h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

If you go away for a while in winter, to what temperature should you set your central heating?
I suspect it mustn't be allowed to get too cold inside.

The main issue, unless you have something that needs a minimum temperature like plants, it to prevent freezing. So the answer is that it depends where your thermostat is.

The coldest part of your house is likely to be the loft, where the cold-water tank lives. This probably only gets heated by leakage of heat through the ceiling under the tank.

Unless you are anticipating extreme cold you can probably get away with a few degrees above zero, but ten is probably a safe compromise.

I wouldn't set my heating to come on at all.

If you've lagged pipes in the coldest parts of the house, you may get away without heating, but houseplants don't like it. I also had my fridge-freezer defrost itself once when the ambient temperature fell below the fridge temperature. The thermostat decided it was redundant and switched the freezer off too.

I have pipes that run *under* the bathtub, which is itself enclosed so heated interior air doesn't keep the pipes from freezing. We sometimes get temps way below freezing. My thermostat is set at 64 degrees Fahrenheit, so I wouldn't risk going below 60, 55 at the lowest.

I don't think it has ever been cold enough where I live to freeze pipes.

>>I also had my fridge-freezer defrost itself once when the ambient temperature fell below the fridge temperature. The thermostat decided it was redundant and switched the freezer off too.

That's weird and counter-intuitive. I wonder what else might suffer unexpectedly with cold interiors? Would interior paint and plaster be at risk?

Traveller in Time on a perch
"Plants, fish tank, budgie nah, will not leave for more then a couple of days. Do reduce the high temp of 20 C to one hour a day (late afternoon), not only for the animals also to keep the moist out. (Low temp just above 10 C to keep away the freeze)

No plants or animals indoors, I would prefer still once a month to have the heater on for an hour (or two). Moist will indeed reduce the quality of 'drywall' (gypsum with two sides paper) and many other materials ."

How long is a while?
We have a frost stat which will bring the heating on if indoor temp falls below a certain value. Generally we just leave the heating on as set, but maybe put the thermostat down a bit if we remember. I recall the chilly atmosphere (in more ways than one) when we came back after a weekend away & I found hubby had turned the heating off.

Maybe a lot of it depends on what you can afford?

I would also be in the 'what an excellent chance to save money and give the boiler a holiday too' camp. Wife and I go round the house and switch of everything,except for the fridge/freezer including heating, if we're away for more than a couple of days. Always have and always will. It's just ingrained behaviour related to an active hatred of waste; why heat and power an empty house?

Of course if we were away in winter when temp likely to fall below zero... nah, we'd take the risk with that too as I haven't lived in a house that's poorly insulated enough to not retain at least some heat or gain some from the neighbours, to get that close to zero. Not since childhood anyway, with single-pane draughty windows that froze inside.

To be honest, the money saved and lack of worry about things going on fire when unattended, makes it more that worth a few minutes of cold upon return; just keep you outdoors clothes on for a few minutes longer?