How to use white meter storage heating??

monika_2

I've just moved to a house that has white metre storage heaters installed - I've never used these before and the previous owners never left any kind of instructions - can anyone give me any help on how these things work - we also don't appear to be able to get any hot water unless we switch on the hot water switch at the wall (which we frequently forget to do!!) - it's driving me mad!!

Cardew

It depends to a certain extent how your heaters and immersion heater are wired.

The principle of storage heating is that they heat up during a 7 hour period* that is normally somewhere in the 9 hours between 11:30pm and 8:30am. This electricity(Economy 7) costs approx one third of the daytime electricity costs.

These heaters, as the name suggests, store the heat and release it slowly during the day.

Normally these heaters and immersion heater are wired so they come on automatically during this cheap period and they have the ability to be topped up at the(expensive) daytime rates.

The problem for many people is they 'run out' of the stored heat in the evenings.

It is also an idea to run any appliances like dishwasher/ washing machine at night to take advantage of the cheap rate electricity.

* Some properties can be on Economy 10 that allows 10 hours cheaper electricity in 2 or more periods.