Aquanta turns your hot water heater into a smart hot water heater

[apostolakisl]

Once the system is connected and up and running please do follow up how the NEST integration works out. I have a friend who is eager to read your review of the two systems married together. He has absolutely nothing right now and would like to move forward with something that integrates well together. 

 

RE: Gas dryer -> I won't lie I've never been a fan of gas appliances. Having said this for hot water and heating nothing beats NG in terms of value per cost ratio. 

 

At some point a hybrid system will be incorporated into my system because this electric HWT is simply a pig. 

 

There is always the concern of burning things inside your home.  CO mostly.  But the tankless mount on the outside of the house so that worry pretty much is nil.  Perhaps up north they don't use the ones that mount on the outside, not sure.  We did have one of our very rare super cold days here (16F) and the tankless heaters still worked just fine.  But the input water was still fairly warm.  Not exactly sure of the temp, but nothing like the 40 degree water that came out of the faucet up north.

[Teken]

There is always the concern of burning things inside your home.  CO mostly.  But the tankless mount on the outside of the house so that worry pretty much is nil.  Perhaps up north they don't use the ones that mount on the outside, not sure.  We did have one of our very rare super cold days here (16F) and the tankless heaters still worked just fine.  But the input water was still fairly warm.  Not exactly sure of the temp, but nothing like the 40 degree water that came out of the faucet up north.

 

Yes, all tankless units are installed indoors no way for the device to survive and operate long term in -35'C weather. I'll review my logs and see how cold the incoming water gets in the dead of winter and report back. This was part of the reason I installed several staged 1 wire probes in the ground to obtain factual data about the temperatures during the winter.

 

I was really hoping to show case the charts and graphs for the one 1 wire system when the frost line breached the 12 foot mark.

 

Sadly, I had a Micro SD card failure and that data was lost . . .   

[GQuack]

Greetings all. I read this post with much interest as I am looking to do something with our hot water heater. In my case, we have a solar hot water unit with A/C backup and we live where there are some of the highest electrical rates in the country. The problem is that the A/C use is totally controlled via an old fashioned on/off wheel timer. I was hoping the unit would have some intelligence that if the solar panels were providing enough power to heat the water, the A/C would sit quietly, but there is zero intelligence.

By my reading of this post, I gather the aquanta system is a sophisticated timer in the use of schedules but also doesn't use the actual temperature for any control, only reporting. I am hoping for a combination of temperature and schedule to control the use of A/C power within the ISY. The power side seems straight forward via an 2477SA2 but how to determine the actual water temperature is eluding me. Is there any way to access the temperature used in the Aquanta or a better method?

[larryllix]

Do you not have some intelligence with the solar DHW control unit that came with the system?

[GQuack]

Zip, Nada, None - no intelligence at all. I was disappointed in that discovery.

[larryllix]

10 minutes ago, GQuack said:

Zip, Nada, None - no intelligence at all. I was disappointed in that discovery.

Then what was to stop the grid backup from reheating the water and the solar doing nothing or was it just expected to manually turn the grid on/off as needed?

 

[Teken]

3 hours ago, GQuack said:

Greetings all. I read this post with much interest as I am looking to do something with our hot water heater. In my case, we have a solar hot water unit with A/C backup and we live where there are some of the highest electrical rates in the country. The problem is that the A/C use is totally controlled via an old fashioned on/off wheel timer. I was hoping the unit would have some intelligence that if the solar panels were providing enough power to heat the water, the A/C would sit quietly, but there is zero intelligence.

By my reading of this post, I gather the aquanta system is a sophisticated timer in the use of schedules but also doesn't use the actual temperature for any control, only reporting. I am hoping for a combination of temperature and schedule to control the use of A/C power within the ISY. The power side seems straight forward via an 2477SA2 but how to determine the actual water temperature is eluding me. Is there any way to access the temperature used in the Aquanta or a better method?

The Aquanta indeed offers insight as to the internal water temperature as seen below. The system has three temperature probes which two are used at the present time. One is internal while the other is external and is affixed to the cold side of the incoming water line. In my system I have seven additional 1 Wire sensors that monitor the cities incoming water supply. Two are provided by my Water Hero system which monitor the incoming water supply as well as the environment.

