Fischer Storage Heaters

Cardew · 19 August 2014 at 5:00PM

Thorpe85 wrote: »

Hi Cardew, BISRA testing will show that company has actually undertaken this quite extensive test, some company's may say this on their website but might not have gone through the expense of this test which explains how well the heaters work and would back up some of the more questionable claims,

the problem with a rough guide, is that its fine if you have put 6 kw into a 5.287 room as you suggested...but if you put 4 kw into that room because you have based the rough calc on a say reasonably well insulated property but have not bothered to measure the insulation, check with the window manufacturer for the U vales of the windows installed or many of the things we have to do, what will happen is that that heater will never achieve the temp required, so instead of your 6 in a 5.25 which will achieve temp and may be on 60% of the hour (which the BISRA test will usually give a figure) the 4 in the 6 will be on for 100% of the time (this is where most of the company's get their "magical" savings from,

so if you have a 2 kw heater installed correctly then you may use only 1.2kw per hour, but if it is installed incorrectly then you will be using the full 2kw per hour

and yes you are right all direct acting electric heaters convert 100% of power to %100 of heat output...the saving comes from how long these heaters are on per hour which then comes down to the accuracy of the thermostat to maintain a level temp (which the BISRA test will also tell you )

and again these views are my own, and in no way reflect the views of any company i may work for

We already know all electrical heaters are 100% efficient, so do not need a BISRA test report of a heater to confirm basic physics.

It is stating the obvious that if you under-estimate the heating requirement of a property, the heating system will not perform as required. However electrical heating can be dirt cheap so make a rough estimate and add extra capacity.

and yes you are right all direct acting electric heaters convert 100% of power to %100 of heat output...the saving comes from how long these heaters are on per hour

What saving?

To maintain a set temperature, if a room, has an accurately measured heat loss of, say, 6kW then ideally any combination of heaters outputting 6kW should be on constantly. If they are not on constantly, then the room will not maintain the set temperature.

and may be on 60% of the hour (which the BISRA test will usually give a figure)

How can a BISRA test know the output required unless it measures each individual building. If 6kW of electrical heating is on for 60% of an hour then the output will be 3.6kWh, which quoting the example above is insufficient to maintain the temperature.

If you have heaters with 24 kW output they will only need to be on a total of 25% of the hour (15mins) to maintain temperature; but there is no saving.

I don't wish to appear rude but you seem to be trotting out the misleading patter of other salesmen who have contributed to MSE.

Thorpe85 · 19 August 2014 at 5:57PM

i would suggest that you look into getting a copy of the BISRA test to see how extensive it is, any major supplier of heaters in the UK would and should be able to supply you with one

they know the figures because they set up various "average Rooms" with the correct heat losses for these rooms, they then install heaters that the company supply's and test theses heaters for a number of days at recommended temps for the room type (living rooms have a recommended temp of 21 with 1.5 air changes per hour), while recording the heat output, room temp and power usage and a hell of a lot more. this then tells us that in that room of a heat loss of ?? our heater achieved the temp in ?? while maintaining that temp with a variance of ?? it will then show us when the heater was on and off to keep that temp in a room with a graph showing power usage per hour.

this is only for an average room in an average house in average town

as the UK has buildings ranging from old stone built cottages to ridiculously well insulated modern builds and just about everything in between,

please feel free to contact BISRA who will be more than happy to go into more detail than i can provide on this

and i take it from your earlier posts that your house is heated by £20 aldi heaters only ?

again these are my own personal views, and in no way reflect the views of any company i may work for

Cardew · 19 August 2014 at 6:31PM

Thorpe85 wrote: »

i would suggest that you look into getting a copy of the BISRA test to see how extensive it is, any major supplier of heaters in the UK would and should be able to supply you with one

Nobody is disputing that a BISRA test of a specific electrical heater is other than extremely thorough; albeit it is commissioned(paid for) by a manufacturer.

