Anyone used Rointe heaters?

jimjim2012

toecutter: if you can, then invest in insulating the home.
i'm in a traditional scottish stone flat. secondary glazing and heavy curtains help. i've fitted some insulation on the external walls with plasterboard over it which has taken 3" of the overall floor space but improved the external wall uvalue = less heatloss
i also looked into acoustic damping my ceiling (noisy neighbour above me) which works out at £45 p/m2. i would loose 3"-4" of ceiling height but then that matters little when it's 4m high. this would also reduce heatloss. less air volume and less heatloss to above.
nice thick carpets help as well. for sound-proofing and heat retention.
i get by on 2x1.5kw dimplex panel heaters with timeclocks. only need them for a couple of hours in the morning and late evening but mainly during the cold season. for over half the year they are off.
i also recommended nice fluffy blankets and one of those luxury bathrobes. comforting when it gets abit nippy.

someone mentioned about energy efficient lightbulbs. i think it's more to do with the light/lumen output equivalents. eg some 20Watt energy lightbulbs give out the same light output as 60Watt old style. Looking at putting in some led fittings to see how they look as they use even less electricity. just not sure what the light output will be like but worth a shot.

oh, but back to Rointe. seems a nice looking oil-filled heater but quite pricey for what you get. but as the consumer you pay for what you want. same with a traditional wet system rad. you can go for a cost effective stelrad panel or a fancy cast iron unit. both may be sized to the same heat output but it's just personal preference.
i think we can all learn to not believe the techno blurb on most products made today. if something sounds too good to be true....

Easy_Heat

Do you know who makes the other so-called energy-saving / super-efficient radiators badged by Economy Radiator Company (Economical Radiator Company), Suka, Redwell, ELTI, Calortec, Ducasa, Farho, intelliheat, Easy-Heat, etc?


Hello LittleVermin

Firstly let me declare an interest here - I work for the company that manufactures and sells easy-heat water-filled electric radiators.

My only reason for joing this discussion is that you ask if people know who makes various types of electric heaters.

I cant speak for the other companies but I would like to assure you that easy-heat electric radiators are not bought in from another country and are in fact manufactured in our factory in West Yorkshire.

Regards.

Cardew

Easy_Heat wrote: »

Do you know who makes the other so-called energy-saving / super-efficient radiators badged by Economy Radiator Company (Economical Radiator Company), Suka, Redwell, ELTI, Calortec, Ducasa, Farho, intelliheat, Easy-Heat, etc?


Hello LittleVermin

Firstly let me declare an interest here - I work for the company that manufactures and sells easy-heat water-filled electric radiators.

My only reason for joing this discussion is that you ask if people know who makes various types of electric heaters.

I cant speak for the other companies but I would like to assure you that easy-heat electric radiators are not bought in from another country and are in fact manufactured in our factory in West Yorkshire.

Regards.

May we ask why your plug in radiators cost, on average, £500 each(they range from £456 to £594), when it is possible to buy radiators, doubtless imported!, for a fraction of that price?

I take it you will not dispute that the heat produced from your, say, 2kW radiator, costing £594 is exactly the same as from a £30 2kW oil filled radiator, or perhaps a £70 to £150 appliance from a manufacturer like Dimplex or DeLonghi.

The whole point of this thread, on a Money Saving Website, is to impress upon people that all electrical heaters produce the same amount of heat, for the same running cost.

LittleVermin

Easy_Heat wrote: »

Do you know who makes the other so-called energy-saving / super-efficient radiators badged by Economy Radiator Company (Economical Radiator Company), Suka, Redwell, ELTI, Calortec, Ducasa, Farho, intelliheat, Easy-Heat, etc?


Hello LittleVermin

Firstly let me declare an interest here - I work for the company that manufactures and sells easy-heat water-filled electric radiators.

My only reason for joing this discussion is that you ask if people know who makes various types of electric heaters.

I cant speak for the other companies but I would like to assure you that easy-heat electric radiators are not bought in from another country and are in fact manufactured in our factory in West Yorkshire.

Regards.

Hi Easy Heat,

Many thanks for clearing that up!

I wonder if you will answer Cardew's question, please?

Cardew wrote: »

May we ask why your plug in radiators cost, on average, £500 each(they range from £456 to £594), when it is possible to buy radiators, doubtless imported!, for a fraction of that price?

