Couple of central heating / hot water questions..

[Localher0]

Hoping that you clever people can help with a couple of issues we have.

The radiators on the top floor of the house are controlled by a wireless thermostat. Unfortunately when the stat is in it's correct position it can't communicate with the controller as the controller and boiler are in the basement. To get round this I keep the stat in a cool part of the basement but obviously it's not reading the temperature on the top floor.
Is there a solution to this? Can I use a stat which plugs in and uses the wiring in the house??

Second question: we have a pressurised hot water system which runs on a timer. There is also a recirculating pump which runs off the same timer. When the HW is off it is noticeably cooler than when it's on. I thought that the heat loss from these cylinders in minimal as they are so well insulated so I don't really understand why the water feels cooler. Could there be some other heat loss?? If I run the HW on constant the house starts to heat up as the pump is circulating the hot water constantly so that doesn't seem very efficient to me!!

Thanks!

[PigletJohn]

If you mean that the recirculating pump is to keep the tapwater hot in the pipes between the cylinder and the taps, then, yes, these pipes will act as long thin radiators. How thick is the insulation on them?

As for the thermostat, how do you control the heating on all the other floors of the house?

[Localher0]

Thank you PigletJohn for replying so quickly!

Yes the recirculating pump does just that - I don't know what the insulation on the pipes looks like as I can't see any of the hot water pipes. Its a new build so everything is hidden. But what you say makes sense as the house does start to heat up with just the hot water on and no CH.

The house is one four floors. Basement and top are traditional radiators with separate wireless stats and separate controllers next to the boiler. The middle two floors have underfloor heating and are controlled with wired room stats.

[PigletJohn]

I would be happier with a wired programmable stat, but you might try a wifi smart stat and use wifi repeaters. However I have no experience of them. AFAIK the thermostat makers do not offer repeaters but you could email them as they will be familiar with the problem.

You probably have a plumbing duct which runs all the way up the house and usually will be in a corner of the kitchen and the bathrooms above it (there are design benefits in having plumbed rooms above each other) and it would be possible to run a cable up there. It is supposed to be clipped to the wall at intervals of 400mm when vertical, which may be tricky if the duct is boxed in with no access.

If a glossy new house the architect may have included cable ducts which will be convenient.

If the bedroom radiators have TRVs I suppose you could try using them and a timer with no effective bedroom thermostat, but it would not be a very good solution.

You will be delighted to know that some plumbers don't bother insulating internal pipes.