Two additional sensors monitor the two exterior water facets to guard against a freeze up. Should the system detect a defined threshold is met the guardian system will activate auxiliary heat tape. The hot water tank is monitored on both hot and cold input / outputs to confirm what the Aquanta is providing is accurate and true. All of this is glued together by my Brultech Green Eye Monitor (GEM) and Dash Box as seen below.

Not only do I know how much water I consumed globally but know what appliance did along with the HWT. One has to know more than how much water is consumed vs how much this is going to cost you. My systems monitor, track, and aggregate all of this information so the ISY Series Controller can help manage my personal needs.

As noted early on ~ Technology only goes so far because if *Human* isn't going to change their lifestyle very little will be seen.

 

[GQuack]

Larryllix, when I called the tech support team (1 guy), I asked him if there was enough intelligence in the system that if the solar panels were providing enough heated water even if the A/C timer was on, that the panels would override the A/C. He told me there is no intelligence in the system. When the timer is set to turn on, the A/C power is applied to provide the heated water. I am unclear how the priority of mixing solar heated water along with A/C heated water is applied. 

Teken, let me go through your usual thorough information to see what I can glean from that.

[larryllix]

If and when you can get your tank temperature, and maybe your solar temperature input  into your ISY, then you can set up an algorithm to control the grid powered backup.

My first guess would just be a few time of day based levels of  too cold detection with a long delay so it isn't running everynight. I now have a new CAO Tag sensor with the Lumen sensor in it but haven't made any applications for that yet. I only have solar PV.  My hot water collectors froze and exploded some piping. Fail!

[GQuack]

Teken and Larryllix, thank you for the great info on this. I've been researching the Brultech system and other information you two have provided, very impressive. I have to think through whether taking that step into the energy monitoring world is worthwhile for my wife and me, to your point, the human has to make the lifestyle changes.

Here is where I am still stuck. While I can see the Aquata does indeed provide insight into the hot water tank temperature, I am not seeing where that information is actionable. Does the Aquanta provide variable(s) to the ISY that can be used in ISY programs to take steps based on what Aquanta is reporting? Larryllix to expand on your thoughts, my first was to split the 24 hour day into day and night segments. If during the day, the tank temperature has dropped below "set point," turn on the A/C grid backup. In that scenario I would assume that the solar conditions are such that the panels are not providing enough power, which in fact has happened. Then during sleep hours, do not allow the A/C backup to turn on at all. Pretty simple programming but I need the tank temperature variable to query. Is that variable available?

[larryllix]

1 hour ago, GQuack said:

Teken and Larryllix, thank you for the great info on this. I've been researching the Brultech system and other information you two have provided, very impressive. I have to think through whether taking that step into the energy monitoring world is worthwhile for my wife and me, to your point, the human has to make the lifestyle changes.

Here is where I am still stuck. While I can see the Aquata does indeed provide insight into the hot water tank temperature, I am not seeing where that information is actionable. Does the Aquanta provide variable(s) to the ISY that can be used in ISY programs to take steps based on what Aquanta is reporting? Larryllix to expand on your thoughts, my first was to split the 24 hour day into day and night segments. If during the day, the tank temperature has dropped below "set point," turn on the A/C grid backup. In that scenario I would assume that the solar conditions are such that the panels are not providing enough power, which in fact has happened. Then during sleep hours, do not allow the A/C backup to turn on at all. Pretty simple programming but I need the tank temperature variable to query. Is that variable available?

This is how this would happen for me. I would set up some basic algorithm using the tank temperature and time of day and my knowledge of saving energy in this regard. Then probably every day or so I would think of some other contingency and modify the programs. After some time the ideas would stop flowing and there would be very few times where I suffered or waited for hot water. This would take some time...maybe a few months to improve the programs as I woke up with my latest news flash, and then implement it. This , of course, is after much trial and error and being caught with cold water a few times.

There will be many decisions to make, like if the water is cold and it is past solar time (dark) do you heat the tank back up? Do you wait and let the solar heat it up the next day? What if you need a shower that night?

