Cycles Per Hour

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nepacoal
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Post by nepacoal » Tue. Feb. 06, 2018 7:37 am

Has anyone changed their thermostat's CPH to see how it affects your system? I have a converted gravity system with around 140 gallons of water and the instructions for all 4 thermostats I have used recommend 1CPH for gravity. That seemed to work OK for the hand fired boiler I used to run but not so much for the KAA-4. With it set to 1 CPH, my system would definitely have longer run cycles and the house was comfortable, but it also had longer idling cycles. Those long idle times led to the 140+ gallons cooling down to almost room temperature on every cycle. Occasionally it would cool down so much that the system would get what I call "out of sync" and have a very long run time to catch back up. About 5 weeks ago I switched it to 3 CPH in hopes of reducing those long idle issues and so far it has performed much better than the system at 1 CPH. The rooms farthest from the boiler are now slightly warmer and the rest of the house maintains a very constant temp. At this point, I am inclined to leave it at 3 CPH forever.
Last edited by nepacoal on Tue. Feb. 06, 2018 9:08 am, edited 1 time in total.

 
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Rob R.
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Post by Rob R. » Tue. Feb. 06, 2018 7:38 am

You have already done the right thing - adjust it to optimize the comfort level.

 
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StokerDon
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Post by StokerDon » Tue. Feb. 06, 2018 8:38 pm

What the heck does "cycles per hour " mean when it comes to thermostats? Why would you want to cycle a thermostat?

Maybe I need to learn something new here.

-Don


 
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nepacoal
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Post by nepacoal » Tue. Feb. 06, 2018 9:11 pm

There is a little built in heating element that helps control cycle times. It allows a single type of thermostat to control hot air, baseboard, or radiator systems using the same thermostat. Hot air might be 6 CPH, baseboard 3 CPH and radiator or gravity might be 1CPH. Air temp will override the CPH setting and allow longer run times if needed.

 
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StokerDon
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Post by StokerDon » Wed. Feb. 07, 2018 6:31 pm

Thanks for the explanation. I have never seen this in any of the thermostats I have taken apart.

Thank you,

-Don

 
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nepacoal
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Post by nepacoal » Wed. Feb. 07, 2018 6:44 pm

Check page 4 of this user manual... It is the modern replacement of the old mercury Honeywell and shows the dip switch settings for CPH. CPH is the modern equivalent of the old anticipator setting in analog thermostats.

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39858_PROD_FILE (1).pdf
.PDF | 4.6MB | 39858_PROD_FILE (1).pdf


 
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Rob R.
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Post by Rob R. » Wed. Feb. 07, 2018 7:45 pm

StokerDon wrote:
Wed. Feb. 07, 2018 6:31 pm
Thanks for the explanation. I have never seen this in any of the thermostats I have taken apart.

Thank you,

-Don
The old mercury 'stats had a heat anticipator that you could adjust to perform the same function.

 
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Post by McGiever » Fri. Feb. 09, 2018 4:59 pm

So many could have improvements in their heating cycles (performance) if they learn and apply these little know features. 8-)

 
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Post by Sting » Sat. Feb. 10, 2018 6:19 pm

Hummm

Maybe I should get back on my soap box and start preaching system balance again????

Naaa

The new search tool works too well
search my posts for system balance
I used to write far too much and bored to many

Kind Regards
Sting

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