Easy to use Household Temperature Monitor?

Jim Carroll asks: "I awoke this morning to a gas furnace that conked out. The house was 60F. We had to turn the switch off and on to get it working again. Fair enough -- but I'm worried about it going off when I'm travelling and having the pipes freeze. I'm looking for an inexpensive, simple to use temperature monitor/sensor that would plug into a USB port, that would then log household temperature to a server, so that I can view it through my broadband connection while travelling. Sure, there are all kinds of complex X10 solutions; there seems to be a few kits out there; and some high end industrial applications, but these all involve spending a few hundred dollars. I want simple, straightforward, cheap -- plug it in, and it dumps the temp every few minutes to a file. But there doesn't seem to be anything that is simple, $10-20, that is consumer oriented? And if not, why aren't companies yet making this type of device?"

Comments

Cookies, beer, and a trinket

[ObviousGuy]

If you are away from home for any length of time, ask your neighbor or a family member to stop in once in a while, especially on cold days to make sure that your house is still in good order. Bribe them with cookies and beer, then when you return from your trip give them an exotic trinket from the place you visited.

Also, keep in mind that 60 degrees farenheit is pretty far from freezing and that the inside of your house is unlikely to reach the temperatures required to freeze the pipes *inside* your home.

Re:Cookies, beer, and a trinket

[VultureMN]

I'd think an even more Obvious answer is to have the switch/thermostat fixed. But maybe that's just me...

Re:Cookies, beer, and a trinket

[timshea]

Also, keep in mind that 60 degrees farenheit is pretty far from freezing and that the inside of your house is unlikely to reach the temperatures required to freeze the pipes *inside* your home.

Agreed. 60 degrees Fahrenheit is pretty warm for the inside of a house at night during winter. Even my folks, in their 70s, keep their thermostat at 60 at night.

It's not uncommon that it's in the 50s in my house when I've been lazy with burning wood and it's under 30 outside...and I've slept a few hours too long. Lazy me.

Your pipes aren't likely to freeze until it's well below freezing if you keep your cold water dripping - I see 20s outside and high 40s inside before I need to start letting the water drip in the kitchen, which is the longest run of my water piping.

Now when the power goes out, and your pump stops pumping, then you'd better be home to drain your plumbing before it freezes.

Re:Cookies, beer, and a trinket

[HyperbolicParabaloid]

I'm guessing you don't live anywhere that gets cold.
If your furnace goes off, the thermostat isn't involved, and your house will certainly get cold fast. If it is freezing outside, it WILL get freezing inside. And since the water and heat pipes are in the walls, they will get colder faster than the inside of the house itself (if they are in the exterior walls, that is).
And since it can get pretty damn cold at night, your neighbor would have to move in, and stay awake all the time to provide effective monitoring.

Re:Cookies, beer, and a trinket

[mdielmann]

Also, keep in mind that 60 degrees farenheit is pretty far from freezing and that the inside of your house is unlikely to reach the temperatures required to freeze the pipes *inside* your home.

If he lives in northern U.S, in the Rockies, in Alaska, or any number of places outside the U.S., it is very reasonable to assume that your furnace not working for a day or two will cause your pipes to freeze.

space heater

[wowbagger]

There is a fundimental flaw in your idea, which is why no-one has done it:

OK, you have a module plugged into your USB port providing temperature to the computer. Oops, the computer has crashed - now who takes care of the problem?

OK, the computer has rebooted, and sees that it is too cold in the house - the furnace has failed. OK, so now what does the computer do - start crunching SETI@Home packets to heat the place?

OK, the computer emails you. The email goes out, and then the computer picks it up and throws it into your mail queue.

OK, you don't have the computer getting your email - you get it via Webmail. So, your computer is in Ohio, and you are in Hawai'i. Now, what do YOU do about the furnace?

There is already a solution to the problem of keeping your pipes from freezing - it is called an electric space heater. Set it to 45 degrees. Place it in the basement away from any flammable items. If the furnace fails, the heater will automatically keep things from freezing.

Sure, a long term power outage will prevent this from working. Guess what - it would also prevent your computer from working. Yes, a UPS will keep the machine running for a while - how many minutes?

The other solution is even more ingenious - it is called "a neighbor".

Lastly, if you WANT temperature monitoring for your computer - look at Dallas Semiconductor's One Wire system. They have cheap sensors that will report the temperature over 1 wire - a little programming on the parallel port and you can read them.

But really, try the simpler solutions first. They will work better.

Re:space heater

[jjshoe]

OK, you have a space heater that goes up in flames and causes just enough flame for the neighbor watching the house to call the fire department. You now have a broken down door, a basement turned into an ice rink from the water used to put it out. No electricity, and no heat.

My ups ran my fridge for three days in the summer, there is no reason i can think of that it cant handle my computer for a week.

K.I.S.S.

[Spock the Baptist]

Turn on a couple of faucets to drip.

Try this do-dad

[R2.0]

http://www.dataq.com/products/startkit/di194rs.htm

$25 data logger, analog & digital inputs. Use an RTD for temp.

Fixing the symptom?

[Anonymous Coward]

I think the first thing you need to do is get your furnace fixed so that it doesn't just "conk out".

Monitoring the temperature so that you can tell if it failed is only fixing the symptom of the problem, not the problem itself (which is an unreliable furnace).

You probably already have a solution.

[chrisatslashdot]

Got a web cam?

Got a thermometer?

Keep it simple and go to the hardware store.

[duffbeer703]

Avoid complex and error-prone geek solutions... buy some pipe wrap insulation and a few electric pipe heating cords.

Pipe cords are like an electric blanket for pipes. They get plugged into a standard wall socket and have a built in thermostat to keep the pipes from freezing. Put these in your bathrooms, kitchen sink and basement and you'll be fine. They run about $10.

Also leave a couple of faucets dripping slightly.

If you are leaving your home for more than a week, ask a friend or neighbor to drop by and check things out.