms in the same zone: Newly constructed or remodeled rooms will probably have better levels of insulation and other thermal characteristics than older rooms, so keep them within the same zone.

• Put zone thermostats in the room that is used most often: It makes sense to keep a zone's most-used room comfortable and to install the temperature controller there. Thermostats in hallways won't always give the best level of temperature control since they might be affected by factors such as sunshine or extreme outdoor temperatures.

• Put rooms with outer perimeter walls in separate zones: Rooms with walls that make contact with the outdoor environment are more likely to be affected by exterior temperatures, resulting in inconsistent heating and cooling.

• Combine rooms with similar heating loads within the same zone: Rooms with different heating and cooling loads will still have inconsistent temperatures if they are placed within the same zone. Keep rooms with similar thermal characteristics in the same zone as much as possible.

Air Assurance has been a professional heating and air conditioning services provider in the Tulsa area for more than three decades. Contact us today for more information on well-designed zoning systems and the many benefits they can provide.Our goal is to help educate our customers in the Tulsa and Broken Arrow, Oklahoma area about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems). Image courtesy of Shutterstock

Zoned Temperature Control -- Would It Be Beneficial In Your Home?

Zoned temperature control is a unique solution to home heating and cooling problems. By dividing your home into zones, and with dampers installed in ductwork that are controlled by a series of corresponding thermostats, you can better manage not only energy costs, but home comfort, too.Home comfort problemsTwo homes with the same square footage can differ dramatically in design; however, they might utilize the same-sized capacity air conditioner. Certain design features can greatly inhibit the ability of any one system to effectively cool a home, including:

• Rooms with cathedral ceilings

• Great rooms

• Two-story homes

• Rooms with large windows

• Additions over a garage or in an attic space

The problem with these types of features is that they often require more cooling than traditional spaces. But with just one thermostat monitoring your home’s temperature, it can be difficult to accomplish whole-house comfort. Further, if you were to turn up the thermostat to provide additional cooling to a great room, the rest of the home would become too cold—and you’d waste energy dollars.With zoned temperature control, you can achieve both goals: better comfort and decreased energy costs. By designating your great room as one zone, you can set the temperature for that space, and then the dampers to that zone’s ductwork will stay open until it reaches the pre-set temperature. With each zone independently controlled, the dampers will close once each space is appropriately cooled, limiting your energy costs.Zoned temperature control is convenient, too. It’s particularly useful when family members have differing ideas about what constitutes a comfortable temperature. You can set one temperature in the space you’re occupying, and another family member can set their zone to what they think is a comfortable setting. Zoned temperature control puts an end to thermostat wars!Consider how zoned temperature control can solve your home comfort problems and help you to manage energy costs at the same time. For more information, or to schedule a free consultation, contact Air Assurance Heating, Cooling & Air Quality today!  We've been serving homeowners in the greater Broken Arrow area for more than 30 years.Our goal is to help educate our customers about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems). Air Assurance services Tulsa, Broken Arrow and the surrounding areas. Visit our websiteto see our current promotionsand get started today!     

Remotely Control Your Home's Temperature With High-Tech Programmable Thermostats

Home automation increasingly utilizes the internet as a means of accessing devices like lights, security equipment and surveillance cameras. This connectivity has expanded to include remote control of your heating and cooling with internet-accessible, programmable thermostats. Also known as IP thermostats, these units give homeowners full monitoring and control of the home environment even while away from home. Internet thermostats incorporate a dedicated server with its own discrete IP address on the internet. Anywhere in the world there’s an internet connection, you can access your programmable thermostat using a standard internet browser. Like any other internet device, your thermostat is password-protected to prevent unauthorized access.Programmable thermostats automatically activate timed heating or air conditioning events during pre-determined spans in a 24-hour period. However, sometimes a homeowner may wish to override programmed events from a remote location or simply re-program the thermostat. Typical scenarios for internet control might include canceling a programmed activation of the HVAC system because you’re going to be working late or delayed returning from an out-of-town trip.Remotely monitoring the temperature of your residence during cold spells or heat waves also permits online activation of the HVAC system as needed to prevent pipe freezing or unsafe conditions for pets. Checking and adjusting interior temperatures while you’re away may be important if the residence has children or elderly at home who cannot operate the HVAC equipment.The link between homeowner and an IP thermostat is two-way. When you are away from home, many models will automatically send a text message or email to alert you to unusual or hazardous conditions like sudden temperature extremes or a component failure causing a shutdown of the HVAC system.Another advantage of internet access to your thermostat is ease in programming—even while you’re home. Some users find a browser-based programming tool more intuitive and functional than programming on/off events directly using buttons on the thermostat.For over 30 years, Air Assurance has provided Broken Arrow and Tulsa-area homeowners with the latest in HVAC technology. Contact us for more information on internet-controlled programmable thermostats.Our goal is to help educate our customers about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems). Air Assurance services Tulsa, Broken Arrow and the surrounding areas. Visit our websiteto see our current promotionsand get started today!     Thermostat image via Shutterstock

Make The Most Of Your HVAC Equipment With A Zoning System

One of the greatest advances in home comfort was the introduction of zoning systems. A home can be fitted with separate thermostats to monitor heating and cooling in different "zones," or areas, of a home. These are tied to a central thermostat control that can distribute cool and warm air in a more controlled fashion. Dampers placed in ducts control the temperature for the different areas. For example, if a south-facing area of the home has a bank of windows and needs more cool air in the summer, dampers will open more for that area. North-facing areas with more shading would require less, and dampers would constrict that air flow. Zoning systems thus direct warm and cool air into areas where they are needed most.The floor plans of most homes are not logically designed for optimum air distribution. Hot air rises, cool air falls. Therefore, the same amount of cooling is not needed for downstairs areas as it is for upstairs. Rooms farther away from the HVAC system can also receive less air flow than is required. Zoning systems address that lack of balance and create a more even heating and cooling pattern throughout the home.In addition, rooms or sections of a home that require less heating or cooling due to limited use can get less air flow, thus saving energy. A properly designed zoning system can not only maximize home comfort but also reduce energy costs.  Think of it as like a light switch for different rooms of your home.  Of course we have those, but who would have only one light switch that controlled every room's lights?  Same principle with zoning systems.  You don't have to cool all of your house, just to be comfortable in part of your house.If you would like to investigate the advantages of zoning systems for your Oklahoma home, contact the comfort experts at Air Assurance. We can explain all the benefits and logistics of zoning. We're always ready to give you the information that you need in order to take better control of your home comfort.Our goal is to help educate our customers about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems).  For more information, click here. Air Assurance services Tulsa, Broken Arrow and the surrounding areas. To get started, check out our website or see our current promotions.