Storage heaters and keeping warm

magic_genie

Hi everyone

I have storage heaters in my flat and I don't think they're very good.
They're quite old and I'm slightly concerned that I'm gonna freeze again like last year now that it's getting cold again. They seem to have let all the heat out by the time I've come home from work. And also, there isn't one in the hallway, so when I open the hallway door to go to the bathroom, it's freezing in the there.

So, I have 2 questions I was hoping you might be able to help me with
1. Has anyone been in my position? I'm wondering if I replace them with the brand new, slimmer types would this be a vast improvement? I'm wondering if mine are just old and nackered.
and,
2. Could you reccomend some kind of heater that perhaps could be attached to the wall in the bathroom?

Oh, forgot to mention - our flats don't have gas, so, no radiators.

Thanks for reading.
kind regards
Alex

divadee

you can get fan type heaters that are suitable for bathrooms you would need an electric point in there.

HTH

trafalgar_2

Or get yourself a small calor gas one you can move from room to room....................wherever is coldest

dreaddan

In my last flat we had storage heaters.
They had 2 control nobs, one for the amout of energy they took in and how mutch they put in.
I found setting them to the max input and min output ment they kept there heat so I could turn them on when I need.
dan

robby-01

storage heaters are no good .Although newer models are more efficient the same problems exist.Namely you store heat overnight for use in the day and that for most people is no good.Did you know that you can now have a conventional wet central heating system fitted that is warmed by an electric boiler.I have fitted some of these and they are suprisingly compact they look very much like large electric shower units.They dont heat radiators as good as a gas boiler but are light years ahead of storage heaters.

gary38uk

yes, old ones are rubbish.
we had old ones that were in house when first built in the early Eighties. we replaced these when we moved in about 10 years ago now. and the ones we have now are much, much better.(although they are 10 years old now) no doubt new ones are even better. its not a bad form of heating, only draw back is: is you have to predict the weather, if you have them on and its a warm day (u know those odd warm days you get in winter)you end up too hot! end up opening windows to let heat out..lol,

Be careful in removing old heaters, they may contain Asbestos! my local council took away my old ones free.
i dont think they contained asbestos as i think that after 1975 they were all made asbestos free, but the council took them as they said they were not sure.

Edinburghlass_2

The very title of storage heaters and keeping warm is a bit of a misomer

Mine are now about 14 years old but do have controls for heat and for when a you can get a boost. I have mine set to give a late boost. I think the newer ones olso have a convector switch.

You can also get a storage heater suitable for the bathroom, small unit with no controls but as I have my bath in the morning it does make the bathroom nice and toasty

scouselass

Magic genie

I have had storage heaters (newer type) for the past two years, but just had them taken out and replaced by GCH. I was on an economy 7 (E7) tariff but still found storage heating too expensive which is why I changed.

I am ashamed to say that I couldn't give them away so one went in the bin!!! The other one is still on the wall (unconnected) and unless I can give it away it too will go in the bin! If you are local I would happily let you have this other smaller storage heater.

I found they did provide a good source of heat that easily lasted throughout the day and this was because of the type of electricity meter I chose.

I was with Scottish Power/Manweb and had a meter called Twin Heat B. This allows two periods of cheaper electricity when the storage heaters are doing their storing (if I can express it like that) which is between 3am-7am and then again between 1.30-3.30pm.

What this means is that the storage heaters begin releasing heat around the time you get up in the morning at 7am and will stay on until 1.30pm. At that point they go off and go back into store mode again for 3 hrs. And then at 4.30 pm they start releasing heat again. Because the heater has had that afternoon boost you will find that the heat will continue until late into the evening, depending on how low/high the release dial is set.

Another advantage of this meter combined with economy 7 is that you can use the cheap afternoon session between 1.30-4.30 (if you are around) to do all those tasks, such as dishwashing, washing, drying, hot water timer etc to maximise the cheap rate of electricity that you have at that time.

I was informed (and this could be wrong) by someone in the Customer Services Dept at Scottish Power that they are the only utility company to offer this type of meter. Most other companies offer economy 7 meters with one period of cheap rate elec which is usually during the hrs of midnight and 7am. Whilst this is great for the storage heaters to be charged whilst it is the cheap rate, how many of us are up at that time doing the chores!!!, Also whilst on E7, the daytime tariff attracts a higher charge than std elec charges, which is what bumps up the costs of E7 meters. So much for the economy eh!

As for the bathroom the Delonghi oil filled radiators are very efficient as they are thermostatically controlled and will switch off when they have reached the set temp. They start at about £60 and look quite stylish in a grey shade.

servalan

I too froze last year with my storage heaters. so much so i have now decided to get central heating fitted . When i was removing the heaters i found a temp valve when i took the cover off them. This was set at min. And it had a couple of different settings. Can't help thinking that i may have froze for no reason. might be worth a look to see if yrs has a temp valve as it may be able to be turned up.
Also found them to be very expensve so another reason to get rid of them

Magentasue

I'd agree with everything said about storage heaters - we had the slimline ones when we moved in and found them very expensive. Plus we were buying coal to light a fire in the evenings. Now we have gas CH.

Last year the boiler packed up on Christmas Eve and we had a week without heating. We went out and bought two £15 convector heaters and moved them around the house. Don't imagine they're cheap to run but I was surprised how good they were. They had timers and they would have been ideal to have in our storage heater days.

Have you tried typing in 'compare heating costs' or sililar into Google?