What is more efficient electric blow heater or oil filled radiator?

Itsadogslife_2

We don't have gas in our village and with the drop in temperature I have turned most of the storage heaters off. We have an electric fire in the lounge which has a blow heater. I don't know the power output but wonder whether the oil filled radiator that is 1500kw is more cost efficient?

DVardysShadow

A fan heater at 1500W and an oil filled radiator at 1500W will cost exactly the same per hour, assuming they run full blast and their thermostats do not cut in. It is down to which one delivers heat in a way you feel most happy with.

And I seriously doubt that you have a 1500kW oil filled radiator - this is about the power of a 6 car railway train

Ectophile

Electric heaters are all 100% efficient, or something very close to it.

The difference is in the way they deliver the heat. An oil-filled radiator gives a background warmth, a fan heater blasts it to wherever you point it. But the total amount of heat delivered is the same.

macman

All the same efficiency, but an electric heater running on peak rate E7 is going to cost you over 3 times as much to run as a storage heater running on cheap rate E7. Say 12p per kWh vs 4p.
So if you still need heating at all, I'd switch the storage heaters back on and save a lot of money.

27col

There is absolutely no difference in the efficiency of electric fires. They are all 100% efficient. The only reason for choosing one as opposed to another is convenience of use. Only the user can know this.

Yorkie1

Doesn't half feel cold when a fan heater switches itself off, though - the contrast between on and off is significant!

Gloomendoom

If you want to be pedantic, the fan heater is slightly less efficient because some energy is lost to noise and to power the fan motor.

DVardysShadow

Gloomendoom wrote: »

If you want to be pedantic, the fan heater is slightly less efficient because some energy is lost to noise and to power the fan motor.

And if you wish to be truly pedantic, the fan motor power, including the noise, quickly renders itself as heat anyway.

rygon

but the noise itself is energy, just like any light given off, or kinetic due to movement, and all of this energy is not going to produce heat so therefore it cannot be 100% efficient (nothing is). Powering a motor for the fan can use up a lot of energy

I think it depends on how long you are willing to wait until it starts warming up. From what ive read, oil rad is more efficient but will take longer to warm up and cool down

http://uk.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20081129045214AAnwxd2

DVardysShadow

rygon wrote: »

but the noise itself is energy, just like any light given off, or kinetic due to movement, and all of this energy is not going to produce heat so therefore it cannot be 100% efficient (nothing is). Powering a motor for the fan can use up a lot of energy

The point very precisely is that it all ends up as heat. Noise, fan blowing kinetic energy, the lot. Noise is a tiny amount of energy. It all ends up as heat - about the only escape is that any noise which escapes the room converts to heat outside the room.

Gloomendoom

DVardysShadow wrote: »

And if you wish to be truly pedantic, the fan motor power, including the noise, quickly renders itself as heat anyway.

Good point, but it does rather depends on the level of noise and whether it can be contained within the room.

Edit: Just seen that you've already said that.