At first glance my idea would be  to assess if the water will  be heated within the next few hours, during daytime with predicted solar radiation. If not, turn on the costing backup. Knowledge of water conditions for the human may be a big bonus to help out.
Not the most cost saving algorithm but then you start to realise,  the same algorithm can be made more efficient by YOU changing your expectations and modifying YOUR habits. Possible just an LED somewhere telling you if the temp is over X degrees.  If the odd shower is needed at night from grid hot water, it isn't the end of the world but you never went without hot water. In the end it will be a compromise between absolute free solar hot water and your convenience.

As with PV. Getting 75% solar costs X dollars,  but getting 100% solar costs 10 X dollars. Greedy will cost you.

[Teken]

1 hour ago, GQuack said:

Teken and Larryllix, thank you for the great info on this. I've been researching the Brultech system and other information you two have provided, very impressive. I have to think through whether taking that step into the energy monitoring world is worthwhile for my wife and me, to your point, the human has to make the lifestyle changes.

Here is where I am still stuck. While I can see the Aquata does indeed provide insight into the hot water tank temperature, I am not seeing where that information is actionable. Does the Aquanta provide variable(s) to the ISY that can be used in ISY programs to take steps based on what Aquanta is reporting? Larryllix to expand on your thoughts, my first was to split the 24 hour day into day and night segments. If during the day, the tank temperature has dropped below "set point," turn on the A/C grid backup. In that scenario I would assume that the solar conditions are such that the panels are not providing enough power, which in fact has happened. Then during sleep hours, do not allow the A/C backup to turn on at all. Pretty simple programming but I need the tank temperature variable to query. Is that variable available?

As of this writing there is no direct method to integrate any of the metrics, functions, or systems into the ISY Series Controller. I've been working with the company for many years and they have not moved on providing a open API for the Home Automation Enthusiasts. 

The closet thing to integration is with Nest and in the future IFTTT.

If they are able to offer tight integration with IFTTT then there may be some possible methods to integrate.

Please keep in mind this device was conceived as a stand alone device to operate in its own little world.

Why?!?!

I have no clue why its been designed, developed, and released in this manner. 

Than again the majority of the *Me Too* crowd have been embracing and going toward this stupid route of the so called *Cloud Power*.   I've tried very hard for years to turn this company around to see the *Virtual Light* as they say to realize they have literally cut themselves off of millions of potential sales. 

You can lead a horse to water but you certainly can't make it drink . . .

Regardless, before you invest in any wiz bang technology I would encourage you to perform an energy audit. Doing so will provide you the first stepping stone and insight as to where energy savings can be had. As noted early on the bulk of the saving will come from lifestyle changes and completing simple tasks. In no specific order of relevance or importance.

- Hot Water Tank: If the tank is more than ten years old. Get rid of it and purchase a energy star unit and the best route is to install a NG unit. Electrical HWT simply do not pencil out even if the cost of electricity is dirt cheap. If you have the ampacity and NG pipe flow you simply can not beat a IHT (Instant Hot Water Tank). You only heat up what you need and use and no more.

- Insulate: If your tank is no where close to being replaced or you simply don't have the budget to do so. Purchase any foil insulated bubble wrap and insulate the entire unit from top and sides. Doing so will ensure the tank is well insulated and minimizes tank heat loss.

- Maintenance: If you have not performed a yearly flush and fill please do so. This will ensure all the sludge is cleared out which impact the safety and efficiency of said HWT. If you have not replaced the anode / cathode do it now as this will ensure the system will not rust out and break down. Confirm the heating elements are still 100% operational and if not replace them. Always test and check the *Petcock* blow off valve and if it's more than ten years old ~ Replace It!

- ToU: Time Of Use: If your location adheres to cheaper rates / ToU it behooves you to schedule your laundry on those cheaper time periods.

- Cold Water Detergents: The advances in cold water detergents have increased over the years. You can literally shave off dollars and cents simply by avoiding doing any laundry that uses hot water. 

- Hang Dry: The highest consumer of electricity in the shortest period of time is the dry besides the oven, HVAC. If you set your washing machine to high speed spin there will be literally very little water to dry out. Hang dry your clothes and let it air out over a slow moving fan.

- Slow Flow / High Pressure: There are countless new facet and shower heads that now offer low flow / high pressure. Using these dispensers in the bathroom sink, kitchen, and shower will save you hundreds of gallons of water per year. It will also reduce the amount of hot water you consume which directly impacts your electrical costs.