I take it you will not dispute that the heat produced from your, say, 2kW radiator, costing £594 is exactly the same as from a £30 2kW oil filled radiator, or perhaps a £70 to £150 appliance from a manufacturer like Dimplex or DeLonghi.

The whole point of this thread, on a Money Saving Website, is to impress upon people that all electrical heaters produce the same amount of heat, for the same running cost.

And maybe people who have bought a 'good-looking' radiator - as promoted by several people in this thread! - which is also super efficient / economical (etc, etc) - as also promoted by several people in this thread - might like to see if they can spot a radiator very similar to theirs on the website of Chinese manufacturer Ningbo Suofei (here). You can even see the prices! Obviously subject to negotiation, but the price quoted for one model (SF-500A) is US D 3-5 FOB (delivered to the ship) ... and you only need to buy a minimum of 100 units!

Maybe some of the local govt officers who, we're told, have bought these wonderful 'economical' radiators should import a container load direct from China and save their poor council tax payers a bundle! Of course most of us MSE-posters hope the local govt officers won't be saddling their tenants with the cost of full-price electricity for their heating until they've provided excellent insulation.
..

penrhyn

Another super efficient radiator has appeared on the back page of Private Eye.
http://www.sunflowltd.co.uk/index.html

Whoops I see they have been discussed before.

Still email to the ASA or Ian Hislop perhaps?

rothers8080

I just saw that advert too, thought I'd come here to mention it and you beat me to it!

It's not the first time PE have carried these sorts of adverts, and they have been pulled up for it in the letters page before!

I suggest starting the letter 'As any flue know...'

davehills

LittleVermin wrote: »

ALL electrical heating is 100% efficient

..

Hmmmmm. Misleading, as you imply electrical heaters are 100% efficient!

If a heater contains a fan, for example, then some of the electricity consumed will go into rotational energy, rather than heat! Admittedly, the fan won't use an awful lot but it will mean that the heater isn't 100% efficient in turning electricity into heat. Also things like the indicator bulb, timer etc..etc will all use power.

Also, consider electric heat pumps. They offer maybe 120% heating performance, over the cost of the electricity!

Cardew

davehills wrote: »

Hmmmmm. Misleading, as you imply electrical heaters are 100% efficient!

If a heater contains a fan, for example, then some of the electricity consumed will go into rotational energy, rather than heat! Admittedly, the fan won't use an awful lot but it will mean that the heater isn't 100% efficient in turning electricity into heat. Also things like the indicator bulb, timer etc..etc will all use power.

Also, consider electric heat pumps. They offer maybe 120% heating performance, over the cost of the electricity!

Electrical heaters are 100% efficient. All the electrical energy is turned into heat.

What do you think happens to the energy(that you term 'rotational energy') that turns the fan? Or the energy used by bulbs, timer etc? The clue is in the Laws of Physics - the First Law of Thermodynamics - you cannot create or destroy energy.

Heat pumps are not electrical heaters. They 'remove heat' from the ground or air surrounding the property. They can indeed be 300% or more efficient(not 120%) in producing heat in a property, but all they have done is moved heat from outside to inside.

grahamc2003

davehills wrote: »

Hmmmmm. Misleading, as you imply electrical heaters are 100% efficient!

If a heater contains a fan, for example, then some of the electricity consumed will go into rotational energy, rather than heat! Admittedly, the fan won't use an awful lot but it will mean that the heater isn't 100% efficient in turning electricity into heat. Also things like the indicator bulb, timer etc..etc will all use power.

Also, consider electric heat pumps. They offer maybe 120% heating performance, over the cost of the electricity!

What happens to the energy used to rotate the fan? Some will be used to overcome the friction in the bearings (generating heat here), and some will be used to move air, and when the air slows down due to its viscosity, the energy again gets turned into heat which warms the air. Add it all up, and you'll find the amount of heat created by a heater exactly matches the energy input into it. (That applies not only to heaters, but all electrical devices - they all produce heat equal to the energy consumed, but hopefully do something useful before the heat release).

As to heat pumps - well the same applies. Use 1kW to drive a heatpump, and heat is generated in the world at a rate of 1kW. It's just that a heat pump (used for heating) takes heat from one place (the outsde world, which cools a little) and moves it inside, together with the heat from the energy used. Also, heat pumps have a coeff of performance far in excess of 1.2 (as you mentioned). At 7C, modern heatpumps have cops approaching 6 (i.e. when using 1kW to drive the heat pump, heat is transfered from the outside in at a rate of 5kW.

