Can I "lock-out" compressors based on an outdoor temperature?
Yes.
Each Pelican thermostat has a configuration called Compressor Lockout*. You can use this configuration to prevent the thermostat from enabling the compressors once the outside temperature is below a configured value.
*Note: The Compressor Lockout configuration is only available if your Pelican Solution has an outside temperature sensor part of the overall system. You will need to send a request to Pelican Technical Support to add this configuration to your thermostats. Once the configuration is set, the system automatically shares a single outdoor temperature to all thermostat to be used for Compressor Lockout.
This configuration can be found in the Pelican Web-App > Admin > Thermostat Configuration > ‘select any thermostat‘ > Thermostat Operation > Compressor Lockout.
Compressor Lockout*
You can set this to any temperature between 0°F and 100°F. Entering a temperature automatically enables the lockout sequence, while leaving the configuration ‘blank’ means the lockout is NOT enabled.
What does this configurations do?
During periods where the outside temperature is above the Compressor Lockout setting, the thermostat will not enable the compressors and instead, if available, use secondary heating and cooling sources to condition the room.
Secondary Heating Source: Heat Pumps that have gas, electric, hot water, steam, or oil heating elements.
Secondary Cooling Source: HVAC units that have outside dampers controlled by a Pelican PEARL, the outside damper will be used as an economizer.
Note on using this function if Pelican does NOT control the outside damper:
Setting a Compressor Lockout tells the thermostat to NOT enable (Y) or (Y2) when the outside temperature is below the lockout setting. This mean that if compressor lockout is enabled, it is cold outside, and there is a third-party economizer controller, then the Pelican thermostat will NOT send a (Y) or (Y2) enable signal to the third-party economizer controller and therefore no cooling will be enabled for the room.
The best option is to switch out the third-party economizer controller to a Pelican PEARL economizer controller since the PEARL will provide better control functionality.