Also, as far as I am aware, nobody has questioned the quality of some of the very expensive heaters that are on the market.

However, you are missing the point in 'banging on' about BISRA testing as if it confirms that the heater under test produces more heat for the power consumed - and hence cost - than other heaters.

The point,(again) we are making is that these expensive heaters do not produce more heat for the same running cost as the cheapest heater.

it will then show us when the heater was on and off to keep that temp in a room with a graph showing power usage per hour.

That in a nutshell is exactly the information required! To maintain the required temp in the room will require xxkWh for a set period of time.

Are you contending that 'your' product will maintain that temperature using less kWh and hence cost less to run, than other electrical heaters?

If it does why not get the Energy Saving Trust(EST) or WHICH to endorse your claims?

As it happens I have Gas CH. However if electrical heating was the only option, I would firstly see if storage heating met my needs. If it didn't I would be armed with the knowledge that £20 Aldi heaters would produce the same heat, for the same cost, as any other electrical heater. That is the message several of us are trying to put across.

Thorpe85 · 19 August 2014 at 7:28PM

the point i am trying to get across is that if you have a heater with no thermostat i.e a cheap convector heater then it will not know, when it has reached the correct temp. therefore costing more money to run (be aware that most scheme are based on an outside temp of -3 for UK and -7 for Scotland) so as the outside temperature does tend to change when it is not -3 outside you will not need 2kw of power you may only need 1.6kw of power, however this will not happen on a cheap convector with a poor thermostat of +3 degrees because your wasting 3 degrees of power which according to the energy saving trust is about £55 a degree, but with a decent heater which should be around +.3 or better it would not cost you that would it ? if you can find a portable or cheap panel at that price with a thermostat as good as a leading panel heater i will buy one, hell ill buy 20 and heat my own house

the point have tried to make on this forum is not to believe someone who turns up at your house, can work out your heat loss in minutes, when to do it properly can take hours and to not believe anything that can be backed up by you guessed it BISRA or any other testing authority

also Which don't test or at least have no reviews on there website regarding wall mounted panel heaters, but our portable ones do quite well and i honestly don't know why we don't have the energy saving trust endorse us, as a number of our products are green deal approved

Richie-from-the-Boro · 19 August 2014 at 8:12PM

I've read the BISRA's. The issue of using proportional–integral logic [PI] to optimise energy distribution and ensure a consistent temperature is also understood.

There are already many and an increasing number of manufacturers of heaters / ovens / etc using PI to set a domestic room to set temperature within ± 0.2°C, any PI stat fitted to anything will do. There is nothing remarkable about this smoothing of the re-heat cycle by 'limiting' the % of milliseconds the 'charge' is unnecessarily over or under supplied.

Take then the BISRA test on maintaining a specified room temp 1400 watts in the UK at 230v translates to 1596 watts so if the cooling applied to the [21°C] chamber during the test was 560 watts per hour and the heater used 560 watts per hour, if you had stuck in a 100kW heater it would have used exactly 560 watts to counteract the cooling.

Power out equals power in less losses and on a resistive heating load there are no losses as the losses are heat

Cardew · 19 August 2014 at 11:14PM

Thorpe85 wrote: »

the point i am trying to get across is that if you have a heater with no thermostat i.e a cheap convector heater then it will not know, when it has reached the correct temp. therefore costing more money to run (be aware that most scheme are based on an outside temp of -3 for UK and -7 for Scotland) so as the outside temperature does tend to change when it is not -3 outside you will not need 2kw of power you may only need 1.6kw of power, however this will not happen on a cheap convector with a poor thermostat of +3 degrees because your wasting 3 degrees of power which according to the energy saving trust is about £55 a degree, but with a decent heater which should be around +.3 or better it would not cost you that would it ? if you can find a portable or cheap panel at that price with a thermostat as good as a leading panel heater i will buy one, hell ill buy 20 and heat my own house

the point have tried to make on this forum is not to believe someone who turns up at your house, can work out your heat loss in minutes, when to do it properly can take hours and to not believe anything that can be backed up by you guessed it BISRA or any other testing authority

also Which don't test or at least have no reviews on there website regarding wall mounted panel heaters, but our portable ones do quite well and i honestly don't know why we don't have the energy saving trust endorse us, as a number of our products are green deal approved

