Problem with thermostat

Jon_Celia · 05-20-2013, 07:48 PM

We are on our first shake down trip with the new 295RL.

We LOVE our trailer. There is so much more room than our Surveyor 265 TT. It's total luxury.

I am having trouble getting the thermostat to turn on the heater in the morning. I wake up the thermostat, touch the mode button, it goes from AUTO to FURN, I use the arrow button to adjust the temperature from 68 to 70 and then both the A/C and furnace turn on together. There is no heat from the furnace and the A/C is not very cold.

I talked with the service dept at my dealer twice today, and he is stumped. I tried calling Dometic, but the call waiting time was rediculous.

Any help greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

Jon

iceblaze580 · 05-20-2013, 07:51 PM

If you go to the fan setting on the t-stat put the speed to auto I was having the same thing happen to me and that seemed to solve it for now

fonzie · 05-20-2013, 07:53 PM

Here is manual for dometic thermostat. Hope it helps.

Jon_Celia · 05-20-2013, 07:56 PM

We are on our fist shake down trip with our new 295RL. We LOVE our new fifth wheel. There is so much more room than our Surveyor 265 TT. This is pure luxury.

When I touch a button to wake up the thermostat, that works fine, I then touch MODE and it changes from AUTO to FURN. I touch the up arrow from 68 to 70, then the furnace and A/C comes on together.

I called my dealers service dept. twice today, he walked me through the same process, and the same end result. He is stumped.

I tried to call Dometic, but the waiting list was so long, I hung up.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

Jon

fonzie · 05-20-2013, 07:58 PM

Here is manual

Dave_Monica · 05-20-2013, 07:58 PM

Here's a link to the operating instructions for a single zone thermostat from the library, have you looked through it?

Forest River Forums - Downloads - Thermostat - Dometic Single Zone LCD

Dave

bob34787 · 05-20-2013, 07:59 PM

thats the opposite of mine, if I put it on auto and the a/c is on and the temp drops below what the furnace was set at than they both run.

Dave_Monica · 05-20-2013, 08:04 PM

John, I've merged your 2 posts into one.

Dave

Jon_Celia · 05-20-2013, 09:44 PM

Thank you for merging my two posts. For some reason, the first one would not load. I guess it did load.

I have the two zone thermostat.

I have read through the manual several times, but it really is not very well written.

Any more suggestions?

Thanks.

Jon

txcolumbo · 05-21-2013, 04:44 AM

I believe I read in another post that they ran the AC up to a higher temperture so the Heater and AC did not conflict. You might try putting AC at least 10 degrees above the Heater setting. See if that works then you can find tune it. Don't know for sure if it will work but mght be worth a try.

amxpress · 05-21-2013, 07:14 AM

If you have a front AC unit, make sure it is OFF.
Set the other to FURN MODE
Set the desired temperature.
If you set the FAN mode to AUTO, the fan will cycle with the furnace when the temperture drops below the set temperature. (Make sure your LP tanks are turned on)
Hope this works in yours as it does in mine.

SargeW · 05-21-2013, 08:15 PM

I am having a similar issue. My furnace does not come on at all. I have 1 zone, and the unit will not switch to heat. If I set the thermostat to furnance, the fan comes on, and the only air blows out of the A/C ducts. Nothing out of the floor registers.

