Evohome went haywire 30 - 31 Jan

[CT1]

Yesterday evening we noticed that a radiator had gone into window open mode, even though there were no windows or doors open. Could only get it back to normal by setting the cancelling a manual overide. Later that evening, noticed that the radiator was very hot even though the room was at set temperature 21deg. Looking on controller it showed a manual override to 21deg even though none had been set. Cancelled override and went back to schedule which was 21deg.

This morning got up at about 5:30 and found that the controller appeared to be showing the temperatures that were scheduled for about 8:00, but also with a manual override on the same radiator for 21deg. Checked phone app and this again showed a manual override to 21deg. Cancelled the override via the app and the override icon disappeared but temp was still showing as set fo 21 deg. (the schedule should have been at 15deg and the first change of the morning should have been to 19deg). Other rooms were still showing values that were scheduled for later in the morning. Was contemplating a power reset of the controller and the unreliable HR2, when suddenly all values went back to normal overnight temperatures. Unfortunately I had not gotten around to nothing the time display on the controller, but even if wrong it would not explain the other behaviour. 2 hours on and normal morning schedule has started okay, so reluctant to mess around until house is warmed up for the day.

System has been working for several years with only the occasional issues reported by others on the forum in the past as known design disappointments. Any ideas?

[G4RHL]

Sounds like a power outage of some sort and the panel did not reset itself properly the first time. Or perhaps even your software has been updated and any resetting the panel did went awry. If I take power off my Panel and take the batteries out, leave for a few minutes then reinstall, it takes some time to restore the settings and sometimes I get odd readings but it comes right in the end.

We often criticise aspects of the Evohome system and Honeywell but I find it robust, it does a good job and in the 6.5 years I have had it problems have been due to me tinkering and or checking the battery terminals or in the beginning not installing correctly. That latter due to a poorly written manual.

[CT1]

Sounds like a power outage of some sort and the panel did not reset itself properly the first time. Or perhaps even your software has been updated and any resetting the panel did went awry. If I take power off my Panel and take the batteries out, leave for a few minutes then reinstall, it takes some time to restore the settings and sometimes I get odd readings but it comes right in the end.

We often criticise aspects of the Evohome system and Honeywell but I find it robust, it does a good job and in the 6.5 years I have had it problems have been due to me tinkering and or checking the battery terminals or in the beginning not installing correctly. That latter due to a poorly written manual.

No power outage, still on old software and I did not reset the panel or HR92. (I was thinking about it when the schedule changed back to normal. Problems occurred over a period from 10pm to 5:45am. It looked nothing like after removing batteries in Evotouch or in a HR92, both of which I have done from time to time. Never seen anything like this behaviour in several years of ownership.

It was a combination of several phantom overrides and being on the wrong phase of the schedule. If it was just the schedule errors, I would suspect a NTS error, but that would not explain the erroneous window open and overrides. Cannot investigate further unless there are more problems, and the family will not be happy if I screw things up on a cold day like today, so no trying to initiate a repeat.

I do not want any more variables so, hopefully I will not get a push update of firmware until I have either found the problem, or it has been stable for some weeks.

[G4RHL]

It could have contracted COVID!! You are now though in the “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it position.”

[CT1]

It could have contracted COVID!! You are now though in the “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it position.”

COVID is as good an explanation as any at the moment, carried by 5G and sent by aliens. More seriously I can only wait and see if no one else has seen anything similar.

[filbert]

I’ve not noticed that sort of problem but have had major comms failures - as per this thread https://www.automatedhome.co.uk/vbul...ll=1#post41496

Like all electronic equipment, maybe the occasional reboot is worth doing.

[G4RHL]

I’ve not noticed that sort of problem but have had major comms failures - as per this thread https://www.automatedhome.co.uk/vbul...ll=1#post41496

Like all electronic equipment, maybe the occasional reboot is worth doing.

Doing that is a godsend. Make a point of doing it after updates whether it is Evohome, your desktop, iPad, iPhone etc.

[DBMandrake]

No power outage, still on old software and I did not reset the panel or HR92. (I was thinking about it when the schedule changed back to normal. Problems occurred over a period from 10pm to 5:45am. It looked nothing like after removing batteries in Evotouch or in a HR92, both of which I have done from time to time. Never seen anything like this behaviour in several years of ownership.

It was a combination of several phantom overrides and being on the wrong phase of the schedule. If it was just the schedule errors, I would suspect a NTS error, but that would not explain the erroneous window open and overrides. Cannot investigate further unless there are more problems, and the family will not be happy if I screw things up on a cold day like today, so no trying to initiate a repeat.

I do not want any more variables so, hopefully I will not get a push update of firmware until I have either found the problem, or it has been stable for some weeks.

There is a clock bug that can cause the clock to be hours out or to stall completely - workaround, reboot the controller.

Phantom overrides are due to timing issues between the HR92 boot time and the schedule - workaround, remove and reinsert the batteries in all HR92's in affected zones (like your 21C override zone) at a "random" time of the hour, preferably not near any 10 minute interval.

As for the open window alert - you don't actually need an open window to trigger it in winter, it just works by detecting a drop of more than 0.x degrees in a 4 minute interval and the default sensitivity is set quite high and can cause nuisance triggering in my experience.

Even just a door opening to a room that is set back a few degrees can cause a draught along the floor that will trigger the open window detection. Even in zones with remote wall temperature sensors controlling the zone it is still the temperature sensor in the HR92 that is used to detect open windows so being close to the floor it is very sensitive to draughts between rooms.

I've had to reduce the sensitivity of several of mine especially the hallway. Do this by increasing the 0.6 degree default for temperature drop until you don't get nuisance triggering but do still get it triggering if you leave the front door open for example. In my zones that kept triggering I increased it to around 0.8 to 1.0.

You can disable it completely as well in the window mode setting in the HR92, which has three settings, off, temperature drop mode or external microswitch.

[CT1]

Phantom overrides did not look like the occasional one I have had in the past. There was nothing remotely like a temperature drop near the radiator that gave the window alert. If the clock had gone wrong it managed to correct itself. Software has not been updated.

Went flaky again last night. Set 2 overrides on app and set water heating for 1 hour. All showed alright on app but one of the overrides did not show on the Evotouch. Closing and reopening app did not correct.

Removed power and batteries from the Evotouch, deleted app and rebooted phone. Waited about 15 minutes put Evotouch back on wall mount then reinserted batteries. Working okay so far but will wait a few days and, if all is well, will reinstall app.