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I recently bought a two-level house that has a thermostat on each floor. The second-floor thermostat was not turning on; I removed it from the wall and removed some corroded batteries, cleaned it and put in new batteries and it powers on fine. However, it doesn't seem to actually do anything - messing with the settings on it doesn't trigger any obvious activity from the HVAC system.

After some reading, it looks like there are supposed to be wires coming out of the wall going into the tops of these terminals. I thought maybe this thermostat is somehow supposed to pair to the other one, or pair wirelessly to the HVAC system, but from finding the manual online it doesn't look like this model supports that. I'm kind of at a loss because it seems like it never would have worked as configured. Is that intuition correct or am I missing something here?

Extremely grateful for any insight or hints as to where I can take this from here.

Second-floor thermostat mount Second-floor thermostat First-floor thermostat Second-floor thermostat model

EDIT: Took the base off the wall per @crip659's suggestion; no hidden wires: Nothing at all

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    That's known as a "psychosomatic thermostat". It lets whiny housemates think they're getting warmer without jacking up your heating bill. :D I doubt it ever did anything or legitimately was expected to. Or someone installed it as a thermometer only.
    – isherwood
    Commented May 31 at 20:06
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    I doubt it, but take the base off the wall to check if any wires are behind it.
    – crip659
    Commented May 31 at 20:06
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    That's not a thermostat, it's a thermometer.
    – Huesmann
    Commented Jun 1 at 13:42
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    We had one in our first house and a visitor called it a "mother in law thermostat" - it was in the living room, the real one was further back in the house.
    – Kate Gregory
    Commented Jun 1 at 14:04

2 Answers 2

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Thanks ya'll! "psychosomatic thermostat" it is - removed the base plate and found no hidden wires, and the wall underneath doesn't look like a hole was patched or anything there. Not sure what the original installer's motive was, but it doesn't look like this ever actually controlled anything.

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  • Please [take the tour, then accept your answer if you like to resolve this post. Also delete your redundant comment rather than cluttering your answer with a reference to it.
    – isherwood
    Commented May 31 at 21:05
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How old is this house? I suppose it could be possible that there was an intent to install a 2nd thermostat, but never pulled the wires out of the wall to actually attach it and someone just screwed it to the wall. But the 2nd layer of paint would lead me to believe that this isn't new construction.

One thing you could do to gauge initial intent and planning is go to your HVAC system and see if there are two sets of thermostat wires coming out of it, with one going to your to your active thermostat, and the other possibly made for this 2nd thermostat. But if you only see one, then for sure it's a dummy in regards to control. I suppose you could also look behind your current active thermostat and see if it's just the wires connected to that one, or if there are wires coming into that thermostat, and also going out.

I suppose it could also be possible that at one point there was a remote battery-powered thermostat that communicated wirelessly to your main one (or your furnace), and got replaced at some point.

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  • Thank you, this is very helpful! I'll take a look behind the working thermostat and see if I can find any other wires coming off the HVAC. The house was built in 2005, but I have some invoices left by the previous owner suggesting that a lot of the system was replaced or upgraded in late 2021, which further complicates the mystery a bit.
    – leonsbuddydave
    Commented May 31 at 22:25
  • @leonsbuddydave, I assume this is a single HVAC system and not a multi-zone system that may have had dampers or multiple zones that would justify multiple control points? I highly doubt that it was set up for traditional WiFi from the upstairs thermostat, as WiFi would use a lot more power than a pair of AA batteries would be able to supply. So I'm at a loss as to why it's upstairs, unless the previous owner got taken by that installer and didn't get the functionality they were thinking they were getting with an upstairs thermostat.
    – Milwrdfan
    Commented Jun 1 at 2:27
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    @Milwrdfan in other countries (no idea about the US, implied from the phone number on the product), wireless thermostats are quite common. They don't use WiFi but a point-to-point link, presumably 433MHz. They can run on AAs for years. And they can be made by Honeywell - but this isn't a wireless model, and I haven't come across a dual wired/wireless version
    – Chris H
    Commented Jun 1 at 19:48

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