I bought a CT80 thermostat made by Radio Thermostat. It’s their top of the line model. It has two slots for adding USNAP Z-wave, WIFI, or Zigbee modules. I added a Z-wave module to mine and quickly found that Vera would lose communication with it that could only be restored for a few minutes by power cycling the thermostat. After reading through the forums, I discovered that I should have paid more attention prior to purchase, as many reported the same thing (with the similar CT30).
Radio Thermostat provided a description and “workaround” for the problem described as follows:
There is a known issue with v7.4 of RTCOA Z-Wave firmware that will cause thermostats to constantly transmit on the Z-Wave network. This constant transmit condition will cause communication failures not only with the thermostat itself, but other Z-Wavenodes in proximity to the thermostat. This issue has been known to occur only on thermostats joined as always listening devices (c-wire) with moderate to large z-wave networks. This race [sic] condition is only present in v7.4 and has been eliminated in all subsequent firmware versions.
So, I thought, here’s the solution. I’ll just follow the directions which involve removing the C-wire and including the thermostat running on batteries so that it would use FLiRS mode. ONE BIG problem; the CT30 and 3M-50 have batteries, but the CT80 does not. I then emailed Radio Thermostat and asked for a solution for the CT80. Their reply:
You will need to contact the company you purchased the thermostat from for the Zwave support.
If you have any additional questions please don’t hesitate to contact us.
Seriously? The seller is supposed to provide technical support for the USNAP Z-wave module with the Radio Thermostat name on it in big bold letters? You know that’s not going to happen. One, because sellers don’t usually provide that service, and two, in this case, because there is apparently NO solution.
Their workaround is also misleading in this aspect. It says, “This race [sic] condition is only present in v7.4 and has been eliminated in all subsequent firmware versions.” Great, I’ll just buy one of those later versions. Guess what? They don’t exist. v7.4 is the only one for sale.
So, in case I completely missed it after Googling for many, many hours, does anyone know how to resolve the USNAP Z-wave problem with the Radio Thermostat CT80?
KKL - after several weeks of fooling around I have gotten to the same point you were at - I have the v7.4 firmware bug and no way around it. Were you even able to get anywhere?
I have the Canadian equivalent of the CT-80 (saved some money) and I completely agree Radio Thermostat’s tech support sucks. I called them after I had a wiring issue and they kept trying to force me to go through the seller saying immediately “the unit must be bad”… which for me wasn’t going to work since I purchased it off of eBay.
Anyway I finally got it to work and it is a great thermostat. I’m just curious why you guys are using the z-wave module. I have the WiFi module in mine and it works perfectly with the Radio Thermostat plugin for Vera. Whatever you guys want the z-wave module to do, the WiFi module can do it with the plugin.
My CT30 sits on a shelf. I had nothing but problems with it. The workaround is a not-workaround. Agree, Radio Thermostat punts. After the “contact the vendor” response, I received the following. I gave up.
Hi
I believe the issue is with the 7.4 version of Zwave. I do not know the firmware version on your CT30 but if your unit supports a newer version of Zwave firmware it will get around your issue.
If you have a CT30eA it will not support the newer version of zwave modules. But if you have a CT30eC with firmware version 1.88 it will support newer versions of Zwave like 9.0 This version should work this Casa Vera.
So if your unit supports a newer version – please ask your vendor to get you an newer version of zwave.
If you have any additional questions please don’t hesitate to contact us.
I thought that RTCOA was getting its act together with the release of Z-wave FW 9.0, but I was sadly mistaken. After adding a Z-wave FW 9.0 USNAP module to my CT80 that already had a WIFI USNAP module, I found that the Z-wave device in Vera UI5 wasn’t accurate. If I change the setpoint temperature via the WIFI device (in the same thermostat), the Z-wave device will temporarily sync to the new temperature, then revert back to its own previous setting. It remains incorrect despite polling, reloading, restarting, etc. The fan indicator also reverts to Auto, regardless of the actual fan setting.
I emailed RTCOA tech support about this and was flabbergasted to read their response:
None of our thermostats should be used with both a wifi module and a z wave module at the same time. You can only have one or the other. Yes, there are two slots on the back, but that is for preference of which side you want the module in, or which side is more easily accessible once installed on the wall. When you try to use both z wave and wifi at the same time, one or the other will not work exactly as it should, and commands from both can be ignored. It is not meant to do both, and we absolutely do not support using both modules. It was not designed for more than 1 use at a time.
I replied:
Here is what the Z-Wave USNAP Module User Guide says at the bottom of page 4: “3) If you only have 1 USNAP module inserted in the thermostat you will see a r1 or r2 to indicate that the radio is in slot 1 or slot 2. If you have multiple radios you can select which radio…” Additionally, here is what the RTCOA news release said regarding the CT80 debut (3rd paragraph): “This thermostat is 100% guaranteed compatible with all popular HVAC systems and also has the capability to accept two communication modules simultaneously.” The interface on the CT80 itself is clearly designed for two simultaneous UNSAP modules.
I received this response:
I checked again with my supervisor and she is saying the exact same thing, z wave and wifi modules will not work correctly when trying to use both at the same time in any of our thermostat models. There is no way to make both of them work exactly as they would individually. Typically the z wave takes over and several wifi features either do not work or are disabled. Our thermostats cannot use 2 modules at the same time.
I suspect that after the the thermostats were released that RTCOA discovered the incompatibility. Rather than bearing the expense of fixing the problem, they just deny that they were designed to use two. Pretty pathetic.
I am using a 2Gig Radio Thermostat RT100 using Zwave which I purchased about a month ago.
I didn’t have connectivity issues, but something else strange happened.
When I first installed it about a month ago, I was looking for an easy way to program it. I believe that I upgraded firmware from UI5 at the time and then on the device control page, below the mode settings, a seven day program schedule appeared. To get an idea of what I’m talking about, it was similar to the schedule for Iris thermostat programming (except that the coloring was totally different and the days of the week were in the vertical columns instead of in the horizontal rows).
It was very easy to program a weekly schedule with four different independent setpoints per day. But then, that interface disappeared and I don’t know how to get it back.
I did install and uninstall some apps before and after the appearance and disappearance of the interface but I haven’t been able to find any apps that offer this function. I also ungraded my UI7 to a newer build, and I’m not sure if that made the interface disappear.
It was a very easy way to program thermostats and I can’t imagine having to code my tstat program after having such an easy graphical interface.
Anyone have a similar experience?
I too was surprised that those stats will not work with 2 radios installed. The whole Idea was to have that option.
This is stuff that screws up the industry.
