Storage Heaters on E7 or Electric Radiators on standard rate?

Bidello

Hello everybody.

I am new to this forum, well actually I have been reading it for some three months now, more or less since my fianc!e and I decided to buy a house.

Long story short: my fianc!e decided she wanted that flat, a three bedroom maisonette with... no gas supply.

I have always been put off by electric heating, and more by an electric hob. I cook a lot and absolutely hate induction or ceramic hobs. It's OK for most things, but sometimes you do need a flame under your frying pan.... Anyhow, I can live with that - well and I'll have to!

As I said, I've been reading may threads here regarding electric heating, house insulation and the likes, and although I have found tons of good info, I am still looking for advice regarding one very thing:

Do I stay with Economy 7 and storage heaters, or move to a standard rate tariff and get normal electric radiators?

Let me give you a more detailed picture first.

Our flat needs some redecoration work, a couple of window have to be changed and although the loft and roof eaves do have some insulation, I am going to insulate everything properly with the right material - no problems here.

The electric meter is an Economy 7 meter with the usual teleradioswitch unit.

We currently have our electricity supplied by Scottish Power.

The three storage heaters - old Dimplex models, don't have the specs sorry, they are BIG anyway - are on a separate circuit controlled by the teleswitch. I tested them and they only turn on when the off-peak tariff kicks in, as it should be.

There is also an Economy 7 hot water tank in the loft, properly insulated from what I can tell, although I might add some further insulation to it...) with the usual two immersion heaters. The unit is controlled by a Horstmann controller located in the kitchen. This is the one with a timed switch for heating using off-peak electricity and a boost switch for the top immersion heater (I haven't tested it but I imagine the bottom immersion heater should only work when the teleswitch turns on the cheap rate electricity supply).

In the three bedrooms upstairs there are panel heaters, again Dimplex, very old ones.

Now, the panel heaters are in a very bad shape. Two of them don't work - we got a couple of oil filled radiators on wheels with the house! Two of the three storage heaters are also not doing well. One doesn't work at all (tested the wall socket and connection, all fine, something is wrong with the heater) and the other looks like someone tried to break it apart with a sledgehammer....

So we though about replacing the storage heaters, and possibly get storage heaters for the three bedrooms as well (although we'd probably have to rewire the panel heaters as they are on the main, high-peak electricity fuse box).

Having never lived before in a house with electric heating only, we didn't know how to deal with it, until we (well I:)) did some research and read this forum a lot, and understood how the electric storage heating works.

Thing is, we are not much at home during the day. We have a 13 month baby, and in the flat we live right now we do have GCH, and use it this way: we warm up the house a little in the morning, before we wake up around 6:00am, have breakfast, shower (there is an instant electric shower) get the baby ready for the nursery, then go out and we are not back before 5:00pm. When it's really cold, the GCH is timed to start heating around 16:15, so the house is warm when we're back. We then turn it on an off accordingly to the house temperature (there's no thermostat).

Also, three times a week we shower in the evenings, after sport.

We are worried that the day we move to the new flat, keeping this lifestyle will cost us a fortune.

How do we know for sure that the storage heaters will be able to provide enough heat throughout the day and keep the house warm in the evening? What if they run out of stored heat and we need to top them up again, using fully priced electricity?

How do we know for sure that the hot water tank will be able to maintain the water warm in the evening? OK for sure we'll have hot water in the morning, but what about the evening?

Surely we can install an instant heater in the shower (toilet needs to be entirely redecorated) but that would use again full tariff electricity.

I do understand it could be difficult to answer my questions without providing some figures. Though I can't just buy new storage heaters, start living in the new house, and find out months later I would have been better off switching to a standard electricity tariff and getting standard radiators.

So, my question again: when using electricity only, does it actually make sense to have a standard 24h tariff and use normal electric heaters, also having instant heaters for the shower and using the hot water tank only those days you want to have a bath, or is it going to be cheaper anyway staying with Economy 7, having the storage heaters on at night only, maybe topping the heat up by using some oil filled heaters on wheels (or even buying combi storage heaters) when it's needed and warming up the hot water tank every night?

Sorry for the long (winded) first post, hope you guys can provide some insight on the matter;)


Cheers,
David

HappyMJ

You really need figures to compare correctly but it is almost always cheaper using E7 heating and using peak rate heating sparingly. You still need some hot water for hand and dish washing so you will still be heating a tank whether you use it or not.

macman

Your heating cost could be up to 3 times higher using standard rate. But you really need to live in the property for a winter before you can decide.
The hot water tank and controller may offer you a 1 hour boost that can be used in the evening should the hot water run short. A hot tank should stay warm all day if properly lagged.
E7 is generally more suited to those who are in the property during the day, and it will always cost more than GCH.

