Anyone used Rointe heaters?

Cardew

muquinhas wrote: »

Is there anyone who purchased the Rointe heaters or any other expensive one who can say: last year with panel heater I spent X amount and since I bought the expensive heaters, for the same period I have now use X amount. We will then know if it is worth it and stop all these virtual fights...

Thanks,
Sam

If you invite people to comment, it is pretty certain that you will get someone with a vested interest to comment in the affirmative.

Or someone who has bought a system and can't bear to think that it doesn't produce more heat.

It is not 'rocket science' for anyone to ascertain that ANY electrical heater produces the same amount of heat/warmth/BTu as ANY other electrical heater. They are all 100% efficient so how can that be improved?

grahamc2003

muquinhas wrote: »

Is there anyone who purchased the Rointe heaters or any other expensive one who can say: last year with panel heater I spent X amount and since I bought the expensive heaters, for the same period I have now use X amount. We will then know if it is worth it and stop all these virtual fights...

Thanks,
Sam

It's not a 'virtual fight' imv.

It's simply salesmen of these things claiming physically impossible claims, and others knowledgeable of physics saying the claims can't be true.

I've noticed on this and other forums the same sort of comments on different things altogether - people saying what you imply, i.e. implying unless you own the particluar gadget under discussion, you can't have sensible comments. It's happened with ecoeggs, solar panels, devices which give you more power from your electricity, things you clip on a cars engine which increase mpg etc etc. You don't have to own anything to make sensible comments if the claims break the laws under which our universe behaves.

If I said I own a 50 bedroom mansion and keep it at 25 degrees all winter by running a special 10w heater costing me 1p per day, would you have to own one and see for yourself, or could you work it out that it probably isn't correct (because it breaches physical laws, rather than you have some objection to the device)? Would you say, like many on these boards, 'you don't know because you haven't tried it'?

The situation is made more difficult because many who buy these things on their claims simply repeat the claims as their experience, rather than in some way assessing their real efficacy (or lack of).

If anyone claims any resistive heaters produce more or less heat than any other resistive heaters from the same amount of electricity, then they are wrong, unless thousands of years of scientific knowledge used to build the things in the world we see are also wrong.

(The situation is a little more difficult to understand for things like heat pumps which, to the user, sometimes give out heat at a rate of 3kw while being powered by 1kw, but looking at the full energy flows - of course - they still balance (the 'excess' (heat) energy in the home balanced by cooling of the rest of the world).

sllid

I’ve had these installed since January 2011 in my 1 bed flat. I'm not going to wade into the whole thermodynamics argument but I’m happy to feedback my comparison of energy consumption. Putting the whole 'do they emit heat for longer or not' argument to one side, the one thing I can say has made a difference (and has been raised in earlier posts) is having programmers on them so I can set the temp for each hour of every day of the week. Previously, all I had were radiant panel heaters with a thermostat and no timer. I’m not the most functional when tired (either in the morning or at night) so I inevitably forgot to turn the panel heaters off or down overnight or when I went to work which was a terrible waste! Also in cold weather I used to leave the heater in the bedroom on overnight at a low temperature just so I wouldn't have to wake up in the freezing cold and jump out of bed to turn the heater on. some may argue that not having timers means you use less energy (if you make sure you turn them off when they're not in use!) because now I have set the heaters to come on just before I come home from work and before I wake in the morning whereas they'd be turned on only when I arrived home or woke up. Then again I’m sure someone would argue that the heating should be left on low all day to keep a steady temperature. I’ll take the Energy Saving Trust's advice when they say that heating systems should operate on an on/off system not left on continuously at a low temperature (except to prevent frost).

I know this doesn't have anything to do with energy efficiency and there are other models out there that are similar but I really hated that burning smell from the dust settling on the elements of the panel heaters.

I think it's safe to say that there is no holy grail of electric heating unless renewable efficiency levels improve. Until that day comes it is down to the individual to be vigilant with their energy use whilst maintaining a level of comfort that is appropriate to them and their household (within reason!).

I’ll check my bills in spring to see if there has been any difference and let you all know.

Cardew

sllid wrote: »

the one thing I can say has made a difference (and has been raised in earlier posts) is having programmers on them so I can set the temp for each hour of every day of the week.

The objection to Rointe and other similarly hideously priced radiators(sorry) is that their websites imply that they produce more heat for your bucks - and they simply don't!

It is without doubt that having timers is an advantage. So people with any form of heater can buy a timer for prices starting a Fiver.

Look at this website:

http://www.sparksdirect.co.uk/energy-management-timers-thermostats-c-74_176_177.html

A mechanical timer for £5 (plus VAT)

A seven day digital timer for £12

A set of 3 remotely switched sockets controlled by a single remote control - £20

Remote Control Switch Set

Activate lights and devices in and around your house (wireless). Set is comprised of 1 remote controller and 3 plug switches.


For £60 you can have three heaters timed and remotely controlled.


Would you care to tell us how much you paid for your Rointe heaters? and size please.

shaney310879

i was thinking of supplying and fitting these but dont want to provide a branded product which is nothing more than hype and could give my company a bad name. Are these heaters actually any good? I get the whole "1kw in - 1kw out" but isnt the benefit of the rointe that its design enables a more efficient heating of the room? Where your standard panel heaters only heat directly in front of them the rointe circulates the heat around the whole room.
The problem is alot of posters on these forums are quick to slate pretty much every new product that comes into the world and i dont want to refuse a product on the basis that some peeps are just trying to prove they're right.
I know rointe have had some bad press recently with the ASA but take out their wild claims of 60% reductions etc are they actually good as a product?

