storage heater/economy 7 queries

StrawberryJam_2

stuartsjg wrote: »

Hi,
I have been in with electric heating use a tarrif avaliable called "Total Heating and Total Control" or THTC

I have two meters:
"domestic standard energy" ie sockets and lights.
"heating control energy" i.e all fixed hard wired heaters, eg storage, water, shower, panel etc.

Its like E7 but you are in total control of when and how you use heat. I can put my hot water, panel heaters, electric fire, shower etc on at any time of the day and it costs me the low rate.

There is a RadioTeleswitch which listens out for a signal.
This controls the storage heater supply and the hot water element.

It does have fixed times however most teleswitches are used for grid balencing.

Sometimes about 4:45-5:00pm the storage heaters and hot water element all go on for a few minutes. This is generally because of a large local industrial load that has been removed so the power needs to go somehwere whilst the power stations wind down to reduced power, or the power has somewhere else to go.

Likewise, around tea time it will go on just before people are having there tea in the country and off just after most people have finnished tea .

The teleswitch system is part of the national grid load balencing system. If they need to get rid of power very quickly then they have millions of watts of storage heaters and hot water elements that can be switched on in 5mS.

it gets more complicated still...
Most teleswitches can respond automatically to grid changes. if the voltage or frequency are too high for a certain period of time then they will switch on the heater loads to pull the frequcny and voltage down - likewise if they are already on the there is a sag in frequcney or voltage they will shut the heaters off.

the storage heat system is used increasinly as a place to go for wind energy - as the wind is variable, sometimes the scotland to england interconnector may not beable to take it all to england so the scotish storage heaters will click on.

The teleswitch system is more common is scotland and the islands as the grids are more prone to over or undercapacity due to there smaller nature.

I presume this is correct? I had no idea what my THTC was. The question regarding THTC - has anyone moved to a better deal? I found the best deal was to wear extra clothing when we talk about cost of heating :T

isobel81

To anyone thinking of installing Kalirel heaters - PLEASE PLEASE DON'T!!

My landlord installed them 2 years ago when my gas fan heaters stopped working and since then my electricity bill has been HUGE!! Obviously there have been price rises in the last couple of years, but my current electricity bill (I don't have any gas appliances now) is £103 per month. A couple of years ago when I had gas heaters the combined electricity and gas bill was £33 per month.

I feel sick just thinking about it.

Unfortunately my landlord still insists that the Kalirel heaters are energy efficient and therefore I am stuck with them for another winter...

Cardew

isobel81 wrote: »

To anyone thinking of installing Kalirel heaters - PLEASE PLEASE DON'T!!

My landlord installed them 2 years ago when my gas fan heaters stopped working and since then my electricity bill has been HUGE!! Obviously there have been price rises in the last couple of years, but my current electricity bill (I don't have any gas appliances now) is £103 per month. A couple of years ago when I had gas heaters the combined electricity and gas bill was £33 per month.

I feel sick just thinking about it.

Unfortunately my landlord still insists that the Kalirel heaters are energy efficient and therefore I am stuck with them for another winter...

Your landlord has obviously been fooled by the misleading advertising blurb.

All forms of electrical heating running on daytime electricity is the most expensive form of heating to run available - and that includes Kalirel and other similar systems.

isobel81

Cardew wrote: »

Your landlord has obviously been fooled by the misleading advertising blurb.

I know :-( But I don't blame him tbh cos the Kalirel website is convincing! Surely lots of other people out there have been fooled??

Blairweech

My two upstairs storage heater are costing about £1/night a run. My downstairs one is costing £5/night to run. Why is this? Do I need to call EDF out to service them?

spuffy1979

I also have 2 storage heaters in my flat, they seem to be costing em a fortune, Ive been taking regular reading etc and last month i have used £80!!!!
Aaaarrrggggghhhhhhhhhhhhh

kris230376

Hi, I am under freezing conditions since 4 days. here is the stroy and thanks for the patience to listen, read.

i moved to a new flat last week and the flat has night storage heaters(E7). i have never used this before.since 4 weeks the house is freezing. there are 2 heaters one in living and one in bed room.

1. There are 3 controls in each of the heaters. Output,input and comfort.

i was browsing interenet for storage heaters and found output and input but not comfort. For each control, 3 is only maximum(some of the articles in internet had 6).

I keep the bear minium output that is 1 when i start in the morning and when i get back in the evening i will increase little bit. i kept input on 2 and comfort is also 2. i am not sure if this is best setting so that the house can be warm.

please can some suggest me the best possible settings so that my house can be warm.

Thanks in advance

odessa_jayne

Sinned666 wrote: »

Hey,

Well this is my first as ive been looking frantically for information about Economy 7 Heaters.

We moved into our property in October 06, at the time we had an actual reading done and then the following month estimated and again estimated in December and January. Our bill was set up for £61 a month.

The heaters are fairly old ones and have the Input - Output dials on.

I phoned up last weekend to re-set up a Direct Debit which had been cancelled the previous month. During the phone i was asked to read my meter, on reading the meter the women on the phone told me that it appears we were on the wrong tariff and have been for quite some time. We live in a block of flats of 15 by the way. She said to me that our bill should be more and said she would be sending out a revised statement.

The revised statement arrived. The £320 includes £89 which was outstanding so in total £230 for January 23rd to 28th February.

Looking at my units, me and my partner are both out 5 days a week 8 - 5.30 as we both work. For the 23/01/07 - 31/03/07 My day readings are. 1015 Units @ 10.301 - £104.56 and for the 1st February - 28th February my day readings are 1266 @10.740 = £135.97.

I cant understand what has happened here as far as am aware we leave the heaters on by the plug, but we were told by the landlord that they only use electricity from 12-7am.

Why has this bill gone so through the roof, have they made a mistake, have we made a mistake, or been given misleading information..

If the bill is correct why wasnt this spotted when the inital reading was taken in October? Can anyone help here as this amount and the usage is ridicilous for 3 heaters, as there is nothing else on in the day as we're both out?

Anybody any ideas im expecting a call from Scottish Power at lunch time about this so would appreciate any feedback at all...

Hi there,

I am going through an almost identical situation to the one above... does anyone know what the problem was and how to fix it? Or is it a case of the electricity company changing the tarriff to a higher one?

Please help...

alliecat_2

I can just about understand some of what you say but just to go a step further. In the kitchen there is a timer/progammer which runs to the on/of switch of the storage heater.The timer has a on,off & timer switch but the question what do I use this timer for/does it effect my econ 7 which has one of these radio transmitter things or do I have to set one of the times to the 0000 to 0700 eco7 times.
Any help will be appreciated

kris230376

Hello group, any help with my query is greatly appreciated.

thanks in advance