Fast-STAT Common Maker - Adds a Common C Popular Wi-Fi Thermostats

My home has only two wires to my thermostats that control zone valves in my forced hot water heating system. I purchased a Nest Wi-Fi thermostat which requires a C-wire. The bottom line is that the Fast-STAT Common Maker does the job. Long story short, older models of the Fast-STAT may not work with the Nest. I cannot speak for other thermostat brands. Here’s the long story. My local HVAC company installed an older model of this Common Maker from their inventory. The basic model of the Nest appeared to be working correctly for that zone after installation. I then wanted to have Wi-Fi capability on another one of my zones, so I then purchased the latest Nest model, Gen3. I connected it in place of the basic Nest model to try it out. The Fast-STAT did not work with it. I contacted the manufacturer, Nordic Technology. Their customer support was great. I learned that the version of their device that was installed by my HVAC company was not compatible with the newer Nest models. Nordic Technology sent me their latest version and then the Nest Gen3 worked. I then moved the original Nest to the second zone, and it again appeared to work with the older version of the Common Maker. However, I discovered that it reported low power on the C-wire when I dug into the thermostat’s menu. I don’t know if that power condition was also occurring in the initial zone where it was installed. Given the compatibility issue with Nest Gen3, I ordered this latest version of the Fast-STAT. After substituting it in place of the older Fast-STAT model, the low-power status message for the C-wire went away. It took some trial and error, but I’m very satisfied with this latest version of the Common Maker with my two different models of the Nest thermostat. Again, the customer support from Nordic Technology was great and it enabled me to troubleshoot the compatibility issue without having to pay for another HVAC company service visit.

I upgraded two older digital thermostats to smart units. Unfortunately when I started the project, I didn't realize they needed a "C" wire. My set-up had only two wires. My first thought was to pull new wires, but someone advised me against this (told me I should have someone experienced do it as the wires traverse studs). After reading on-line, I learned about these gizmos and decided to give them a try. Prior to buying, I actually called their customer support and asked questions, as I've not done much electrical work in the past. The support person was awesome: patiently explaining how to do this and made me feel confident I could do this. I also learned that I needed to order a power supply.So once I sat down to do the job, I found I didn't really understand the diagrams (and deciding which diagram I needed to follow). So I called customer support again. A different person asked me to send him pictures of how my furnace is wired. He quickly figured out what I needed to do and explained it to me (again). He said to call back if I ran into problems.While I was a little concerned when I cut the wires running from upstairs to the basement, the wiring task wasn't too hard. There's actually two units involved. One went upstairs behind the thermostat. Connecting that was easy. The second unit, which is what was featured in the pictures, was also easy to wire up. Even adding in a power supply wasn't hard. The thermostat booted up just fine the first time.Oh, and think about how you will provide electricity to the power supply. I had to get a power strip to run from the outlet to where I put the connections.

Finding a solution to install my Ecobee thermostat was either this thing, or pull another wire through the walls.. Not an easy task, and likely expensive. We’re at their mercy if you chose the former. I guess they should be rewarded for their engineering, but value for $$ is maybe 2 Stars, PARTICULARLY since the cheapskates don’t include the minimum of 2 wire nuts you’ll need in a typical installation.The actual wiring was very simple in my situation. I’m not sure why, but the instructions don’t say, “Splice the Purple wire to the White wire.” Looking at the wiring diagram SHOWS the connection, but they never actually use the words. There may be other variations, but the extensive diagrams could easily state that, (and provide the wire nuts).Hopefully I’ll never know that there’s too much heat generated by the sender, (or that it will ever happen), since it is now dangling in the bowels of my wall.Bottom line: It works!

This works as exactly as stated! Perfect fix!