Owain_Moneysaver

shaney310879 wrote: »

isnt the benefit of the rointe that its design enables a more efficient heating of the room?

No.

Heat can be transferred by conduction, convection or radiation.

Electric oil-filled 'radiators' and wet central heating 'radiators' give a mix of mostly convected heat (to the air) and radiant heat (infra red rays).

With the radiant heat you feel the heat 'coming off' the radiator when you stand next to it, even if the air is cold.

With the convected heat the warm air rises, circulates, cools and falls, distributing the heat round the room. Forcing the convection using a fan heater spreads the heat around the room more evenly quicker, but the room doesn't get hotter more quickly overall.

It cannot heat the room 'more efficiently' as electric heaters are 100% efficient.

In a fan heater the electricity used to operate the fan motor is also dissipated as heat, so it's not wasted.

One advantage of some types of heater is that they have an electronic thermostat which gives more accurate temp control (so the room doesn't veer between 'too hot' and 'too cold') and doesn't go clicky-clicky-clicky all night long.

GrahamIW

Hi,

I am very new to this forum moneysavingexpert.com

I have just spent 2 hours reading all the posts to get up to date on opinion, I was keen to buy Rointe radiators 2 hours ago to replace old storage heaters now I think very differently, though now utterly confused where to go next. I understand cardews reasoning and makes absolute sense that you can't get out more than you put in and after the ASA ruling I will leave Rointe well alone.

So your thoughts on this: As I am on E7 would I be better to update the existing with new storage heaters with the duoheat or with an added convection heater. Both sound great but the cost of a storage heater with convection is much more than a standard unit. so my reasoning is that I might as well buy just a convector heater and plug it in as an addition to the old storage heaters and save money.

Or just buy new storage heaters that might retain the heat better than the old style what do you think?

Got no gas just electric.

penrhyn

I use to live in a flat with storage heaters, swapped out a very old Dimplex unit for a Creda and found that the performance was much better. It gave a much more even output during the discharge period.

If I remember it was a TSR model.

Looks like they still do them http://www.dealec.co.uk/acatalog/Creda_TSR_Sensor_Plus_Storage_Radiators.html

Supplement them with a nice feature fire, or a cheap convector.
With what you save on the Rointe you could get one of these Dimplex ones.........nice.

http://www.dimplex.co.uk/products/fires_surrounds/what_is_the_optimyst.htm

Cardew

GrahamIW wrote: »

Hi,

I am very new to this forum moneysavingexpert.com

I have just spent 2 hours reading all the posts to get up to date on opinion, I was keen to buy Rointe radiators 2 hours ago to replace old storage heaters now I think very differently, though now utterly confused where to go next. I understand cardews reasoning and makes absolute sense that you can't get out more than you put in and after the ASA ruling I will leave Rointe well alone.

So your thoughts on this: As I am on E7 would I be better to update the existing with new storage heaters with the duoheat or with an added convection heater. Both sound great but the cost of a storage heater with convection is much more than a standard unit. so my reasoning is that I might as well buy just a convector heater and plug it in as an addition to the old storage heaters and save money.

Or just buy new storage heaters that might retain the heat better than the old style what do you think?

Got no gas just electric.

Welcome to the forum.

Your reasoning, about buying just a convector heater in addition to a storage heater, is spot on!

The advantage of the Duo type storage heater is that it is all in the one 'box' and there is a degree of automatic regulation of heat. With a £10 fan heater you will need to switch it on as required.

There is a paucity of reliable information on the heat retention properties of modern storage heaters. Probably because in the past manufacturers never admitted that there was a problem with heat leaking from their heaters.

There have been a couple of posts from people who have experience of new storage heaters and they sing their praises. Personally I like to see some test results as first hand reports can lack objectivity.

Cardew

shaney310879 wrote: »

i was thinking of supplying and fitting these but dont want to provide a branded product which is nothing more than hype and could give my company a bad name. Are these heaters actually any good? I get the whole "1kw in - 1kw out" but isnt the benefit of the rointe that its design enables a more efficient heating of the room? Where your standard panel heaters only heat directly in front of them the rointe circulates the heat around the whole room.
The problem is alot of posters on these forums are quick to slate pretty much every new product that comes into the world and i dont want to refuse a product on the basis that some peeps are just trying to prove they're right.
I know rointe have had some bad press recently with the ASA but take out their wild claims of 60% reductions etc are they actually good as a product?

I don't think anyone has even implied that Rointe heaters are not a good well made product.

The objection is twofold

Firstly their advertising that is designed to convince the layman that they somehow give out more heat for the same running cost than other lesser heaters. Look at their website.

For instance they talk of '60% equivalent ratio of no consumption'

All that impressive term means is that they used a 1.43kW heater to keep a room at 21C over a 24 hour period and the average consumption was 560 watts. i.e. 40% of max output.

Well if they had used a 3kW heater in the same test it would have had an '82% equivalent ratio of no consumption' . Even more impressive and totally meaningless!

Secondly prices:

If you look at their Brochure you get their Trade Prices(VAT to be added)

A 1.6kW radiator costs £622(£746 after VAT):eek:

A 750watt Towel rail costs £693(£831 after VAT)