Storage heater or oil filled radiator during nightime?

Cin10

I have two storage heaters that come on in the night during E7 times, but they barely heat up the flat.
I also have two plug in electric oil radiators that actually heat up the rooms noticably.
What I'm wondering is how much of a money difference would it be if I used a timer plug for the oil radiators to come on in place of when the storage heaters would come on?

matelodave

You'd find that the flat was warm during the night when they were on and cold during the day when they were off.

They wouldn't store any heat, so to heat the place during the day and evening you'd have to use peak rate leccy which would be very expensive, possibly three times the cost of using the off-peak rate

Have you checked that they actually do get warm. Most storage heaters have two controls - an input control which should be set to at least mid position or higher when its cold and an output control which should be set to minimum overnight so the heater can charge (store heat) and ideally leave it closed as long as you can during the day so the heat leaks out slowly and there's still some left for the evening.

Generally if you are cold then they either aren't big enough to heat the place properly, you aren't using them correctly or there's a fault.

thozza

There is a useful summary post here about storage heaters and Economy 7:-

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4271707

Cin10

They heat up well enough during the night but it never does enough to heat the flat (old building, big brick walls)
I think the sudden burst of heat supplied by the oil radiators heats up the air more, since rhe storage heaters slowly release heat the heat is being cancelled out by the walls etc..

footyguy

Cin10 wrote: »

They heat up well enough during the night but it never does enough to heat the flat (old building, big brick walls)
I think the sudden burst of heat supplied by the oil radiators heats up the air more, since rhe storage heaters slowly release heat the heat is being cancelled out by the walls etc..

Sounds like you should concentrate your efforts on improving the insulation of the flat