storage heaters/electric central heating or gas?

Hugbubble

I am moving in a couple of months into a property with no central heating (negotiated the price accordingly!) My question is, we want to put electric heating in (no gas supply). We were toying with electric wet central but how much disruption is the installation? Do the floors need to be ripped up to install the pipes?

Also, I saw, on a heating sales website, new types of storage heaters that are thermostat & fan colrolled so that heat is released when you time it to? Does anyone have any experience of these? Are they any good?

samtheman1k

Installing central heating is just as disruptive as installing gas/oil central heating. Floorboards need to be lifted, holes drilled in walls etc. It shouldn't take more than a week, but yes, it will be disruptive.

Be vary wary of installing a direct wet electric central heating system...the running costs will be massive, 3-4 times more than gas. Gas is normally the preferred option as it is the lowest running cost. If gas is not available, then either oil or a heat pump based electric system will still see reasonable running costs.

powerchamp

Cardew wrote: »

What do you mean by 'higher temperatures' for storage heaters? The higher the temperatures of any 'body' the quicker it will lose heat. e.g. a kettle of boiling water will cool(lose heat) quicker from 100C to 90C than, say, 70C to 60C.

I am afraid that a 2 bed bungalow will cost a lot to heat by storage heating but, if you don't have gas, electric storage heating is the cheapest method available and much much cheaper than any form of electrical heating running on daytime electricity.

These water filled CH systems like Kalirel/Electrowarm etc are simply radiators filled with a fluid and produce no more heat for 1kWh input than any other electrical heater, including granny's old electric one bar fire.

Kalirel/Electrowarm radiators are just like oil filled radiators(costing £20/£30 each) and produce no more heat for a given input. Their websites are IMO a disgrace in that they use all the buzz words like 'eco' and 'green' and are totally misleading.

In particular Electrowarm's figures are a disgrace. When all the stupid meaningless calculations are followed through; they state that their heaters produce the same heat from 7kWh in a day as storage heaters produce from 23.8kWh in a day and conclude that they will heat a room for 73p a day and storage heating will cost £1.48 a day. Criminal!

If they dared to put these calculations in media other than the internet they would be hammered by the Advertising standards authority and every Trading Standards Authority.

Cardew

I'm a bit ashamed about the way you easily condemn a product without giving evidence of how much you really know about it. The electrowarm radiators manufactured in Germany by Sueka gmbh are not filled up with water or oil. They are filled with no liquid at all. So please check your facts well and get to know the product before lumping it into the same category as a "£20/£30 each" heater.

Sometimes, the loudest contributor to forums is not necessarily the most well informed. So people taking advice such as yours need be a bit circumspect.

powerchamp

shockabuku

Hi all. New forum member, got here whilst researching how to heat a 2-story 30ft x 15ft barn that we intend to use as office space & a home cinema. The walls are thick stone, with a tall ~13ft vaulted ceiling. We already have oil CH in the main house, alonside the barn, and no gas in the area. I'm trying to work out if installing a 2nd oil boiler in the barn (we can get a used one from a friend very cheap) will be more economical in the long run than installing some kind of electric (storage?) heating. Obviously, I'm not intending that the barn is super toasty warm, but just enough to keep it useable & protect the electronics from massive temperature fluctuations. I'll be working from home in the barn pretty much all day, if that makes a difference. Any theories much appreciated! Cheers. Mark.

Cardew

powerchamp wrote: »

Cardew

I'm a bit ashamed about the way you easily condemn a product without giving evidence of how much you really know about it. The electrowarm radiators manufactured in Germany by Sueka gmbh are not filled up with water or oil. They are filled with no liquid at all. So please check your facts well and get to know the product before lumping it into the same category as a "£20/£30 each" heater.

Sometimes, the loudest contributor to forums is not necessarily the most well informed. So people taking advice such as yours need be a bit circumspect.

powerchamp

Having just joined MSE, I take it you are connected with selling/marketing the heaters??

You would do well to read my post carefully!

It doesn't matter what a radiators is filled with - air, clay, water, oil etc etc - they all produce the same heat output for a given input.

i.e. there is no magic ingredient that enables them to produce more heat output - so if you spend a pound on electricity for(non storage) electrical heating you get the same amount of heat from any electrical heating system - be it oil filled radiators costing "£20/£30 each" or a system costing £thousands.

So I am saying exactly as you state - I am lumping these overpriced systems(marketed as if they produce extra heat) in the same category as a simple oil filled radiator. They produce no more heat for your buck!

Got that?

Lastly I have no axe to grind - why not try and prove me wrong?

powerchamp

Cardew wrote: »

Having just joined MSE, I take it you are connected with selling/marketing the heaters??

You would do well to read my post carefully!

