Category: Faulty Device

This is not the usual energy hog story but nevertheless SENSE has other ways of flagging problems in your home. So we all know that sound the sump pump makes when it’s pumping water out that’s entering your sump pit, right? Well the fact is you wouldn’t really know the sump pump stopped working until it’s too late and you had a flood. It’s not like you’re constantly checking for water right. So one of the first things my SENSE found was the sump pump. It kept notifying me one night that it found the sump pump. Over night it had come on and off like 30 times yet I didn’t hear of feel the vibration of it. And I can usually hear it. I decided that either that was not the sump pump it found or something was wrong. I opened it and found a decent amount of water in there which was the first bad sign. I used my hose to flush the pit with water and the Sense went on and off again. I starting removing my sump pump and found the pit was full of debris and so the pump was clogged. All I had to do was clean the pit and hose the pump down. No replacement needed.

Our electric consumption almost doubled since last summer. Why? I just purchase Sense and self installed it. When looking at the meter on the app I noticed a pretty large current draw about every 6 minutes. It looked like a motor signature to me. The water pump controller was perfectly synched with the power draw even though no water was being used! The pressure meter went from about 68 to 58 pounds over the 6 minutes then turned on. I shut off the main water valve and the water pressure held steady. With a bit more looking it occurred to me that it might be our old well and pump were still connected but the breaker was off. After shutting off the valve from that old pump the pressure held. So, I guess the check valve in the old pump or pump line leaks. By the way, the old well and pump still work but have it on standby. No more! The bottom line? Sense makes cent$.

Here is a story you may like:
I got a new A/C and Sense picked it up 2 weeks into operation.
While the new equipment kept the house nicely cool I did not understand why the power meter showed an average cycle of only 4min40sec. Even during a heat wave it still ran for this short cycle and then stopped for 4-5 min.
Not good I was told. Constant stop and go wears down the equipment and condensation water would not drain keeping humidity at higher level than necessary.
I called the installer, a technician came, I showed the data, he came back with a Lennox rep and 2 weeks later the installer swapped the equipment for a smaller size at no cost and cut a check for the size difference! Sense more than broke even instantly only three month after install.

I have used the Sense device for two years and have monitored many household devices. Recently I saw a large spike in usage of the heat pump hot water heater. It was caused by the compressor failing and the heater switching to full electric heat. If it was not for Sense I may never had been able to quickly diagnose the electrical use increase. Quick fix under warranty! Who knows how long it could have gone unnoticed! Thanks Sense!

We started seeing an increase in our power bills over the Summer months of 2017. It had increased by $150, then up $300 more, by the end of the Summer we had a $900 power bill! I was fervently trying to figure out the problem. I had an electrician come in, he couldn’t figure out the problem. I was beyond frustrated. We use gas heat, so thankfully we got a break in the Winter months. Fast forward to the Spring of 2018 and my electrician mentioned finding a device to read my household electric usage per each appliance and device. After researching online, I found Sense. It claimed to measure the kilowatt hours of each device and record them so that I could view them on the app. After a $900 power bill, what did I have to lose?! My electrician installed Sense, and immediately it went to work. Almost immediately, it was recording devices. We were able to pinpoint them one at a time – it is so detailed it even records my ice maker in the freezer!

About two weeks in, we were really watching the usage of the furnace and hot water heater. In the end, it was the furnace that was causing the problems. The heat strip was kicking on for two minutes and off for two minutes CONSTANTLY 24/7. Who would have thought it was using that much electricity, but it was! With the help of Sense telling me specifically the problem was coming from the furnace, I was able to reroute the thermostat wire to a different relay which in turn fixed the problem.
Without Sense, I would have NEVER found the problem and would still be having ridiculous high power bills. I am so grateful for this system. It’s very easy to use, the app is easy to navigate and very convenient to name all of your devices. I can check the app during the day to see how electricity my home is using during the day. This is a grade A technological device and I very highly recommend it. I’m looking forward to Summer knowing I won’t go bankrupt with my power bills!

[Note: this story is from a Sense employee]

After my first winter month with Sense, I noticed that my 10kW auxiliary heat strips were running way too frequently (with the high bill to match). I compared my Power Meter data to my Ecobee data and found that Ecobee wasn’t even indicating that the aux heat was running, instead thinking that the heat pump was responsible for all of my heat for the month. Thus, the problem seemed to be within my heat pump itself. After doing a little digging, I found that my heat pump had a temperature sensor installed that was locking it out below 45F! I set it to a more reasonable temperature and now my aux heat only comes on when it’s absolutely needed.