Using AirConditioner as both heat and cold unit

[ALERTua]

I apologize for creating an issue. The discussion is not enabled for this GitHub project.

As the default air conditioner Auto HVAC mode is unable to read from external temperature sensors, I am in need of this great plugin. But I cannot figure out how I can use climate.ac_unit for both cooling if higher and heating if lower temperature than stated in the config, with setting the AC temperature. I would appreciate a config example for such usage.
Also, it would be great if this repository has an examples folder with the examples of config YAML files for different setups.
Thank you.

[dugancom]

Hello, this was my need too but it doesn't seem that the component is designed to control one unit that has both a heat and cool function. My attempt was to set both the heater and cooler parameters to the same switch but it seems like it only uses the first one.

[neoKushan]

@ALERTua @dugancom does this help? I had the same issue as you guys (plus another annoying issue), I wanted to use this component to control an AC unit that I use for both heating and cooling, but with an external sensor because the one in the Unit is borderline useless.

To do this, I created two template switches that control the AC unit in different ways:

- platform: template
  switches:
    office_aircon_cool:
      value_template: "{{is_state('climate.office_ac', 'cool')}}"
      turn_on:
        - service: climate.set_hvac_mode
          data:
            hvac_mode: cool
          target:
            entity_id: climate.office_ac
        - service: climate.set_temperature
          data:
            hvac_mode: cool
            temperature: "{{state_attr('climate.office_smart_thermostat', 'target_temp_low') | round(0, 'floor') }}"
          target:
            entity_id: climate.office_ac
      turn_off:
        service: climate.set_hvac_mode
        data:
          hvac_mode: "fan_only"
        target:
          entity_id: climate.office_ac
    office_aircon_heat:
      value_template: "{{is_state('climate.office_ac', 'heat')}}"
      turn_on:
        - service: climate.set_hvac_mode
          data:
            hvac_mode: heat
          target:
            entity_id: climate.office_ac
        - service: climate.set_temperature
          data:
            hvac_mode: heat
            temperature: "{{state_attr('climate.office_smart_thermostat', 'target_temp_high') | round(0, 'ceiling') }}"
          target:
            entity_id: climate.office_ac
      turn_off:
        service: climate.set_hvac_mode
        data:
          hvac_mode: "fan_only"
        target:
          entity_id: climate.office_ac

A couple of things to note here, as it might not be relevant to you:

My AC is really stupid, when you power it off it won't accept additional commands until it has done its power-off-clean-cycle, which can take up to 20mins to do - not ideal when I just want it to keep the temperature in check, so for these switches the "Off" function just sets the AC to fan-only mode, which will let it quickly switch back to heat or cool mode when it needs to.

My AC's built-in temperature sensor is also terrible but it tries to use it regardless, so in order to get it to actually heat or cool based off of the external temperature, I set the target temperature in the service call to a rounded number (up if heating, down if cooling) - so if you set the temperature to say 22.4, it'll be 22 in cooling mode or 23 in heating mode

Finally, with those two switches defined, I use them in this dual smart thermostat like so:

climate:
  - platform: dual_smart_thermostat
    name: Office smart Thermostat
    heater: switch.office_aircon_heat
    cooler: switch.office_aircon_cool
    target_sensor: sensor.lumi_lumi_weather_temperature
    min_temp: 18
    max_temp: 26
    target_temp: 22
    target_temp_high: 22.0
    target_temp_low: 21.0
    cold_tolerance: 0.3
    hot_tolerance: 0.3
    min_cycle_duration:
      seconds: 5
    initial_hvac_mode: "heat_cool" # hvac mode will reset to this value after restart
    heat_cool_mode: true
    keep_alive:
      minutes: 3
    away: # this preset will be available for all hvac modes
      temperature: 7
      target_temp_low: 7
      target_temp_high: 30
    anti_freeze: # this preset will be available for all hvac modes
      temperature: 7
      target_temp_low: 7
      target_temp_high: 30
    comfort: # this preset will be available for all hvac modes
      temperature: 22
      target_temp_low: 21.0
      target_temp_high: 22.0
    home: # this preset will be available only for heat or cool hvac mode
      temperature: 21
    precision: 0.1

I have defined the anti_freeze and away profile for scheduling purposes, they're just there to effectively turn the AC off because I can't find a good way to actually switch it off since the "off" mode in both is defined as fan mode. Hope all that makes sense.

[ALERTua]

Yes, this would help. This was my first solution. But then I wrote my own script using Pyscript.

[neoKushan]

I'd be interested in learning more about your solution, @ALERTua, if you have something you're able to share?

[ALERTua]

https://gist.github.com/ALERTua/0e89f5279dd0e1de7ee270c9e718d8d2
based on https://github.com/custom-components/pyscript and https://github.com/ALERTua/ha_pyscript_modules