Are convector heaters effecient ?

mikeyw

Guys,

We have a reasonably large house and struggle to keep 2 upstairs bedrooms up to a reasonable heat....could do with larger radiators really in these rooms.

As an alternative are these little heaters any good ?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Delonghi-HS20-Convector-Heater-Settings/dp/B0000E5SO8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=kitchen&qid=1227093986&sr=1-1

Was thinking it might be better leaving one of these running on thermostat instead of having the central heating on constantly when the rest of the house doesn't really need it.

Is it a more cost effective way of getting these room warmer ?

TIA,
Mike.

Cardew

No.

All electrical heaters, including this one, are equally expensive to run.

Just run your CH with the radiators off in the rooms that you don't wish to heat.

prolific8

We bought a similar heater due to our living room storage heater being broken and our letting agency being useless about fixing it. It has three settings, 750w, 1250w and 2000w. Off the top of anyones head, is running this for an hour or so a night during peak time on the 1250w setting better than letting a 2/3kw storage heater run all night during off-peak? Warmth in the living room isn't really an issue until we get home about 6pm by which time our other storage heater has already lost all its heat.

Cardew

prolific8 wrote: »

We bought a similar heater due to our living room storage heater being broken and our letting agency being useless about fixing it. It has three settings, 750w, 1250w and 2000w. Off the top of anyones head, is running this for an hour or so a night during peak time on the 1250w setting better than letting a 2/3kw storage heater run all night during off-peak? Warmth in the living room isn't really an issue until we get home about 6pm by which time our other storage heater has already lost all its heat.

That is a 'how long is a piece of string question!'

Firsty you need to know how how much power the storage heaters consumed overnight and the price per kWh for Economy 7 electricity.

Then how much power the convector heater uses and the price per kWh

One thing is pretty certain, if you are not using your storage heaters then you should change to a 'normal' (i.e. not Economy 7) tariff.

bryanb

To answer the original question. Yes all electric heaters are 100% efficient. That is to say for every Kw of electricity in, you get 1 Kw of heat out.
However, economical they are not when compared to gas by price.