It doesn't matter what a radiators is filled with - air, clay, water, oil etc etc - they all produce the same heat output for a given input.

i.e. there is no magic ingredient that enables them to produce more heat output - so if you spend a pound on electricity for(non storage) electrical heating you get the same amount of heat from any electrical heating system - be it oil filled radiators costing "£20/£30 each" or a system costing £thousands.

So I am saying exactly as you state - I am lumping these overpriced systems(marketed as if they produce extra heat) in the same category as a simple oil filled radiator. They produce no more heat for your buck!

Got that?

Lastly I have no axe to grind - why not try and prove me wrong?

Dear Cardew

The problem is that you simplistically lump anyone who dares question you as a heater salesman or working for the companies in question. First of all, I'm not a salesman and would not have time for this forum if I were.

Many people who end up here (except Electrorad that is) are out in search for alternative solutions to other forms of heating they do not want to install. So for you to condemn such systems without even proving you've ever used them except that you saw them in Germany when you lived there is IMHO unhelpful. Where in Germany did you see them and when was that? What brand were they? How were they used? What running cost did they have? How much warmth did they produce in the given spaces? Did you actually see them in action? What feedback did the owners have? Can you prove what they said?

As a chartered electrical engineer (you told us you are) you seem to assume that you know all that is possible to know about any form of electric heating system. You're not even prepared to open up your mind allow others to do so to the possibility that new technology might be in the marketplace you're not fully aware of. You haven't answered Jazzman's questions. And I hope you don't think I'm Jazzman or electrorad.com or electrowarm.com or sueka.co.uk or wibo.co.k or dimplex.c.uk

Electrorad challenged you to send them your address for the data of their test results. I would've hoped that you'll do so and report back in this forum. But you being ALL KNOWING have rejected that and continue to harp on your presumed knowledge of Süka/Electrowarm/Electrorad heaters. It's a shame that we have people in our society who know all (you're a chartered electrical engineer), have got all (told us how many houses you have with different heaters), seen all (you've lived in Germany) and have the audacity to judge all (accusing people who question you as salesmen).

What you did with Electrorad was shameful. No wonder they stopped trying to educate you. You're incorrigible. And rather than remain focused on the argument, you went to ASA website to extract information out of context about them and published here. But challenged to receive their test data which invalidates the ASA report, you refused. Because you feared to expose your own ignorance and dishonesty.

How do we know you're not hiding behind a "wet system" company or an Air Source Heat company, that is, if I were to turn coin over and accuse you of what you accuse me and others of?

IMHO, it's only a matter of time that electric heating in the form supplied by Sueka or Electrowarm or Electrorad will become a norm in the country. Electricity may be expensive but it is the supply side rather than the demand side. So if you pooh pooh such products, you're suggesting that no technology is possible in the sphere of electric heating that can radically improve the efficiency in the way we warm our homes.

Please do yourself a favour. Stop suspecting that anyone disagreeing with you is a salesman. That's a warped way of thinking unexpected of a chartered electrical engineer who owns three homes and has lived in Germany.

The least you can do is to get access to one of such products and prove to yourself how they work and then report back here for our consumption.

powerchamp

Cardew wrote: »

Jazzman,
Sorry - I obviously made the wrong assumption about you working for the firm.

having lived in Germany for quite a while I have actually seen this type of radiator.:eek:

There are a whole mass of electrical systems being marketed by various 'get rich quick' firms using terms that are simply designed to confuse the non-technical.

There is something in our psyche that hates admitting ...

Cardew,

How interesting that you see "something in our psyche that hates admitting" that we're simply ignorant of certain things? You said that yourself above. So that explains why you'll keep "banging on" and exposing your own ignorance?

When did you live in Germany and how long is "quite a while"?

How do you define "various 'get rich quick' firms" and to what extent do those definitions match the companies you condemned here?

The products being marketed by electrorad and electrowarm as my research has revealed have been in production since 1970 by Sueka Elektroheizgeraete GmbH (See http://www.sueka.de and http://www.sueka.co.uk). So how do you think the manufacturers have fared this long if they were in your own words "get rich quick" firms?

Please answer the questions and don't try to evade them.

powerchamp

Cardew wrote: »

With the exception of expensive to install heat pump systems, storage heating is the cheapest way to heat using electricicity.

However they do have drawbacks in convienience and, if you are in all day, usually run out of heat.

Any electrical heater makes sense for limited use in a room; the cost of installing an alternative system will outweigh the savings.

Hi Cardew

It's me again. I hope you don't think I'm in this forum solely to answer you. I find your above admission rather interesting if I recall well, all that you wrote about the electric storage heating already.

So if storage heating is the cheapest way to heat using electricity, why is your granny 1/2/3 rod heater compared with the electro whatever heaters? And if some storage heaters have the drawback of convenience, is it possible there may be others that have answered that inconvenience and eliminated the drawback?

