Immersion heater to run central heating

Danni636

Hey everyone, I live in a flat and it's electric only. It has a timer to heat my water which is fine, but to run my heating, I need to turn the immersion heater on and it costs me a fortune. Anyone used one of these systems before? When I moved in, the electric guy told me to have it on all the time and I ended up owing 237 quid for 2 months, just on my heating. Stupid really.

matelodave

It's not clear what sort of heating you've got - does it have hot water radiators fed from a hot water tank or flow boiler or are they panel radiators or even storage heaters. What sort of energy tariff are you on, a single rate, E7 or something else

No one can help without a bit more info but most sorts of all electric heating are going to be expensive (some a hell of a lot more than others) so you need to understand what you've got and how to operate it effectively to reduce your costs.

Hasbeen

Immersion heaters as I know them do not run central heating systems.
Your system must be Hi Tech.
Are you talking about an electric boiler? or an indirect pre plumbed single zone cylinder?
Photo, Name and model number would help?

Is it a rented flat? if so move out ASAP. Electric heating systems are very, very expensive to run

Danni636

Omg guys, I have no idea. I have water filled radiators. I have a boiler I can turn the temp of water up and down on and a hot water tank above it. I don't even know, even the plumber said hes never seen anything like it. I'm currently on a fixed rate tarrif. I think I have taken pictures of everything. Hope that helps. 

Danni636

More photos

Gerry1

Plan to move out ASAP: it will always be expensive.

In the meantime, make sure you have a credit meter on the cheapest Economy 7 tariff you can find (start comparing with Citizens Advice and 'Switch with Which?'), that the lower heater is switched by the meter and that the upper heater is on a 24h supply but limited to about an hour by a local timer.  Send monthly meter readings and make sure your DD is keeping up with the bills.

matelodave

Ok, it's just an E7 hot water tank with two immersion heaters, one that should come on at off-peak times and the second to give you a boost if you run out of water during the day. It's nothing to do with your heating system.

However we need to know what sort of heaters you've got and do you have an e7 meter. Ideally with this you should have storage heaters which come on overnight and store heat for during the day however it's not unheard of for them to be pulled out and replaced with electric radiators in which case the wiring might have been altered to everything is on a peak rate

More info is needed - what sort of heater (piccy please) what sort of leccy meter and what does your fuse board look like (piccies help a lot if you are unclear especially if there's lots of wiring in the meter/power cupboard) Lastly have a look at your leccy bill and find out what tariff you are on - are there two prices, one for peak and another for off peak and how much are they per kwh. telling us how much you spend is no use we need to know what you used in kwh - a photo of your bill (with your name, address and serial number blacked out) would help

tacpot12

Do you own the flat or do you rent it? If you rent it, your landlord should have given you proper instructions on how to use the heating system and the hot water system. If they didn't you might write some instructions for the next tenants, once you have figured it out. 

In theory, as the Elson Coral E is a thermal store, it could be used to heat radiators filled with water, but I doubt it is in this case. I expect it is configured exactly as matelot dave explained, i.e. it is for heating water for the taps only. If you use a lot of hot water in the early morning, and very little at night, this system is quite suitable. Whereas if you use lots of hot water at night and very little in the mornings (or not much hot water at all), you would be better with instantaneous heating for your hot water (like an electric shower).

Danni636

matelodave said:

Ok, it's just an E7 hot water tank with two immersion heaters, one that should come on at off-peak times and the second to give you a boost if you run out of water during the day. It's nothing to do with your heating system.

However we need to know what sort of heaters you've got and do you have an e7 meter. Ideally with this you should have storage heaters which come on overnight and store heat for during the day however it's not unheard of for them to be pulled out and replaced with electric radiators in which case the wiring might have been altered to everything is on a peak rate

More info is needed - what sort of heater (piccy please) what sort of leccy meter and what does your fuse board look like (piccies help a lot if you are unclear especially if there's lots of wiring in the meter/power cupboard) Lastly have a look at your leccy bill and find out what tariff you are on - are there two prices, one for peak and another for off peak and how much are they per kwh. telling us how much you spend is no use we need to know what you used in kwh - a photo of your bill (with your name, address and serial number blacked out) would help

They're water filled radiator looking radiators. Picture below. I can turn the heating on manually but will only actually heat up if I turn the bottom boiler thingy (which I was told is the immersion heater) on 
I don't know what an e7 meter is but I've attacked a pictures of everything  just in case that helps 

Gerry1

It's all bad news.

You're on a single rate tariff not Economy 7, and 17.58p/kWh and the standing charge of 22.52p/day are both ridiculously expensive.

If you're renting, the only solution is to move to a property with gas central heating.

tacpot12

Yes, you appear to have water filled radiators. The drain-off valve and TRVs are a giveaway. If these only come on when you operate something on the Horstmann Electronic 7 controller, then I would expect that the controller is controlling a circulation pump to drive the water round the radiators, picking up heat from the Elson Thermal Store, as well as possibly operating the boost immersion heater.

That the Consumer unit has a 32A MCB for the "Water Heater" (immersion 1 + 2 and the Horstmann timer?) and a 40A MCB for the "Heating" - I've no idea what this might supply. 

I've just read the instructions for the Horstmann Electronic 7 controller and they are quite possibly the worst instructions I have ever seen (excluding anything written in China). I can't see that the instructions help, other than confirm that the controller can be set to use off-peak electricity and to change to BST/GMT automatically if the tariff also changes automatically. 

The OP's meter is a SMETS2 Smart-meter; the datasheet doesn't mention whether support for multi-rate tariffs, and as far as I know ALL SMETS2 Smart-meters have to be able to work on Economy 7, so the OP could switch to Economy 7. The bills seem to indicate that their tariff is not a multi-rate tariff.