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Original material is licensed under a Creative Commons License permitting non-commercial sharing with attribution.
12/29/08
Frankly, do ing this in a home will make the netire system LESS efficient. Especially if you were to set all the vents to close on the floor that had the thermostat. The heat would run all night because the thermostat would think that it's colder than the set temp in the whole house, because no heat is coming out and warming the thermostat floor.
Likewise for closing vents in unused rooms. it just makes the whole house less efficient.
12/29/08
Well, but if you coordinate the vent timers with a programmable thermostat, and you don't mind tinkering around with it a bit, you could set it up so that the room with the thermostat receives less heat at a particular time of day, and that the thermostat is set to a lower setting during that time. Not too low, as you do still want it to push heat to other parts of the house.
My townhouse gets a little wonky, though. The first floor is noticably warmer than the upstairs, and the basement is warmer still. I've shut all the vents in the basement and it still gets a ton of heat just from having all the ductwork running through it. The first floor is only being heated by one vent in the kitchen (not where the thermostat is located, though it is the closest one) and it feels fine. The first floor half-bath gets very cold in the winter and very warm in the summer, but that's because it has a vent but not a return (we just need to add an outflow fent in the door at some point and it should start to match the downstairs temp). The upstairs, I have every vent open but these condos are not insulated so the upstairs bleeds heat out at night. Heat's supposed to rise, but the reverse seems true in my home. Fortunately, the gas bill is covered by the HOA so I don't need to wear a parka to bed.
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