If "any electrical heater makes sense", would you then narrow the search to an efficient electrical heater? Or is there no such thing as efficient electrical heater?

You know why Britain has lagged behind in renewable energy generation and nearly 3 million household still use night storage heaters? It's because we have bureaucrats who have several letters after their names and therefore feel insulated from opening up to the idea of new technology.

Somebody compared Britain to the proverbial bunny who laughed when a tortoise challenged him to a race. She made the tortoise take the lead and then she run to overtake him but before reaching the endpoint, decided to relax and fall asleep thinking that by the time the tortoise reaches her, she would have awaken and completed the race. The tortoise trundled on, came past the bunny and reached the final mark before the bunny really woke up. And it was too late to win the race.

Now put Britain in place of the comfortable cuddly bunny and the France or Germany in place of the Tortoise.

So if we don't open up to new ideas irrespective of where they come from, our "Chartered" qualifications would only continue to keep us as followers rather than leaders.

I was born in Devon but moved to lived in Germany (mostly in Hesse and Bavaria) between 1969 till 2000 when I was 23. When I returned to the UK, I was really amazed to see that most of the houses I tried to buy in Cornwall were with night storage heaters. I was later to discover through various estate agents that it was still the norm here.

jchapman

We live in a large old house and in winter often prefer to heat just one large family room rather than turn on the gas central heating. To do this, for the last 22 years this room has been heated by its own gas fired balanced flue wall heater with thermostat. The heating load of the room is 3.5KW and the gas heater has an input of 4.98KW and an output to the room of 3.5KW. All works well and the room heats up within 20 minutes.However we can no longer get spares and the heater will not work this winter so I am investigating a replacement method of heating this one room. In the 22 years we have had the heater, technology may have moved on and I am open to new ideas.

To buy and fit a replacement gas wall heater ( Drugasar ) will cost £600-750.
To buy two free standing Dimplex type oil filled heaters will cost about £200.
To buy two simple electical convector heaters will cost about £40.
I believe the running costs of these two types of electrical heating on full price tariff will be quite high.

I then come across Sueka heaters which I do not totally understand.
The Sueka quote for this room -- 2 radiators -- is £1200.
Sueka heaters look like ordinary "wet" high output radiators but have a large surface storage core of composite material inside a bit like old night storage heaters.
I understand that 1kwh of electricity will give me 1kw in the room for one hour ( just like my granny's old one bar fire ) yet Sueka sales claim that their system will somehow break the normal rules of thermodynamics.
They state---
With regard to your other questions about the difference between our heaters and convector heaters, our heaters take only 15 minutes of electricity and give out about 45 minutes to an hour of uninterrupted heat. The heat is released as radiant warmth (about 75%) and convected heat (about 25%). So if you turned our heater on for 20 minutes and then unplug it, you’ll still feel warmth in the room some 45 minutes later. That feat is impossible for convected panel heaters.

They also state
Everyone uses the heaters differently. So running cost although lower than
night storage heaters (by nearly half) and other forms of electric panel
heaters, it would be misleading for us to just give you a figure and set
your expectations to that.
The Sueka sales staff are most cordial and helpful but I cannot understand how their system can appear to give out more heat than I have paid for. I then ask for names of satisfied customers to whom I can talk direct.They have a number of these in the west country where I live but do not give out names as the existing customers have been contacted late at night and the system has been abused.

And so, dear reader, I turn to you to advise me what will be my best buy to heat this room for the next 22 years.
The gas wall heater option I understand as it has worked fine before.
However, before spending my cash, I would like to be certain that the Sueka option
is not superior to the gas wall heater option. This is the only place on the internet that seems to know something about Sueka heaters and I would prefer not to reject them completely without some expert opinions.

With very many thanks in advance for any opinions that will help me make up my mind on this matter.

Cardew

Powerchamp,

2 questions;

Do you work/are connected to a firm that sells heating systems? - your name suggests you might be.

Heat pumps aside, are you aware that all forms of electrical heating give out the same amount of heat for a given input?

I have no connection with any company selling any product - either now or in the past.

I will continue to point out to readers of this forum that some electrical heating products are marketed in a misleading fashion; and imply that they produce more heat for the money than other electrical heating systems. Post 192 above is a good example.

Those reading can make up their own mind, or question the Energy Saving Trust - Which etc etc to see who is correct.

If you want to discuss this further, I suggest you attempt to stop trying to bring this down to a personality issue and simply post some data demonstrating that the heat output of the systems you are defending(selling?) is greater than other forms of electrical heating.

You have understood I hope that I am talking about HEAT OUTPUT and not some meaningless test that a room can be heated to xxC for yyP.