New HeaterMate's Wi-Fi - Has anyone used it?

Forums › Gadgets, robotics, home automation, electronics (including wearables) › New HeaterMate's Wi-Fi - Has anyone used it?

philthynz

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#272850 20-Jul-2020 12:09

Has anyone here used the new HeaterMate wi-fi? Does it work as advertised?

And in general, are they still dangerous to use? I've seen mixed blogs, some say it's dangerous and it has smoked, others say they haven't had issues. Maybe something they fixed in newer versions?

kingjj

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#2526027 20-Jul-2020 14:37

We've got 2 HeaterMates at home, have not tried the Wifi one as yet. Have one of the originals and one of the Wireless ones. Have been somewhat unimpressed with both. The original fell apart quickly and is currently held together by electrical tape. The wireless one was very finicky to start with and would randomly disconnect requiring re linking. Have had no concerns around safety though, neither has smoked/burned out.

I personally wouldn't jump straight into the first release of any of their products having had issues with both the first batch of originals and the first batch of wireless ones. Would be interested to see peoples opinions over the WiFi one though.

networkn

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#2526028 20-Jul-2020 14:39

Perhaps not the response you'll want, however with the exception of a heat pump, I wouldn't leave any heater in a room unattended for more than a few minutes, especially while I sleep.

Despite making my living from IT, there are some things where the consequences of failure mean I am not keen to risk it.

tanivula

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#2526034 20-Jul-2020 14:43

I've got 2 of the plain ones (oldest one dates back to 2015) and can't say I've had too many issues with either of them. I see arlec have started selling a similar (non wifi) one but has 0.5deg increments (and possibly only heating as opposed to heating and cooling which I've used in both modes with the heatermate).

Occasionally after a long period of non use, or after travelling and buttons being mashed - they have required a reset, but other than that they've been pretty good.

fearandloathing

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#2526035 20-Jul-2020 14:44

kingjj:

The original fell apart quickly and is currently held together by electrical tape.
Have had no concerns around safety though, neither has smoked/burned out.

Are they not contradictory statements?

tehgerbil

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#2526045 20-Jul-2020 15:29

They're great - provided you run no more than 1kW through them. The worst mistake people do is hook them up to a normal 1.5+ kW heater and it fries the contacts from what I understand from reading reviews etc.

In regards to the wifi model - I agree as above, avoid v.1 of products that are high-risk in nature.

We did have a heatermate for our sons room, but after my SIL killed hers by running too much current we relegated it to our bedroom and ensured we only have the heater on 1/2 and it's been fine for over a year now.

We now have thermostat micathermic heaters in the kids rooms.

russelo

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#2526117 20-Jul-2020 17:29

Bought two of the original ones 5 years ago and still working fine.

Have been using it on a 2000W fan heater without any problems. Their specs says 10A max.

kingjj

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#2526639 21-Jul-2020 16:22

fearandloathing:

kingjj:

The original fell apart quickly and is currently held together by electrical tape.
Have had no concerns around safety though, neither has smoked/burned out.

Are they not contradictory statements?

Yeah I'll grant you that... the original's casing came apart when pulling out the heater plug one day. It had several clips, a couple didn't survive so when I reassembled it I wrapped it up in electrical tape for peace of mind. In regards to safety, there's been no smoking/excessive heat/fused contacts etc. So I guess what I was trying to say was that the build quality of the case was not great but I haven't had concerns about the internals.

Re the Arlec one someone else mentioned, we have one in our bedroom - two things to note with that one: there is no battery backup so when you lose power it resets to the default temperature of 22c (learnt that one the hard way) and the green light for when it is operating is excessively bright, to the point where we've had to cover it.

In an ideal world we'd all be able to run efficient heat pumps in our bedrooms, alas this isn't feasible for a lot and when you toss in the cold weather we get down south its also not feasible not to run a heater at night in bedrooms. Running low risk heaters (e.g. oil column) on their own circuit with a good thermostat and a lot of clearance is safe enough for me.

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philthynz

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#2526645 21-Jul-2020 16:32

Hmmm, I miss my European style radiators 😂

I was deciding to get a heatermate for a nursery and using a panel heater, but after the bad feedback I've seen I wouldn't trust it. The heatermate was an idea to regulate temperature and control a panel heater that didn't have a thermostat. Probably a better quality heater with built in thermostat would be better than the heatermate. Like the Dimplex panel heaters that can also be controlled by an app.

I have a trial of an InfraRed heat panel with a wireless thermostat on it's way, so I'll be testing this to see how it performs.