I bought a nest gen 2 thermostat to play with a open source project that revives old nest thermostats (https://nolongerevil.com/). Since I don’t want to install it into the home, because it will be a toy. I was thinking of building a test rig using a arduino or esp32 to simulate a HVAC and indoor temperature. I’m IT guy, not a HVAC guy, I think this would be a good learning project. Any suggestions?
I do want to stimulating the temperature. Also interesting theory, it would be cool to put it to the test. But I need some way to simulate a thermistor. Also, The testing rig I want to build could be a cool demonstration piece for how a thermostat works. I might donate it to some tech school when I’m done with it. Time will tell
thermistor is just a resistor that has resistance varying with temperature. often that relationship is linear over a reasonable range, like with Pt100, and you can probably get away with using potentiometer instead. that said you have to figure out what you have there, because there are many options
You need a variable resistor with digital control.