Is it cheaper to keep ticking over or...

niftynew

Hi all

A mate of mine says he keeps the central heating on all day at about 14-15 C while hes at work and an hour before he gets in it switchs to 18c.

He says its much cheaper to do it this way than do it the way I do.

mine switchs on for an hour in the morning when I get up and get ready for work then it switchs off and it dont come back on till an hour before I get in from work, both temps are set for 18c

so my question is.....is it cheaper to keep your central heating ticking over or let your house go cold throughout the day and then boot it back up just before you get in from work?

Regards
Niftynew

HappyMJ

It's not cheaper. It will cost only a little more leaving it on 14 (it won't come on very often) but it is cheaper turning it off completely.

grizzly1911

Question raised many times.

The best analogy i saw was;_

Think of you house as a leaky bucket.If you leave the tap running slowly (constant low heat) it just continues to leak.

If you fill it up rapidly on timed slots it will still leak but not for so long.


That argument may be slightly different for a big old stone pile rather than a modern, properly insulated house that will not absorb so much heat before it becomes cosy.

steve237

I'm sure, according to Martins latest newsletter he stated:

" It's NOT cheaper to leave heating on all day. We asked the Energy Saving Trust and it says it's an urban myth that it's cheaper to leave it on all day rather than set it for an hour before you get up and get hom"

So I guess that settles it!

I've just posted a question on this forum about leaving heating on in the house all day when only I'm in, vs leaving it off (or very low) and using an electric fan heater in my home office to blast some warm air when it gets cold.

If anyone can advise, please follow this link!

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/48615865#Comment_48615865

spinningsheep

I asked this question once having heard the urban myth about keeping it on 24/7 being cheaper and believe me unless you live in a super insulated house, which to be fair the vast majority of UK households are not, it really is not cheaper. The analogy you wouldn't keep your kettle on 24/7 just in case you fancied a cup of tea is a perfect one. Yes you have to wait a few mins for it to boil but that is vastly cheaper than if you were to keep it on 24/7 on a lower temp. We have our heating set to come on at 6am and off at 8am to fit in with when we come and go. It then comes back on again at 4pm and goes off at 10pm, and the boiler is not firing all the time, I find that in the morning it is on all the time for that 2 hours, but come the evening cycle it gets up to 21 in the hallway where the digital thermostat is, and this has a corresponding temp of about 23 in the lounge and the boiler goes off, it will then fire periodically to top up the heat if it drops below 21 in the hall, which is not that often to be fair. And if we are in all day on days off etc, we may pop the heating on constant for an hour just for a boost, but this really doesn't seem to affect the consumption that much at all. We may need to ajust the heating times a little when the really cold weather comes along, but we will see, as this in our 1st winter with the new boiler. I do believe that older properties with no cavity wall insulation such as mine, you do need to "warm the bones" of it otherwise you will never really feel warm, these houses were not designed to be left to run cold, remember they were heated with coal fires in the rooms that would have been kept in virtually 24/7 so they were kept "aired". Bottom line is, heat on = gas burnt = £££ spent. You need to keep a happy medium between cost and comfort.