Will Honeywell EVER acknowledge problems with the CS92?

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  • Cchris
    Automated Home Sr Member
    • Nov 2015
    • 95

    Will Honeywell EVER acknowledge problems with the CS92?

    Several people have posted about comms errors with the CS92 here, and yet again this morning no hot water because of a comms error that occurred at 3am and wasn't resolved until batteries were taken out and reinstated at 6.50am.

    I've tried the method of making sure the contacts on the back of the pcb are sound. The sensor is nowhere near any metal or wires, and it is in the next room to the controller and gets an excellent signal.

    This is plain and simple an error in the software used by the CS92 and or the controller.

    Quite frankly when Honeywell can spend their time adding pretty pictures of flames to the screen to tell you when the boiler is firing or hot water is on, but keep silent on the fact the CS92 has an inherent fault and not bother updating it, it tells me all I need to know about their attitude to the product.

    Come the spring I'll most likely be removing the hot water function from Evohome and reverting back to a fixed timer and a smart controlled immersion heater. Honeywell have known about this issue for years and simply ignored it.

    I shall also be doing research on other smart heating controls and or zwave controlled radiator valves with a view to ripping the entire Evohome system out.

    I've been an advocate of Evohome and demonstrated it's benefits to any visitors to the home that ask about the controller when they see it sat on the side, but no longer. This is just pathetic.
  • stevelup
    Automated Home Jr Member
    • Mar 2015
    • 35

    #2
    Mine will have been installed three years in two weeks time.

    For some balance, I have had not one single problem with the CS92 - I literally haven't touched it since the day it was installed (still on the original batteries too).

    Comment

    • paulockenden
      Automated Home Legend
      • Apr 2015
      • 1719

      #3
      Originally posted by stevelup View Post
      I have had not one single problem with the CS92 - I literally haven't touched it since the day it was installed (still on the original batteries too).
      Same here.

      Comment

      • Dan_Robinson
        Automated Home Ninja
        • Jun 2012
        • 347

        #4
        Have installed hundreds, and have not had any reports of this fault.

        If it was a software error I think I would have noticed.
        Kind Regards - Dan Robinson (Jennings Heating Ltd)

        Comment

        • Cchris
          Automated Home Sr Member
          • Nov 2015
          • 95

          #5
          Clearly I, and the others reporting this fault on various threads here are making it up then.

          Just because the issue is not common does not negate its existence. Perhaps the number of heating cycles we have for our hot water just makes it more likely that an intermittent comms fault from the CS92 will coincide with one. If users have other systems controlling their hot water like evotouch or similar, or use the hot water element of evohome to report temps or as a booster, then they will likely never see the problem. There is enough of an evidence base here to suggest that there is a problem with either the software or hardware of the CS92, especially when people are reporting issues fixed by taking it apart and bending contacts (which has not resolved it in my case and several others below).

          I will however concede that it is probably not common enough to make it commercially viable enough to look into. Though this issue along with the complete lack of innovation on range extenders for installations in larger environments is starting to make me think that whilst a good product, the Evohome range is not being given the attention it needs at Honeywell. Issues like this will be the reason that consumer like me look at other options in the future when individual room controll becomes available from other manufacturers. At £3k+ invested in Evohome its going to be a big outlay to swap, but trust me, when the wife complains at 6.30 am that the hot water isn't working again, swapping out a £3k system to solve the problem seems a bargain.








          Last edited by Cchris; 6 March 2018, 10:59 AM.

          Comment

          • DBMandrake
            Automated Home Legend
            • Sep 2014
            • 2361

            #6
            Originally posted by Dan_Robinson View Post
            Have installed hundreds, and have not had any reports of this fault.

            If it was a software error I think I would have noticed.
            So no reports of hot water overshoots then ? How would you know ?

            If a customer has their hot water set to 55 degrees and it sometimes heats to 60 degrees due to comms errors, are they going to phone you to complain about it ? I suspect in the majority of cases, no. Some people wouldn't even notice or even know what their hot water was set to in the first place or think some variation was normal.