- HWT Max Temp: Set the HWT to the highest / safest level per the makers recommendation. Doing so will ensure small children and adults do not get scalded and burned. This will also reduce your energy costs because the tank will not be called to heat up so often. Measure the water with a NFC thermostat at the closet and furthest taps and verify the readings.

- Dishwasher: Confirm the dishwasher is set to its safest range for the heating element which reduces the call for hot water. Do not use the bells and whistles like plate warmers, and other silly features in the dishwasher. All they do is suck power and offer nothing in ways of making the dishes any cleaner!!

- 1 Wire: There are several companies that offer hardware which allows a person to integrate 1 Wire temperature probes. This can be from the likes of Z-Wave, RPi, to 3rd party hardware vendors. Going this route allows endless possibilities to monitor, track, and record metrics to offer you that critical insight. As stated up top I have a huge 1 Wire network that monitors almost every facet of my homes environment and super structure. With the power of the ISY Series Controller it has offered me the ability to know, manage, and control the sub systems in my home to offer me the most efficient, safe, and secure home.

Consider deploying such a 1 Wire system and invest in a hardwired sensing grid. The investment of resources, finance, and sweat equity will pay for itself ten fold!!!  

- Passive Hause: I would encourage you and anyone else to learn about *Passive Hause* technology. The basic principles and technology if applied in your home can and will save you money. I've been involved with passive hause technology for more than 25 years. My next home will be built and certified to meet and exceed the passive hause standards by a factor of two fold. Going this route will allow me to spend my money on better things besides heating, cooling, electricity, gas, water, and tax's!!

Lastly, this is a journey where small steps will help you reach those monumental mile stones. One does not need to spend hundreds / thousands to achieve energy efficiency / reduced costs. It really comes down to lifestyle choices and changes in user habit and timing. If the family unit has buy in you can realize those saving today. If the humans that make up the family unit have zero buy in.

You are simply going to have to accept opening that wallet . . .

 

[larryllix]

2 hours ago, GQuack said:

<snipped>Larryllix to expand on your thoughts, my first was to split the 24 hour day into day and night segments. If during the day, the tank temperature has dropped below "set point," turn on the A/C grid backup. In that scenario I would assume that the solar conditions are such that the panels are not providing enough power, which in fact has happened. Then during sleep hours, do not allow the A/C backup to turn on at all. Pretty simple programming but I need the tank temperature variable to query. Is that variable available?

My first thoughts for the simplest method to get a temp into your ISY would be to get a CAO Tag with a probe (or more of them), along with a CAO Tag manager. Slip the probes into spots to get your needed temperatures and use kumo apps to stuff variables in your ISY.  Alternatively IIRC Jimbo or somebody has developed a node for PolyGlot to do this but that brings in dependence on more gadgets to depend on.

With no cloud dependence, a CAI WC8 board with a few cheap DS18B20 probes to do them same thing. You would have to learn some of their PLC coding but it is an easy and simple language to learn. NodeLink can grab variables right out of that box (no coding)  and stuff them into ISY but again, that takes a RPi or similar (another dependancy box).

[GQuack]

Thank you Larryllix, let me look into that method

[Skazzy]

On 12/27/2017 at 10:05 AM, fasttimes said:

I’m anxiously waiting on my Aquanta to arrive. So anxious that I’m frittering away the hours by posting a sneak-peak review of the product. BTW, I’m not associated with Aquanta in any manner, so sorry if it sounds like I’m shilling for them. I get no kickbacks or discounts of any kind.

 

The Aqunata is a small box that mounts to the top of your hot water heater. It has a enthalpy sensor that plugs into your TP port of your hot water heater. Supposedly if you can replace a sink faucet, you should be able to do this on your own. I believe the sensor measures temperature, but it might measure things as well. This sensor is plugged into the Aquanta unit. The unit comes with a cold water sensor, which you attach to your heater’s cold input supply. The unit uses these two sensors in conjunction to determine your hot water usage patterns. You can also purchase an optional leak sensor.

 

There are three different versions of Aquanta: Electric, Power-vented gas, Atmospheric gas. When ordering, you also need to tell them how tall your tank is. It should work on most newer heaters, though older gas style systems (ones without electronic control) are not supported. If you are unsure, take a picture and email support. They have a 60 day guarantee, so I wouldn’t worry about returns being an issue.