Bidello

Thanks a lot for replying.

@ HappyMJ, yes I agree I'd still need hot water, but for hand washing only, I have a dishwasher I plan yo use overnight.

@ macman, well I hoped that was going to be the case, that is, the hot water tank keeping the water hot all day long :-P

Unfortunately we are not going to stay home during the day but the weekends - actually we go out quite often at weekends as well....

I gather, however, that getting rid of E7 altogether and buying electric radiators might not be the smartest move, and that I could regret it in the future....

Any other opinion at all?

Ada3050

Storage heating will work if you are going to be well insulated which from what you have posted you will be.

I have storage heaters and they aren't that bad, lots of people dismiss them who have never had them, the others only remember them from years ago with badly insulated houses, undersize & broken heaters.

There is a noticeable difference in my house between downstairs and upstairs, the storage heaters work just fine upstairs, but struggle downstairs. Due to living on a hill and the direction of the wind, they only really struggle below freezing temps. For the few days we have low temps my best buy was a cheap £8.99 halogen heater for quick warm ups while watching telly.

The main thing I would say that most people miss is they shouldn't be regarded as direct replacement for GCH, they work fine as background /constant heating much the same as people who run their GCH on low 24/7. Also they act to keep the fabric of the building at a constant temp preventing damp etc.
There are a few threads on here about storage heating, good and bad. There are also threads about GCH and the problems they encounter, I have to say in the 15 years I have my storage heaters they have needed no servicing/checks and have never gone wrong.

Having said all that, if you are in for only a few hours each day I would guestimate the cost for panel heating based on your life style. Should be fairly easy to work out (hrs x kwh x tariff) and see what the figures are.

Scottish_Power

Hi Bidello,

My short answer is that you need to keep the E7 meter, as stated above moving to a standard tariff will without doubt increase you charges.

I would recomend that you contact our independant energy efficency team on 0800 33 22 33.

Kind regards

Graeme @ ScottishPower

Bidello

Thanks a lot Ada3050, your post sums pretty much a lot of the info posted in many other threads (at least the ones I read!).

And yes, your suggestion does make sense, I should be able to work out a rough cost of heating the house using only panel heater with that simple calculation, and do a comparison.

Have a couple more questions - might be obvious to many, but here they are:

- modern storage heaters have a thermostat I should imagine (not sure about old ones). Does that mean that they are not going to draw electricity constantly during the 7 hours they're on at night, right? i.e once they have reached the "fully charged state", they should just be idling, possibly topping up if needed....?

- if I stay with E7 and warm up the water tank at night, it won't make much sense to shower using an electric instant shower at evening, thus drawing expensive electricity, right?

Oh and thanks Grame @ScottishPower, we'll see what I end up doing, and whether I stay with SP...:D

macman

The electric shower will draw at peak rate, yes, but it will only be on for a few minutes. The bulk of your electricity consumption will be for heating and hot water, these are the areas to focus on.

Bidello

Thanks macman, I thought that was going to be the case.

Oh, forgot to mention that in my area is also available E10 (Scottish Hydro).

However, prices are higher, and there is a standing charge as well...:think:

Ada3050

Yep, you would be correct. In milder weather I turn mine down so the thermostat will kick in and prevent a full charge.

Bidello wrote: »

- modern storage heaters have a thermostat I should imagine (not sure about old ones). Does that mean that they are not going to draw electricity constantly during the 7 hours they're on at night, right? i.e once they have reached the "fully charged state", they should just be idling, possibly topping up if needed....?

Bidello

Many thanks again.

Some more thoughts: what would people have in the bedrooms, storage heaters as well or panel heaters?

I usually never keep the heating on at night, no much point really as I'm in bed and the room (in a properly insulated house that is!) does not freeze at night.

I do have the timer set to turn the heating on roughly 45 minutes before we get up.

This is happening right now in the flat I'm renting, with GCH.

But once I move in the new property I wonder what would be more of a sensible option. I have to replace the panel heaters that are in the three bedrooms, but am not sure what's best.

I was thinking that if I got storage heaters for the bedrooms as well, I could time them to come alive only one hour or two before I wake up, in order to have the bedroom warm in the morning, thus avoiding having the room heated all night long - I never liked too much heat when I'm sleeping.

On the other hand, I could well get timed panel heaters, and do the same trick: only use them a couple of hours before waking up. The only problem would be that the bedrooms could go cold at night. That's why I'm thinking of storage heaters also for the bedrooms.

Am I on the right track at all??