            The nature of the fault is that it can be there at a low level (intermittent comms loss, moderate hot water overshoots) without being bad enough to trigger a big scary red warning on the screen that might prompt a customer to phone you.

            The controller has to hear nothing from the CS92A for three hours before it will report a fault... that is a lot of lost comms transmissions...

            Living with the system day in day out and observing its intermittent behaviour is a little different to installing it for customers who you seldom hear back from and aren't probably as technical or discerning of minor issues as yourself. So if you have not experienced this issue in your own home installation you may not even appreciate what all the fuss is about.

            For those of us who have experienced this problem it is a very real, very frustrating problem with no real solution other than to ditch Evohome. I like the system as a whole enough to stick with it but the intermittent hot water issues are frustrating to say the least, especially when it results in uncomfortably hot water.
            Last edited by DBMandrake; 6 March 2018, 11:34 AM.

            Comment

            • DBMandrake
              Automated Home Legend
              • Sep 2014
              • 2361

              #7
              Originally posted by paulockenden View Post
              Same here.
              I thought when you checked your Domoticz logs a while ago you saw evidence of hot water overshoots ?

              Or do you just mean you haven't had any cases of hot water failing to heat up at all or comms errors reported on the controller fault log ?

              If so, I think the latter is just an extreme case of the same root comms issues. Minor comms issues can result in overshoots, major comms issues can result in a reported comms error on the controller which then causes the hot water relay to be kept off for safety reasons.

              Comment

              • Cchris
                Automated Home Sr Member
                • Nov 2015
                • 95

                #8
                It would be interesting to see the fault logs of other users with the CS92 to see if they are experiencing comms faults, but they just haven't happened to coincide with heating demand times and therefor have not caused a noticeable problem.

                I have two choices to try and fix this as far as I can see:

                1. Replace the CS92 and hope that i just happen to have a faulty one, and replacement will fix it. Cost £80ish.

                2. Rig up a mains 3v power supply on a 7 day timer set to disconnect and reconnect the power for a minute just before each heating cycle - mimicking the removal and reinsertion of the batteries which invariably fixes the problem every single time. Cost around £15.


                If a simple removal and reinsertion of the batteries forces an immediate update, then this seems like a problem that is caused by and could very easily be fixed with different software or method of interaction between the CS92 and the controller. The batteries in a HR92 seem to last around a year, with constant polling, and the duty of driving a motor a few times a day. So why is the CS92 designed in such a way that it can't send and receive more regular temperature settings/instructions and effectively "reboot" itself if it misses one or more? Why is it allowed to go three hours or more without talking to a controller without taking some corrective action itself?

                Comment

                • Edinburgh2000
                  Automated Home Guru
                  • Dec 2016
                  • 134

                  #9
                  Originally posted by DBMandrake View Post
                  So no reports of hot water overshoots then ? How would you know ?

                  ........Living with the system day in day out and observing its intermittent behaviour is a little different to installing it for customers who you seldom hear back from and aren't probably as technical or discerning of minor issues as yourself.
                  Agreed. I have given up worrying about my CS92 and accept that there are regular overshoots, mainly in the winter. Because my DHW valve is wired in series with a mechanical thermostat in my cylinder, the overshoots are limited to about 62oC and so no-one in the house seems to mind very much. The water just seems a bit hotter than usual for a while. I am sure no customer would call their installer to get anything changed just because of that and so installers are unlikely to be aware of this shortcoming. I maintain that the CS92 is a poor piece of kit and I wish Honeywell would produce a mains-powered replacement that could give more frequent and regular signals to the controller. I would not trust my CS92 on its own to control my hot water temperature.

                  Comment

                  • rotor
                    Automated Home Guru
                    • Aug 2015
                    • 124

                    #10
                    I've just checked, and I have one overshoot (11 degrees over) in the past 7 days, and a couple of days ago when I checked I had a couple of errors from the hot water sensor (haven't correlated them, and I cleared the log so it's too late). I'd say it's probably happening to a lot of people who just don't notice it.

                    Comment

                    • Dan_Robinson
                      Automated Home Ninja
                      • Jun 2012
                      • 347

                      #11
                      Originally posted by DBMandrake View Post
                      So no reports of hot water overshoots then ? How would you know ?



