Reading the other thread got me thinking about adding the X300 to monitor temps of my boiler. I have a boiler shack 150ft from house with storage in my basement. I could get internet to the boiler shack if needed. I would primarily like to monitor temps on the boiler since I already have an Azel on the storage but if I could do both that would be great. So the question is do I install the x300 in the boiler shack or the basement? Will running cat 5 through the existing conduit work at that distance? The conduit has water in it unfortunately and the Azel would not work at that distance. The water must have entered the conduit on a joint that wasn't completely sealed. I do have a rope in it so I could pull whatever wire I needed.
X300 Location
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JP11
Minister of Fire
Don't do cat 5. use the over the wire solution I mentioned in the other thread. simple. plug it in and it works.
JP
JP
I was thinking of the cat 5 for the sensors going to the x300. I haven't decided how to get internet to the boiler shack. The powerline adapters like you suggest do seem the easiest.
JP11
Minister of Fire
I bought the sensors from the same website as the temp control box. simple to connect. I think I did run cat 5.. but it was kind of a waste.. as I was running all those pairs of wire, and only using a couple. In reality.. now that I have the system installed. All I really needed was one top sensor and one bottom sensor in my tanks.
it's neat to have data though.
JP
it's neat to have data though.
JP
eauzonedan
Member
Rumors of my demise have been way overblown....just been busy getting my Garn 1500 up.....more on that to come but I had a lot of help from Karl at Northwind. Anyway.....We kicked it around and added an x300 What a great piece of equipment. We put it in the remote Garn Barn and tied it back to the house with a run of Cat5 and connected that back to an available port on the wireless computer router. This allowed anything going on in the x300 to be viewed or acted upon by either anything tied to the computer network..... including my smart phone. This whole thing started by wanting to find a way to slap a sensor or two on the Garn - and monitor the storage temp in that remote building from a couple different locations back in the house...Finding a solution with multiple displays was not easily done... Reading a bit here we decided to give this thing a try and tie it to the home network ......... WOLA I now have that info in my pocket as well as next to the bed when I wake up........
Connection of this thing is cool. It has coded ID's in each sensor and the wiring scheme is just like network cable...... one wire can be "T'd" into all the sensors and the controler can sort out which sensor is sendinig what information. a word of caution be sure to run 3 conductor, which can be telephone wire or about anything else you have available. We ran an unshielded leg of telephone cable all the way back into the house (150') to tie into the DHW tank and and dropped a sensor down the dry well in the DHW tank...... way cool......I now can read DHW temp - along with my in/ out temps at the HX as well as three submersable sensors dangeling at different elevations in the Garn tank .....all on my smart phone. We later needed to come up with a way to control another relay in the Garn Barn by sensing the temp of the output of my LP backup boiler (located in the house) and drive a relay back in the Garn Barn. Thought bummer we will have to fish another wire thru the burried conduit between buildings.... PIA, but do-able .... then the light bulb went on and we remembered all we had to do wat tie the additonal sensor to the leg we had run for the DHW run and used a relay within the x300.......like I said way cool!! This thing will handle 8 sensors as well as three built in relays that can be controled by whatever you want to do with the sensor inputs. Get plenty of sensors as you will end up hanging them on a lot of areas you didn't plan to as its way too simple and EZ to wire up. I may buy a second one just to stick out in the heated shop which has both in-floor down and rad's up to keep an eye on all that - all from my pocket...... oh yea... you can overide the relays by remotes ...and this also thing keeps a log file of temps and times which could then go into Excell and play lots of fun graphing games...... lots of possibilities here guys
More to come on the overall Garn install, but wanted to get this out there as it was pretty timely with guys looking at the x300. Thanks again Karl....you are the MAN I'd still be feeding the wood stove without ya
Dan
Connection of this thing is cool. It has coded ID's in each sensor and the wiring scheme is just like network cable...... one wire can be "T'd" into all the sensors and the controler can sort out which sensor is sendinig what information. a word of caution be sure to run 3 conductor, which can be telephone wire or about anything else you have available. We ran an unshielded leg of telephone cable all the way back into the house (150') to tie into the DHW tank and and dropped a sensor down the dry well in the DHW tank...... way cool......I now can read DHW temp - along with my in/ out temps at the HX as well as three submersable sensors dangeling at different elevations in the Garn tank .....all on my smart phone. We later needed to come up with a way to control another relay in the Garn Barn by sensing the temp of the output of my LP backup boiler (located in the house) and drive a relay back in the Garn Barn. Thought bummer we will have to fish another wire thru the burried conduit between buildings.... PIA, but do-able .... then the light bulb went on and we remembered all we had to do wat tie the additonal sensor to the leg we had run for the DHW run and used a relay within the x300.......like I said way cool!! This thing will handle 8 sensors as well as three built in relays that can be controled by whatever you want to do with the sensor inputs. Get plenty of sensors as you will end up hanging them on a lot of areas you didn't plan to as its way too simple and EZ to wire up. I may buy a second one just to stick out in the heated shop which has both in-floor down and rad's up to keep an eye on all that - all from my pocket...... oh yea... you can overide the relays by remotes ...and this also thing keeps a log file of temps and times which could then go into Excell and play lots of fun graphing games...... lots of possibilities here guys
More to come on the overall Garn install, but wanted to get this out there as it was pretty timely with guys looking at the x300. Thanks again Karl....you are the MAN
I'd still be feeding the wood stove without yaDan
McKraut
Feeling the Heat
I agree with JP. If you don't have the wires run, I would use the wireless setup. I was lucky enough to have the wire already in place. I also decided it would be less cluttered in the boiler room without a module and assorted wires hanging on the wall. I would think it would be cheaper too if you used the wireless. All comes down to personal preference. I think you'll love the set up. I am VERY happy. Let us know if you have questions.
Bob
JP11
Minister of Fire
I was looking into all sorts of wireless solutions to get internet out to the barn. (probably 3 or 400 feet straight line)
All solutions were expensive. Guys that installed my solar just plugged in the brick.. stole the wire from my wood boiler tanks for testing, and set up a laptop to get speed test out in the barn.
Wire goes thru 3 panels, and a run of about 160 feet, and a run of 400 feet to get to the barn. We were all surprised how well it worked.
I plan to use the wired internet out there for some backup data storage. Gotta figure, short of a forrest fire.. you won't lose both buildings at once.
JP
All solutions were expensive. Guys that installed my solar just plugged in the brick.. stole the wire from my wood boiler tanks for testing, and set up a laptop to get speed test out in the barn.
Wire goes thru 3 panels, and a run of about 160 feet, and a run of 400 feet to get to the barn. We were all surprised how well it worked.
I plan to use the wired internet out there for some backup data storage. Gotta figure, short of a forrest fire.. you won't lose both buildings at once.
JP
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