Even cheap convector heaters usually have a thermostat. look at this lot:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/?ie=UTF8&keywords=convector+heater+with+fan&!!!!!googhydr-21&index=aps&hvadid=31507276280&hvpos=1t3&hvexid=&hvnetw=s&hvrand=13032655165092045711&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=b&hvdev=c&ref=pd_sl_16wcxk738p_b

You can also buy plug in thermostats with 'precision digital temperature control' similar to these for £20:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/?ie=UTF8&keywords=plug+in+thermostats&!!!!!googhydr-21&index=aps&hvadid=30051722086&hvpos=1t2&hvexid=&hvnetw=s&hvrand=8659771925206015809&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=b&hvdev=c&ref=pd_sl_61twpcc0iv_b

As stated, in a domestic situation heating with electrical heaters, the calculation of heat loss is not critical when selecting the rating of heaters to be fitted. If the heat loss is roughly 5kW - then get 6kW or 9kW.

If your firm commission(and pay for) a test with BISRA, they will produce a thorough report stating that the product meets its specification, also that it is well made etc.

That doesn't mean it produces more heat for the same running cost than the cheap heater.

Richie-from-the-Boro · 20 August 2014 at 1:07AM

Take Cardews GSH, the radiators are sometimes too hot or too cold [over/under] for too long. The reason for this is the old analogue stats have a resistor in them that attempts to compensate for the ± swings from the set temp. Overtemp excursion [waste heat] is better controlled with a PI stat, but the nett saving per annum, must be low - I've never tried calculating it.

Back to the real subject, most of the Dimplex range of NSCH and even their panel and convector heaters have the same low thermal inertia are ± 0.3°C, hell even Delonghi oil filled rads use a PI stat. This is what the PI stat does compared to the older elecro-mechanical stat :

So finally if you had a targeted temp of 23°C the EM [on/off] stat control would produce a temp of ± 5% and the electronic stat would produce a Dimplex temp of ± 3% while these magical Paul Daniels radiators claim to produce a temp of ± 2% of [anticipating things like undershoot and overshoot] fluctuation. And that folks unless someone wants to disagree with my assertion that """Power out equals power in less losses and on a resistive heating load there are no losses as the losses are heat""" is why I never bothered calculating the savings.

anthropologist · 3 September 2014 at 10:57AM

I notice that Fischer Heating / Fischer Futureheat have got in trouble with the advertising standards authority again. A new adjudication has been published on the ASA website and complaints against their advertising have been upheld on 8 points! I can't post the link being a new member so maybe someone else could ( or just search the ASA website for Fischer in rulings ) It may help prevent some people from being mislead into buying

lstar337 · 3 September 2014 at 11:17AM

anthropologist wrote: »

I notice that Fischer Heating / Fischer Futureheat have got in trouble with the advertising standards authority again. A new adjudication has been published on the ASA website and complaints against their advertising have been upheld on 8 points! I can't post the link being a new member so maybe someone else could ( or just search the ASA website for Fischer in rulings ) It may help prevent some people from being mislead into buying

http://www.asa.org.uk/Rulings/Adjudications/2014/9/Fischer-Future-Heat-UK-Ltd/SHP_ADJ_268600.aspx#.VAbq4RJTfmc

anthropologist · 9 September 2014 at 12:30PM

Does anybody know how many times companies like Fischer Futureheat can have advertising standards adjudications for misleading advertising before more action is taken by trading standards?

Fischer Storage Heaters

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