                      For those of us who have experienced this problem .........

                      Most of my installations are not fit and forget. I even have access to several. Whilst I do get the occasional problems with Comms errors, I can't think of any that have inherent overshooting that can't be logically explained.

                      Originally posted by Cchris View Post
                      Clearly I, and the others reporting this fault on various threads here are making it up then.

                      Just because the issue is not common does not negate its existence.
                      You and various others are a statistically insignificant number in the grand scheme I'm afraid.

                      More likely there is an issue specific with the units, or their installation.
                      Kind Regards - Dan Robinson (Jennings Heating Ltd)

                      Comment

                      • Dan_Robinson
                        Automated Home Ninja
                        • Jun 2012
                        • 347

                        #12
                        Originally posted by Edinburgh2000 View Post
                        Agreed. I have given up worrying about my CS92 and accept that there are regular overshoots, mainly in the winter. Because my DHW valve is wired in series with a mechanical thermostat in my cylinder, the overshoots are limited to about 62oC and so no-one in the house seems to mind very much. The water just seems a bit hotter than usual for a while. I am sure no customer would call their installer to get anything changed just because of that and so installers are unlikely to be aware of this shortcoming. I maintain that the CS92 is a poor piece of kit and I wish Honeywell would produce a mains-powered replacement that could give more frequent and regular signals to the controller. I would not trust my CS92 on its own to control my hot water temperature.

                        I agree a mains powered option would be much better. But trust me..... People will phone up..... Microanalysis and misunderstanding things is one of the pitfalls of evohome. I can spend as long explaining things as I do fitting the stuff with some people.
                        Last edited by Dan_Robinson; 6 March 2018, 06:30 PM.
                        Kind Regards - Dan Robinson (Jennings Heating Ltd)

                        Comment

                        • paulockenden
                          Automated Home Legend
                          • Apr 2015
                          • 1719

                          #13
                          Originally posted by DBMandrake View Post
                          I thought when you checked your Domoticz logs a while ago you saw evidence of hot water overshoots ?

                          Or do you just mean you haven't had any cases of hot water failing to heat up at all or comms errors reported on the controller fault log ?.
                          I meant I’ve not seen the issue reported at the start of this thread, which appears to be different from the overshoots.

                          Comment

                          • gordonb3
                            Automated Home Ninja
                            • Dec 2016
                            • 273

                            #14
                            Don't have a CS92, but I do get a lot of communication errors on modules that are two stories up from the main controller (HR92 and T87RF). This issue is not restricted to the Evohome installation though. I get similar errors on the mechanical ventilation unit that is also running on 868 MHz. The cause is quite clear, it is the steel reinforcement in the concrete floors of my 2010 home that is creating disturbances. While this doesn't appear to be too bad on the first floor (WiFi speed is affected though) it gets really bad on the top floor (WiFi is non-existent there) and this is where the technical installations are. Which in my case is just the MV as I am on city block heating for which I only need to operate a valve that is on ground level.

                            Comment

                            • ukEvo
                              Automated Home Jr Member
                              • Jan 2019
                              • 11

                              #15
                              This morning, no hot water for the first time since fitting the evohome around a year ago. I've done all of the 'fixes' I've found on here but now my problem doesn't seem to have been covered, or I can't find it mentioned.

                              The CS92 is correctly bound. My hot water is set to 54 deg in the system parameters. The hot water is set to 'on'. The displayed temp will not go above 24 deg (was at 19 deg when it failed this morning). The water from the tap is 24 deg, maybe less. There is no demand on the boiler, even though the controller tells me that the hot water is on. I can turn the heating on and the boiler fires up just fine.

                              I've also just noticed that the controller has self-cleared the fault log. There were lots of communications failrures that I hadn't been aware of. It seems that they usually fixed themselves.

                              Is there something else I can do or is my CS92 knackered? Had I best go turn the immersion heater on (defeating the whole object of energy/money saving by using the evohome)?
                              ukEvo 'cos I'm an Evans.

                              Comment

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