what uses less gas?

dawn_rose

im in most days with 2 young children so the heatings almost always on at the moment. do you think it is more economical to heat a room using a gas fire (coal effect) or running 2 raidiators (2 doubles one large one small). Itd be a great help if anybody knows. Thanks Dawn.

Cardew

Nobody can answer that question I am afraid.

It depends on the size of the radiators and the efficiency of your gas boiler. Also some older gas fires are very inefficient.

You should be able to get some idea by accurately noting your gas meter reading(including the last digit) and trying it for similar periods at the same temperature - trying to pick days when the out side temperature is similar.

My guess is that for most people, radiators will be cheaper.

dawn_rose

thank you for your reply.

HaushinkaGreenDay

Hi Dawn, I would be inclined to agree with what Cardew has already said.

Looking at it from a health point of view, I don't think it's wise to only heat one room when you have young children in the home, as moving from a warm/hot room to a cold one is a shock to the cardiovascular system; small children, the ill, disabled and elderly people can't cope as well with sudden temperature changes as healthy adults.

Any savings you might make, if any, I would personally say outweigh the health risk in your case.

If you are concerned about your current gas usage with the CH on after you have monitored it as Cardew suggested above, you could try turning the thermostat (if you have one) down by 1-2 degrees to see if that has any effect on your usage. I guess it depends on what temperature you have it set to now, though, as I wouldn't recommend any lower than 18 degrees during the day (I have mine at 20-21 because of illness).

Hope this helps!

Haushinka

markharding557

i find it is is more economical to use a gas fire on low than central heating but my fire is a conventional fire and not a living coal job which may affect its economy

Mazio_2

Wrote this in another post but may be of use here too ( I have added a few more points).

The problem with CH is it was never designed to heat say 1 or 2 rooms efficiently the reason is the boiler will heat the water in the pipes that run throughout your house even if the rads are turned off so the first time you switch it on it will use a large amount of gas this will be slightly smaller amount if its not going through too many rads (less water to heat and keep hot) but still a large %. If you only heat 1 room with a gas fire all the heat output will be in that room so should use less but you will only have 1 room hot (and no hot water) if you then mutiply each room with a gas fire it would cost more..
You will probably find only a small increase in consumption to heat your whole house if you have some temp controlls eg TVRs or room thermostat.

But as already stated by Cardew you need to check this yourself as too many variables.

Also gas fires can be 40-90% efficient so depending on your fire it may not be that much if any different.