eTrack discussion

How does that furnace gas tracking work? I set it up (otherwise went smooth!) but it only prompted about the kw/h and said it could only track electrical use for the heater.

It also did not find my outletlinc's or outdoor modules.

Thanks!

I'll be interested to see what if any ROI there would be on switching out some bulbs to LEDs.

Thanks,

-Chris

Hi Chris.

Thanks for the feedback. If it didn't prompt for the furnace gas usage but did prompt for kWh values for your thermostat, then you're using an old version of eTrack (I don't think the latest 1.1b1 version is up yet on the User Contribution page). Be sure to download the version linked to in my first post of this thread.

As for the OutletLinc and outdoor modules, what are the exact model names listed in the Indigo edit device dialogs for the missing devices? I'm currently having eTrack filter the devices it tracks based on the model name (to prevent errors with devices like sprinkler controllers, motion sensors, and magnetic contact sensors). If you give me the exact model names (including proper capitalization), I'll add them to the valid device list within eTrack.

Thanks!

That seemed to do it, I was clicking on the link, not noticing I needed to update the version.

OutletLinc
Outdoor Appliance

Nice addition on the gas, I believed I parsed your instructions correctly. The specs on the heater say:

Btu/hr Input Rating: 14,000
Btu/hr Output Rating: 10,039

So I came up 0.14 to enter in for therms.

-Chris

Hi Chris.

Glad to hear you got it working, and thanks for the model information. I'll add those two to eTrack and update the link in the first post in this thread.

You got it. 14,000 BTU/hr input = 0.14 Therms of gas energy used. I hope the instructions in that dialog were clear enough. It's hard to keep instructions like that short while still decipherable.

Updated to eTrack version 1.1b2. It now supports OutletLinc and Outdoor Appliance devices. The Download link in the first post has been updated. Be sure to run the eTrack Setup included in that zip file and choose to "Overwrite" the attachment when prompted.

Thanks,

Yeah the instructions were pretty clear. In my case (Williams wall unit) the input was written in big black letters on it but only said BTU/HR, after reading the spec sheet for the unit your directions made even more sense.

-Chris

BTW the reset (not the reset-all) action script seems to reset the EtrackCostPerKWH and EtrackCostPerTherm. I am not sure if this is expected, but does not seem like it would be unless you wanted to run it manually each billing cycle and update those.

Thanks,

-Chris

BTW the reset (not the reset-all) action script seems to reset the EtrackCostPerKWH and EtrackCostPerTherm. I am not sure if this is expected, but does not seem like it would be unless you wanted to run it manually each billing cycle and update those.

Hey Chris.

Yes, that's intended behavior specifically with the intention of being run at the end of a billing cycle. Would there be a reason to clear the other cost, kWh, and Therm variables but not the eTrackCostPerKWH and eTrackCostPerTherm variables? For testing perhaps?

To me you would want to put that in a timed action to reset the cost KWH/Therms for the devices to run automatically at the end of a billing cycle, but only adjust the costs when they change which happens with far less frequency.

Thanks,

-Chris

Exactly. I opted for creating an Action Group instead of a Schedule (timed action) because many energy companies have variable billing cycles (some cycles with 29 days, some with 30, some with 31, all depending on the month and the customer's billing group). So you'd need to create your own schedule, then just execute the "eTrack - Reset" Action Group as the action taken by the scheduled task.

Just to be clear, running the "eTrack - Reset" Action Group or the "eTrack - Reset All" Action Group doesn't recalculate anything, it just changes all the values to zero. If costs change (e.g. your cost per kWh or cost per Therm) in the middle of the billing cycle (also a common situation), simply change the corresponding eTrack variable (eTrackCostPerKWH or eTrackCostPerTherm) to the new rate. It won't recalculate existing values, but will calculate all new energy usage with the new rates, adding them to the respective Grand Total variables.

I think my use case is slightly different, in part because I just don't have the time to make it 100% accurate (Dad of 15 month old twins). So I will probably put the reset on a schedule. What your saying is certainly true, I'm more just looking to get order of magnitude costs out of it. To see what the return on investment time would be on things like changing out a bulb for a more efficient one if it is used allot or comparing the electric heater in the kids room vs the gas one in ours. I know the gas one is more efficient but I'm wondering how long it would take to payback having one installed. Also I'm on tiered electric pricing with PG&E so it is already not 100% accurate to begin with.

So far working great though.

I've already learned about one track light that has used 1.7kwh while everything else is a tiny fraction of 1 each.

-Chris

Ahh.. Gotcha. Yes, I've learned something similar with some track lighting in my music room as well. Glad to hear eTrack has been of some use for you.

nsheldon
Nice handy script, thanks for sharing. Would like to request some added variables. One is a variable for total run time
for each device, and a cycle count per device (how many time did the device change state).

This would be handy for finding the best temperature setting for AC when no one is in the house. If the total run time is
high and the count is low I am not saving much.

Thanks again for the script.

Elwood

Hi Elwood.

Thanks for the feedback. I'll look into adding those variables and associated triggers.

I just tried installing eTrack and right after specifiying the wattage of my devices I get an error that says "Can't continue createVariable". I ran the setup again and clicked edit which opened the script which I ran and entered the information again. It seems the specific section its failing at is the following when running the actual script:

Error: IndigoServer got an error: Can't continue createVariable

Script:

createVariable("eTrackCostPerKWH",costPerKWH, true)

I also just saw this in my Indigo Log, this happens when it loads the questions about costs for electricity.

Error CloseFile() caught exception: FileIOError -- cannot close unopen file
Error LoadAttachment() caught exception: FileIOError -- cannot read from unopen