Replacement storage heater advice please

Lemon_Tree

having been left with no option but to stay in our flat we've decided that we are going to make it habitable heat wise.
Our living room is 16ft by 13ft with a patio door approx. 6ftx8ft down one side wall (we put up two sets of curtains in winter to help with heat loss). We have a storage heater but spend winter in triple layers of clothing and blankets yet still pay £350 for a winter quarters worth of elec.
Please can someone advise what watt/strength/ size storage heater we should have for the room to make it warm or if considering we're only in during the day on weekends we would be better with an electric fireplace/heater so that we get the heating in the evenings when we need it rather than it running out during the day and the room being freezing by the time we get home from work.
Thanks in advance for your advice it is much appreciated.

AdrianW2

Your numbers suggest you're using roughly 100 kWh/day on heating. That's a big storage heater.

£350/Q buys you 25kWh/day, so you could spend 10 hours a day cuddled up to a 2kW fire for less money.

brig001

AdrianW2, are you sure? I get: £350 / 90 days = £3.88 per day. £3.88 / 0.14£/kWh = 28kWh (I'm no expert so please check - I'm not too good at this). This is still quite a lot, so I would look at draught-proofing and insulating. Look at what else uses electricity too like hot water and see if that can be reduced. Compare you winter and summer bills to figure out how much extra is used over winter (ie heating). Are you on economy 7?

AdrianW2

Seems about right. My numbers were just near-enough approximations; the 100kWh is based on a night-time rate since the OP claims to have a storage heater already and my 25kWh daytime rate matches your 28kWh.

FWIW my entire flat never used more than 45kWh and that had uninsulated walls, ceiling and floor as well as a huge heat-sucking cellar (but it did get a little cold in the evenings).

Lemon_Tree

i don't know if this helps but we usually have the hot water turned off as everything we need heats from cold, and during summer our leccy costs us about £3-4 a week. We do have another storage heater which is much smaller but the main problems is the freezing living room. We are on economy 7 which is 4p overnight and about 20p during the day. we run the washer overnight whenever possible. Although its huge the patio door is double glazed and as i said we have two sets of curtains up in winter, one of which only rarely gets opened. I'm sure most of the problems is the age of the storage heater which is why we need to sort out a replacement somehow.
thanks for the advice so far it's much appreciated.