 

I have an atomospheric gas heater, and that is connected from the Aquanta unit to the COM port on the heater. The electric heater version is installed between the heater’s power supply (see the video at the end of this post). I have no idea how the Aquanta controls the gas powered vented version. I’m waiting for a response from support, even though I don’t have that type of heater. I’m just curious. Both gas versions plug into a power outlet, so make sure you have one available if you want to buy this.

 

The installation procedure looks pretty simple:

 

https://portal.aquanta.io/images/install/Aquanta_Installation_Instruction.pdf

 

Once you’ve hooked everything up, you connect to the Aquanta using it’s built in wifi hotspot using their mobile app. You then create an account online and register the unit. There are no subscription fees. It appears to be similar to the Nest model. In fact, one of the best things about this is it will work with your existing Nest thermostats. So when your house is set to “away”, it turns your heater off. The unit is supposed to learn your water usage habits (similar to Nest), and you can control your heater remotely over the internet.

 

Now why do all this? Because you can! You love gadgets, right? But energy savings is the obvious reason. I NEVER turn my heater to vacation mode, because I always forget. And I don’t want to come home to cold water after a trip. I wish Nest would have an app that scans your email and sees a travel itinerary and automatically controls your temperature so it’s at your desired levels by the time you get home. This would also turn on you hot water heater as well. I keep bugging Nest for that. But back to energy savings. This is from Aquanta’s website:

 

“Residential water heaters in the US use on average 2662 kWh (for electric water heaters) or 210 therms (for gas) of energy a year according to the US Energy Information Administration, and our data suggest that at least 20% and up to 50% of that energy in a typical home is wasted through "standby loss". We are being careful to not overpromise, and have 3rd party testing underway to more specifically quantify the saving opportunity. However, our internal studies and modeling suggest that between 10-30% of water heating energy can be saved by intelligent control through Aquanta. The economic value of intelligent control of water heaters is much higher when factoring in peak or time-of-use pricing and utility peak demand reduction and similar incentives.”

 

I’ll post pictures and possibly video after my unit arrives and is installed.

 

Their website is: https://aquanta.io

 

There is also an install video (for electric heaters) here:

 

https://youtu.be/QIyo8y7v2MU

 So I just got this yesterday and set it up. Everything seems to work perfectly and the installation seemed to have gone flawless. However, this morning I woke up to a cold water tank. Any idea why this might be? I have an electric water tank and I followed the installation video perfectly. I have even hit ‘Boost’ and turned off the timer (thinking somehow I screwed something up with the times) but it has been an hour now and no change in the temperature.  What could’ve gone wrong? 

[Teken]

2 hours ago, Skazzy said:

 So I just got this yesterday and set it up. Everything seems to work perfectly and the installation seemed to have gone flawless. However, this morning I woke up to a cold water tank. Any idea why this might be? I have an electric water tank and I followed the installation video perfectly. I have even hit ‘Boost’ and turned off the timer (thinking somehow I screwed something up with the times) but it has been an hour now and no change in the temperature.  What could’ve gone wrong? 

On the physical unit is the LED lit and if so what color is indicated. If the LED is flashing the unit has not connected to the internal WiFi infrastructure. When the system is at rest / standby the LED will be solid blue. If the unit is heating and on the LED will be some kind of pinkish color.

A basic check is to ensure the breaker is on . . .

If it is turn it off, wait 10 seconds, turn it back on.

The unit will beep and make a funny sound and from there connect to your internal WiFi. If connected and you go to the Aqunata website it should indicate a status of Aquanta Intelligence as seen in the image capture here.

 

[Skazzy]

21 minutes ago, Teken said:

On the physical unit is the LED lit and if so what color is indicated. If the LED is flashing the unit has not connected to the internal WiFi infrastructure. When the system is at rest / standby the LED will be solid blue. If the unit is heating and on the LED will be some kind of pinkish color.

A basic check is to ensure the breaker is on . . .

If it is turn it off, wait 10 seconds, turn it back on.

The unit will beep and make a funny sound and from there connect to your internal WiFi. If connected and you go to the Aqunata website it should indicate a status of Aquanta Intelligence as seen in the image capture here.

