Quote Originally Posted by dr. d View Post
what did you do, when you 'hacked" into it?
i see the additional hot and cold box additions...
Made it a bit "smarter". It's both for convenience and to lower the power consumption.

Here are a few examples:

1. I can ask Alexa to turn on/off the Hot water or Cold water, independently. Or I can say "water dispenser" instead and it turns on/off both hot and cold simultaneously.
2. I have setup elaborate timers for when the Hot and Cold water turns on. For example, the Hot water automatically turns on 30 minutes before our alarm goes off and turns off around an hour later, typically after we've drank our hot beverages. As for the Cold side, nobody drinks cold water early in the morning so I set it to turn on at 7am. I have subtle schedule differences during certain weekdays and weekends.
3. If I say "Alexa, coffee mode", it will turn on the hot water for 30 minutes then shut off. Alexa would remind me when the water is ready and when it's about to turn it off again.
4. It's also part of a routine called vacation mode. When I trigger that via Alexa, it turns off everything in the house.... lights, power plugs, A/C, entertainment center, water dispenser, etc.
5. Finally, whatever state it is in, both cold and hot water are set to shut off every night at 9:30pm