All About Home Thermostats
Whether your use a heat pump, central furnace, wall heaters or a gas fireplace to heat your home, these as well as countless other forms of heating and cooling systems all have one very important thing in common, in that they all require a thermostat to operate.
Thermostats are simple devices that combine both a setting device, which permits the homeowner to select a desire temperature in a given room or location and an internal thermometer, which continually monitors the actual temperature. In addition, there is an electric circuitry, which turns on and off the heating and cooling system as needed to maintain that set temperature.
The simplest form of thermostat is a small knob on a wall or baseboard heater or air conditioner, which operates on line voltage. This means that it has temperature settings in degrees or is simply marked with cool, warm, etc. These are the least expensive types of thermostat, as well as the least accurate.
The type is the remote line-voltage thermostat, which is usually used with electric wall and baseboard heaters. Because these thermostats are installed on the wall instead of on the unit, they are more sensitive and tend to be more accurate. Several brands of line-voltage thermostats also have the added features of timer settings, giving the thermostat the ability to automatically increase or decrease the temperature at pre-selected times.
The standard type of thermostats for central heating and cooling systems are low-voltage thermostats. Low-voltage thermostats are also used on pellet stoves and gas fireplaces. These thermostats range from those with simple mechanical controls, which have fair to moderate accuracy, to ones with electronic controls, with tremendous amount accuracy.
Electronic automatic-setback thermostats are convent and energy efficient. These systems use digital displays, which makes setting the desired temperature as easy as pushing a button to input the command. Because these thermostats utilize low-voltage wiring, many are simple to install for the do-it-yourselfer. In addition, automatic thermostats are very accurate and will pay for itself in energy savings.
Several brands of “setback” or programmable thermostats are capable being programmed for both weekday as well as weekend settings as well as having the option of being able to have individual settings for each day of the week. In addition, several top quality systems have battery backups, which will hold the program in memory in the event of a power outage.
There are countless types of thermostats on the market. If you are considering replacing your current thermostats, then consider installing a setback or programmable thermostat. You can purchase these and other types of thermostats through reputable websites and at most home improvement stores.
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