travelor2 · 05-21-2013, 11:03 PM

Hello,
To say that the manual is not very well written is a huge understatement!!!
I had the same issue when I got our 320rs. I never had a 2 zone thermostat and it really was giving me fits. I read the manual and it just confused me more until I boiled it down to 2 things to do.
First make sure your fan in all modes is set to auto. Do not set it to a certain speed. This will ensure that the fan for the ac and the furnace will only run when the ac or furnace is actually running. On auto you will notice that the fan will run at different speeds depending on what the temp differential is inside the trailer. For instance if you are running the AC and you have it set for 10 degrees cooler than it is inside you will get a higher fan speed than if the temp differential is only 3 degrees. The systems automatically figures it out.
Second. You control all zones by temp. First, I need to tell you that at the end of the day, and I am all done with AC, I set the temp to both zones as high as the t-stat will go. Lets say you want to run the ac, but you only want to run the rear unit. In my trailer that is zone 1. So, I wake up the thermostat and go to the AC mode. I punch up zone 1 and set the temp, and the unit starts. Since zone 2 was already set to max temp it will not come on. If you decide to run zone 2 as well, just set zone 2 down to your preferred temp. When you are done with the AC, just set both temps in both zones to max. The units will stop until you re-set the temps. In this way, you can control each unit to suit your needs.
I know you referenced getting your furnace to work properly. I always set my furnace at night to a low sleeping temp, and then in the morning jack it up until the wife says she is comfortable.
So, the bottom line is this. This thermostat tells the AC or furnace to turn on or off, based on the temps you set. If your AC is working, there is only 2 ways to get it to turn off. Either set the temp higher for the zone you want off or press the off button. Switching to another mode will not turn it off.
I hope I have made myself clear and this helps you to understand how to operate your system.

Jon_Celia · 05-22-2013, 05:15 PM

Travelor2:

Yes, you made yourself perfectly clear. I finally figured it out this morning.

When we woke up this morning, is was 41 inside the trailer and 31 outside with dry snow falling.

I woke up the thermostat, the furnace mode was on and I left the temperature where iwas set at 68, and everything kicked in fine and warmed up the trailer.

What I was doing wrong was raising the temp to 72 and that kicked both the a/c and furnace on.

Now I have it figured out. It works fine.

How do you reprogram the thermostat. Again, there is nothing in the manual how to program anything. A worthless piece of paper.

I actually called Dometic, and they would not even talk to me and said I had to call the dealer and they would talk with them. Now that is great customer service, especially since I told them the dealer service dept was stumped and how the thermastat worked. They suggested I take my trailer to any RV dealer and have them try to help me. That was great as we are on a trip.

Glad I finally figured it out.

slacktime · 05-22-2013, 09:31 PM

Thanks for the subject, I will spread the temprature range between the two units when I pick my TT up. I could see where both units could cycle if only set two degrees apart. And deffinatly set for Auto and hope all is well.

travelor2 · 05-23-2013, 12:36 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jon_Celia

Travelor2:

Yes, you made yourself perfectly clear. I finally figured it out this morning.

When we woke up this morning, is was 41 inside the trailer and 31 outside with dry snow falling.

I woke up the thermostat, the furnace mode was on and I left the temperature where iwas set at 68, and everything kicked in fine and warmed up the trailer.

What I was doing wrong was raising the temp to 72 and that kicked both the a/c and furnace on.

Now I have it figured out. It works fine.

How do you reprogram the thermostat. Again, there is nothing in the manual how to program anything. A worthless piece of paper.

I actually called Dometic, and they would not even talk to me and said I had to call the dealer and they would talk with them. Now that is great customer service, especially since I told them the dealer service dept was stumped and how the thermastat worked. They suggested I take my trailer to any RV dealer and have them try to help me. That was great as we are on a trip.

Glad I finally figured it out.

I am happy to hear that you got it figured out. They might as well have written the manual in Russian. Not user friendly at all. Sorry I can't help you with reprograming the thermostat. I was quite happy just to figure this thing out and get it to work. Again, I am glad it now works for you and just maybe this thread was a help to other folks on the board who were having issues.

SargeW · 05-23-2013, 08:36 AM

I called Dometic yesterday and spoke to a tech about the problem I was having. After walking through all of the functions and doing a reset on the thermostat, it was determined that I either have a main board failure on the thermostat, or the furnace itself is defective.

I could check the function of the furnace if I pull out the furnace and grounded the thermostat wires together. I may wait until I get home for that.

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