Easy_Heat

Hello Cardew and LittleVermin

The reason for my original post was to answer a question which had been posted about our product. I did not want it to seem that our radiators are bought from abroad and simply ‘badged’ as if we had made them when a lot of time and effort goes into manufacturing our product here in the UK.

I will try and answer your question about the cost of the product.

Firstly, the radiator and how it works was developed, at significant cost, here in the UK. We manufacture the product, by hand, here in the UK also. We don’t buy it from abroad as it is not available abroad as we own the patents. We could have the product built abroad under license but we are very proud of the fact that it is manufactured in Britain. The radiators are built by people on our production line and we don’t use machines to do it.

Our radiator is not a storage heater and it is not filled with oil, gel or dynamic fluid etc. Our radiator is in fact filled with water (with an amount of protective fluid to prevent corrosion etc).

This water is heated by a specially designed element and pumped around the radiator. Using this technique, rather than just a standard ‘rod’ heating element, uses more component parts and at no small expense as they are not simply ‘off the shelf’ components.

The shell we use is a high quality shell especially adapted for electric use. It is not simply pressed from a number of panels that make up any size heater. Instead we have to stock 14 different size shells and all of the component parts.

We believe we manufacture a high quality electric radiator – it looks and acts just like a gas centrally heated radiator because it uses the same shell (which people seem to like) and is filled with water but with some additional benefits associated with electric heating such as greater controllability and 100% efficiency etc.

All of this means that we can’t charge £150 for a radiator as we have to cover our build costs and labour costs as well as the significant development costs.

Despite our pride in our product I can understand why your posts and other forum posts make some of the points that you make and, to be honest, I don’t disagree with everything written on here. Let me make it absolutely clear that our company is fully aware that if you ‘put’ 1kW of energy into ANY electric heater it will give out 1kW of heat for the same cost.

I would like to point out that our website and literature does not make any special claims regarding the heat output of our electric radiators or their costs to run.

We don’t claim that we have somehow changed the laws of physics to improve the performance of our radiators so that you will magically get more heat out than energy put in.

We don’t say that our radiators are cheaper to run than gas central heating, we don’t say that it will only cost 2p per hour to run our heaters, we don’t say that the water is specially adapted super water with a gimmicky name which has been taken from the springs of Mount Doom etc. In fact we state that the running cost of our largest radiator could be 25p per hour if it is in a room with poor insulation factors such as solid stone external walls and single-glazed windows etc – we could annualise this cost oand divide it by 8760 (hours in a year) to give a great ‘headline’ figure but we don’t do that because, firstly it is misleading, and secondly the ASA dont like it.

I think we are pretty honest about our product and electric heating and sometimes this is to our detriment but word-of-mouth referrals is a key market for us and you don’t get these by making false claims. We ont get complaints about running costs either.

We get many calls from potential customers with questions about why our radiators seemingly cost more to run than our competitors products. We try and explain that this isn’t the case and we take the time to explain why BUT I know we have lost sales to competitors based on their claims.

Pleasingly some customers have come back to us after ASA judgements or when they see their heating bills.

Even more pleasingly, we’ve made quite a few sales from people who have been on the MSE forums looking into competitors products which you (and others) have commented on.

Having said all of this I understand that this is a money savings forum and the comments are intended to help consumers make a more informed choice to save money or maximise the value they get. Yes, we are more expensive than a fan heater and some panel heaters etc but we find that customers who are interested in our product are looking for something different to those types of heater – they may be looking for something a bit more permanent or a bit more robust or perhaps something that looks a bit more British or like a gas system etc (although beauty is in the eye of the beholder).

In most cases we are not competing with a fan heater or a panel heater or a £150 heater etc but we are in competition with some of the heaters named in this thread. We don’t win every sale and it is annoying if we lose a sale when the customer thinks we are more expensive to run when this is never ever the case.

I guess what I’m trying to is to say is we work hard to be a professional company in a market which, in some instances, seems to becoming increasingly unprofessional.

I would never expect you to recommend our product and feel free to criticise or comment on our product based on its cost-to-buy, heat output vs fan heaters, price to run compared to gas central heating etc but please don’t tar us with the same brush as some of our competitors for the claims that they make.

Thanks.