Automating CH/HW System with "Smart" capabilities

[corkyboy]

Presently we have an oil fired boiler serving the CH/HW it's a pressurised system with a water storage tank. Controlled by a Honeywell Thermostat (located in the hall) set at 22c and a Honeywell ST9400c programmable controller (located in the kitchen).
In everyday use the HW runs on a programme twice a day but the CH we tend to put on manually as and when we feel the need, except in severe weather when we let the programmer take over.
We have several Alexas dotted around the house and what I would ideally like to do is to tell her to put the heating on and off.............so how could this be accomplished equipment wise? I see loads of ads for Nest/Hive thermostats but on their own they won't solve my problem, will they?

Your advice would be greatly appreciated,
Colin

 

[ericmark]

A number of points I would make, having got an oil fired boiler with Nest Gen 3 and Nest Mini's plus Energenie stuff around the house.
1) Nest mini's get it wrong too often, ask them to stop playing music and it says turning off 5 switches and the lights go out, ask it to switch lights back on and it says don't know how to do that yet, so even though Nest Gen 3 and the 4 Energenie TRV's can work with Nest Mini, I would not risk it.
2) Although the Energenie TRV's can be set with IFTTT to work with geofencing, not bothered as once the Nest Gen 3 has turned down heat, they can't heat the room anyway as no water circulating.
3) I don't walk around the house with my mobile phone, it simple sits on charge, if some one calls, I answer with my watch, so having to find a tablet, phone or PC to alter room temperature is a pain, all I want is to walk up to the radiator and push the Eco/Comfort button, but with the Energenie TRV head you can't set the Eco/Comfort temperature, so I actually prefer the cheap eQ-3 TRV heads as I can set the Eco and Comfort temperatures to what I want.
4) The expensive Energenie TRV heads don't have open window detection without adding sensors to windows, where the cheap eQ-3 just detect rapid temperature drop to activate open window temperature reduction (really for open door when unloading shopping).
5) The anti hysteresis software on the Energenie TRV means at 7 am set to 20°C and it was 11 am before actually got 20°C so cheat and set to 22°C for an hour then to 20°C which works OK with a schedule change, but not geofencing, it is claimed the Drayton Wiser TRV head is smart and works this out for its self.

So although we have a "Smart" system it is not as good as one expects, and the house does not cool down or heat up that fast, so when I switch down to 16°C over night, it never cools that much, so if my wife and I go out, although geofencing works, we need to be out for 8 hours or more to make any saving, so in real terms does nothing.

 

[muggles]

Presently we have an oil fired boiler serving the CH/HW it's a pressurised system with a water storage tank. Controlled by a Honeywell Thermostat (located in the hall) set at 22c and a Honeywell ST9400c programmable controller (located in the kitchen).
In everyday use the HW runs on a programme twice a day but the CH we tend to put on manually as and when we feel the need, except in severe weather when we let the programmer take over.
We have several Alexas dotted around the house and what I would ideally like to do is to tell her to put the heating on and off.............so how could this be accomplished equipment wise? I see loads of ads for Nest/Hive thermostats but on their own they won't solve my problem, will they?

Your advice would be greatly appreciated,
Colin

Should do. Nest thermostats work with Alexa

 

[corkyboy]

Many thanks to ericmark and muggles, I've taken the plunge and Hive is on the way. This thread is now closed.