Vicki with an External window Open/Close sensor
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Vicki has a built in functionality to detect the event of opening a window. If the temperature drops more than a pre-set value over a 1 minute period the functionality is triggered and the valve is closed completely. This is done in order to avoid wasting energy, heating a room that is at the same time being cooled by cold air entering from the outside.
While this is a useful feature, it has the disadvantage of being time based. Upon activation the Open Window mode is triggered for a time, after the period expires Vicki reverts to its normal operation schedule.
As the Vicki has not way to determine when exactly the window has been closed with its onboard sensors this process can be a bit of a hit and miss.
However, utilizing an additional MClimate sensor attached to the window and combining it with MClimate Enterprise advanced functionality a scenario can be realized where Vicki will be controlled precisely and it will react on opening and closing the window both.
This article assumes that you have the necessary devices and functionalities implemented into your Building already, which are listed below:
Vicki in Automatic/Automatic with External Mode
Heating profile assigned to Vicki
Open/Close Sensor
If you have not onboarded and/or configured the devices, you can look at our Quick Start guide and the Heating Profile section to set up your Schedule.
Make sure your Vicki is installed well, calibrated properly and you have your Heating profile set up and go to the next chapter to start configuring the Open/Close sensor.
Go to the Control section of the Open/Close Sensor and expand the Advanced settings. Select the Vicki you want to control and move it to the right via the arrow button.
In this example we are controlling a single Vicki, however you can have as many as you need. If the two were properly paired the Vicki should move to the right portion of the table.
This change can also be viewed in the Command logs for the Open/Close sensor. Checking on the logs is considered a good practice and gives a good indication on past events, we highly recommend getting used to looking at Command logs and Uplink data when you want to get a deeper understanding of the adjustments that have been performed.
Now that the Vicki and the Open/Close sensor have been paired, a change of state (open to close and vice versa) will trigger a response in Vicki.
Let us look at the event of the sensor reporting changing state to "Open". This is done by separating the two portions (the LED blinks to indicate it), which in our case would be when the window is open.
The "Open" event, triggers a Scheduled change of the target temperature to 5°C. This is the minimum allowed value for the Target temperature, thus it will result in the Vicki completely cutting off the flow via the valve it is controlling in order to save up energy (as it would be inefficient to heat a room with an open window).
The event is reflected in the Monitor interface and the Physical display of Vicki (depending on your keep alive it might take a couple of minutes to update visually).
As there is a Heating profile applied to Vicki changing its Target temperature to 5°C forces it to go into Boost mode. This is a mode where Vicki operates under a Target temperature different from the Heating profile scheduled one for a period of time. When the period expires it reverts to the schedule.
If one were to look at the Boost time it can be noted that it adds up exactly to the 24:00 point. Heating profiles work on a 24 hour basis and can not be carried over to the next day, so the setting is applied to the end of the day and will be set anew the next one. This ensures that unless the window is closed when the next schedule timeslot comes Vicki will remain closed.
The real benefit of this advanced setup as opposed to the build in Open window detection is the ability to automatically change the Target temperature when the Window/Sensor is closed. This is not possible with Vicki alone as there is no good way to determine when the window is closed, which the Open/Close Sensor can do.
Let us look at the Closing event.
The Open/Close sensor instructs Vicki again, this time to Schedule a temperature change to whatever is the current Target temperature as per the Heating profile at the time is. Keep in mind that this can be different from the Target temperature at the time of opening the window as it could have moved to a different Heating profile zone while the window was open.
In this particular example Vicki goes to a Target temperature of 24°C as this is the one for the current Heating profile time frame. The valve opens up to a certain degree depending on the Measured temperature and the temperature control algorithm kicks in, adjusting in order to reach and remain at the Target temperature.
This setup ensures that heating will be efficient and you will not be taxing your system forcing it to work overtime to heat a space that is being rapidly cooled at the same time.
