Heating on all day in house vs electric heater in single room switched on when needed

SYNERGY

steve237 wrote: »

Thank you, all. I am going to ring my local Lidl and see if they have any in stock.

Thanks once again, everyone!

Liddle and Aldi don't stock such as these radiators in the stores all the time, they have ' offers ' which vary weekly and they have limited stocks.

Go to the Liddle and Aldi web sites and sign up for their email newsletters.

You will get, on average, a weeks notice of upcoming offers, they usually change the offers on specific days.

Handy if there is something you definitely need, that they would have limited stocks of.

You can be first in the queue. :j

steve237

Hi all,

I opted for an 1800-2100W compact electric fan heater which I dug out from my loft. My office is about 3.5m x 4m and I just switched it onto medium mode and it warmed my office in no time.

I checked my electricity monitor gadget it and showed it is consuming 11p of electricity per hour. For short blasts throughout the day when the house is empty and heating off, I reckon I've found the cheapest option energy useage-wise.

Meanwhile, I've switched off all radiators upstairs when heating is on and nobody is up there.

Hopefully knock one or two hundred off my energy bills per year, maybe more!

Opinions more than welcome.

Thanks for all your advice.

macman

A 2kW fan heater full on will use 2kw per hour, unless it has a thermostat cutting in and out. At a typical price of 10p per kWh, that will cost you 20p per hour, not 11p.
Yo cannot rely on these cheap monitors for consumption info, they are notoriously inaccurate.

steve237

macman wrote: »

A 2kW fan heater full on will use 2kw per hour, unless it has a thermostat cutting in and out. At a typical price of 10p per kWh, that will cost you 20p per hour, not 11p.
Yo cannot rely on these cheap monitors for consumption info, they are notoriously inaccurate.

That's interesting info re: energy monitors. This is a new one so thought it was accurate (when no electrical appliances are on except a few things on standby and maybe a light, it shows 2-3p per hour useage.

Anyway, I'm thinking that a 3-4 minute blast of this electric fan heater once an hour would still be a cheaper option when working alone at home than a thermostatic radiator with £40 outlay.

What do you think?

HappyMJ

steve237 wrote: »

That's interesting info re: energy monitors. This is a new one so thought it was accurate (when no electrical appliances are on except a few things on standby and maybe a light, it shows 2-3p per hour useage.

Anyway, I'm thinking that a 3-4 minute blast of this electric fan heater once an hour would still be a cheaper option when working alone at home than a thermostatic radiator with £40 outlay.

What do you think?

3-4 minutes of heat an hour will not keep a room warm on a freezing winters day. That only about 115Wh of heat. That might keep a room the size of an airing cupboard warm.

And regarding the energy monitor switch it to read in kWh and do the math of pennies per hour yourself rather than relying on the preset figure in the energy monitor.

macman

steve237 wrote: »

That's interesting info re: energy monitors. This is a new one so thought it was accurate (when no electrical appliances are on except a few things on standby and maybe a light, it shows 2-3p per hour useage.

Anyway, I'm thinking that a 3-4 minute blast of this electric fan heater once an hour would still be a cheaper option when working alone at home than a thermostatic radiator with £40 outlay.

What do you think?

They are produced in bulk in China for about a fiver, some are up to 20% inaccurate, especially at low readings. If you want readings, use the highly accurate device you already have installed-your electricity meter.
Any electric heater of the same rating costs exactly the same to run, be it a fan heater or an oil filled radiator.
A 2kW fan heater running for 4 mins will produce no more heat than an oil filled rad running for 4 mins.

oldskoo1

hmmmm 90p for a full working day using an electric fan heater

I've just been working out my consumption on an unrelated issue. For the day i used £1.27 worth of gas. This is to heat a 4 bed detached at 16C - 18C, 24/7 and hot water tank heating twice a day + gas cooking.

I typically run at 16C all day apart from boosting to 18C in evening. I kept it at 16C in evening and used the gas fire instead, this was 30% cheaper during those hours of boosting.

So why not just run the CH 24/7 on a lower temp. Say 17C and boost it to 19C in the evening.

If i ran an electric heater that cost 11p/h i would practically double my electric bill which is currently £19 something over 21 days.

I also work from home during the day, some days and my laptop, monitor, broadband and phone charging is normally on.

steve237

To be clear, I used my fabn heater in my home office 3 or 4 times yesterday - each time for no more than 4 minutes. That's 16 minutes of use in total with no central heating on in the house during working hours. That must be no more than 30p worth of electricity.

I truly cannot think of a cheaper way of keeping warm during working hours when working at home.

Please correct me if my logic is flawed!

macman

It is flawed, because you are only getting 16 minutes output. 16 mins from a 2kW heater only gives you 533 kW-that's about 5p, and a tiny amount of heat.
A 2kW oil filled rad will produce exactly the same amount of heat over the same period, and for the same cost.

Cardew

steve237 wrote: »

To be clear, I used my fabn heater in my home office 3 or 4 times yesterday - each time for no more than 4 minutes. That's 16 minutes of use in total with no central heating on in the house during working hours. That must be no more than 30p worth of electricity.

I truly cannot think of a cheaper way of keeping warm during working hours when working at home.

Please correct me if my logic is flawed!

16 minutes use, even if it was using the full 3kW would be 0.8kWh - say 10p.

However it is hardly representative to take a mild day in November - if you are discussing the principle of which is cheaper.

Being pedantic, if you had shut off all radiators in all rooms except where you were working, that amount of heat would cost less than 4p.

If we have a really cold spell where heating is required all day - the saving using gas would be considerable.

That said I have the heating going off at say 9:30pm in my house and if I am in my study late at night, I will do exactly what you do - put a fan heater on for a few minutes.