 

Yes, it's all connected fine. Lit solid green and showing 0% at 13 degrees celsius (cold!!)

[Teken]

21 minutes ago, Skazzy said:

Yes, it's all connected fine. Lit solid green and showing 0% at 13 degrees celsius (cold!!)

Have you tried to turn off the Aquanta unit as seen in this image capture? Are you sure the system isn't set to *Away* mode?? Lastly, I don't recall what a green LED means so will need to dig that up in the manual.

EDIT: Seems a green LED indicates everything is good to go and ready. I gather mine is blue because it's set to the most aggressive load management which is always solid blue unless in heating / recovery mode.

[Skazzy]

25 minutes ago, Teken said:

Have you tried to turn off the Aquanta unit as seen in this image capture? Are you sure the system isn't set to *Away* mode?? Lastly, I don't recall what a green LED means so will need to dig that up in the manual.

EDIT: Seems a green LED indicates everything is good to go and ready. I gather mine is blue because it's set to the most aggressive load management which is always solid blue unless in heating / recovery mode.

Not set to Away for sure. Do you mean turn off Aquanta Intelligence? But that shouldn't affect it should it? I'll try that now. How long is reasonable to wait if I'm 'boosting' the unit for hot water? How soon should I see an increase in temperature?

[Teken]

I would expect the hot water to come on immediately once unit has been disabled. Since the unit was placed in *Boost* that leaves me a little concerned. In the fact it should have offered similar results to letting the HWT operate as a dumb appliance.

If you haven't cycled the breaker give that a shot to see if the unit behaves differently. If it doesn't please do engage the company as they are really great and would be eager to learn what is happening with your unit. 

[lilyoyo1]

3 hours ago, Teken said:

I would expect the hot water to come on immediately once unit has been disabled. Since the unit was placed in *Boost* that leaves me a little concerned. In the fact it should have offered similar results to letting the HWT operate as a dumb appliance.

If you haven't cycled the breaker give that a shot to see if the unit behaves differently. If it doesn't please do engage the company as they are really great and would be eager to learn what is happening with your unit. 

Welcome back. I was wondering where you ran off to. 

[Skazzy]

3 hours ago, Teken said:

I would expect the hot water to come on immediately once unit has been disabled. Since the unit was placed in *Boost* that leaves me a little concerned. In the fact it should have offered similar results to letting the HWT operate as a dumb appliance.

If you haven't cycled the breaker give that a shot to see if the unit behaves differently. If it doesn't please do engage the company as they are really great and would be eager to learn what is happening with your unit. 

Ok.  My bad. Apparently the wiring in my house was completely opposite than the coloured wiring on the video. The bottom terminal was wired the opposite to what it should’ve been, so I simply switched those two wires and now it works. Thanks everyone for your help. 

[Teken]

Welcome back. I was wondering where you ran off to. 

Have been hip deep in a 22 million hardware refresh. Just getting back to normal life and starting to back fill some personal projects on the go!

Hoping to document and load them up in the next few months. Happy New Years ~ will talk soon!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Teken]

Ok.  My bad. Apparently the wiring in my house was completely opposite than the coloured wiring on the video. The bottom terminal was wired the opposite to what it should’ve been, so I simply switched those two wires and now it works. Thanks everyone for your help. 

Rock On . . .


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Jojo-Madman]

In researching this Aquanta controller, I stumbled across this forum and thread, which I love the information shared, thanks!

I was originally looking for information which validated or disproved that this unit really works as marketed, and came across a field study done by "Minnesota Department of Commerce, Division of Energy Resources" for Field Study of an Intelligent, Networked, Retrofittable Water Heater Controller which was the Aquanta unit.

http://mn.gov/commerce-stat/pdfs/card-water-heater-contoller.pdf

In reviewing the test results, it seems to me that this controller may not really provide energy savings as indicated, and at the very least, appears to possibly result in higher water usage due to irregular water temperatures vs steady state.

While I love the concept idea and was ready to order one to try (my cost is higher as I am not in the USA), between the fact that the results of this report seem in conflict and that the unit is cloud-based, I am somewhat reluctant now.

Does anyone have further insight into this?