Replacement Storage Heaters?

BobR64

My mother moved into a one bed retirement apartment last year. It is all-electric and no alternative is possible. She has an economy 7 tariff with EON.

There are two Dimplex storage heaters dating from when the flat was built - about 20 years ago. One is in the lounge and one in the bedroom. She does not use the bedroom heater as she likes a cool bedroom. She had been using the lounge one, but never really got to grips with the controls. I tried to help but, because I am only able to go occasionally (especially during the last year), and the nature of the things is that you don't get any immediate feedback from an adjustment, I wasn't particularly successful. Recently, she said that she was finding the room to be so excessively hot in the morning that she felt there must be something wrong with the heater and has turned it off. Basically, she has lost all confidence in it. To be fair, when I looked at it, the controls for input and output were both low so I suspect something might indeed be the matter.

She was recently talking about this to a fellow resident in the development and the other lady mentioned that she had had a company called Fischer in to replace her heaters and that she was quite happy with them. To cut a long story short, my mother ended up ordering a new heater - just for the lounge - which was going to cost £2000. I was shocked about this and was able to persuade her to cancel the order in the 14 day cooling off period, to give me chance to look into things properly. It wasn't just the purchase cost that was the issue but my understanding - despite the blurb saying it was suitable for Economy 7 - that this was not a storage heater and would run mainly on peak electricity.

I have done some research but I have ended up with various options and questions going round my head and not being sure what to do:

• Try to get someone in to look at the existing heater. Are they repairable? I have heard that it is hard to get parts for older models now. If it was me, this is what I would try to do but my mother gets ideas in her head and I think she really would be happier with something new and, ideally, easier to control and adjust.
• So do we replace the storage heater with a more modern one? I understand that these are now available with controls that allow a target temperature to be set and that are improved in terms of how they retain and release heat. The problem is that many modern ones seem to need two electricity supplies - an economy 7 one and a 24 hour one - but only the single old Economy 7 supply is easily available at my mum's flat without disruptive electric work. Having said that, I believe there are a few models available that will work off a single supply subject to some caveats about the Economy 7 arrangement at the property and the need for some work at the consumer unit.
• I keep seeing hints that Economy 7 is on its way out. How likely is this? If Economy 7 tariffs were to be eliminated, does it make any sense at all to have storage heaters? I worry about spending a lot of money on a new heater only to find it is inappropriate in the near future.
• This leads me on to another thought: do we forget about storage heaters and go for a simple, on demand electric heater - but something cheaper than Fischer? This will use expensive day time rate electricity but the flat is not difficult to heat. The lounge has a relatively small external wall and the common areas of the building are heated. My mother is a night owl and does not get up particularly early, so she tends to need heat later in the day. This suggests storage heaters are not ideal anyway and maybe on-demand ones would not be that much more expensive in practice. But then... maybe in the depths of winter she will need more during the day... and I wonder again about whether the more modern storage heaters might in any case work better for heating later in the day.

Sorry that this has been a bit long and rambling but it reflects my general state of confusion. As well as any ideas about the specific questions I have asked I was hoping to maybe get some practical experience and insight from anyone who has replaced storage heaters, either with more modern ones or with non-storage electric heaters. And more generally, just some help to get my thoughts in order about the best way to approach this.

Reed_Richards

You might like to wade your way through this thread, although the title is misleading because they are NOT storage heaters: https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/3516223/fischer-storage-heaters#latest
 

Reed_Richards

Unless you mother is short of money, I would go for your last option of an on demand electric heater with simple controls.  Or, perhaps even better, you could get a storage heater with an on-demand boost option.  

Robin9

Argos - £20 
E7 might then not be the best tariff

BobR64

Robin9 said:

Argos - £20 
E7 might then not be the best tariff

One thing I didn't mention is that the hot water is from an overnight storage system. From what I can gather this is what uses most electricity and probably does tip the balance still in favour of E7.

BobR64

Reed_Richards said:

Unless you mother is short of money, I would go for your last option of an on demand electric heater with simple controls.  Or, perhaps even better, you could get a storage heater with an on-demand boost option.  

That's interesting. I didn't know about the on-demand boost option.

matelodave

TBH hot water probably isn't your major cost. It takes around 9kwh to heat an average 150 litre tank from stone cold to 60 degrees, but a single person would have to be a pretty dedicated waster of hot water to get through 150 litres a day so it's probably only 4-5kwh a day to top it up = less than £1 a day.

Heating is a lot more costly depending on what sort of heating you are using and for how long.

You can do some relatively simple sums to determine the size of heater you require to keep the place warm and focus it down to which rooms you want warm all day and those which just need heat for a relatively short period. The lounge might need heat all day if she's at home all day but the bedroom and bathroom probably only need heat when you get up and go to bed. You also need some background heating so the place doesn't get stone cold.

On demand heating can work out very expensive, especially if you need heating during the day and evening - it's OK for a hour boost at bedtime but just one 2kw heater from say 7am to 10 pm = 15 hours would probably average about 12-15kwh a day. At a peak rate of 15p/kwh =  well over £2 a day, probably more if she likes it warm or the insulation is poor and it's running all the time Storage heating works out to be a lot cheaper to run, although it's not as controllable.

the sort of heater that R-R is suggesting are High Heat Rention storage heaters (Dimplx Quantum or similar) which have better insulation and a boost fan which controls the output. The idea being that heat is only released when it called for. They are still expensive to buy but nowhere near the silly costs of Fischer and they do benefit from using off-peak electrictity unlike Fischer or similar which use peak rate.

Fischer, Rointe, or any heaters that claim supernatural properties from magic clay, fairy dust or unicorn oil dont produce any more heat or cost any less to run tha an £20-£30 heater of a similar rating from Argos or B&Q so be very wary of the hype.

macman

There is another option. All new NSH's now have to be LOT 20 compliant, which means they need a peak rate supply as well to supply the boost on demand, and to work the electronics. However, it is possible to buy refurbished ones, which will do the job of the existing ones, but with better control. It's still legal to install these as replacements.
This is a perfectly feasible option without the extra expense of a LOT 20 NSH, and the additional cost to run the additional peak rate circuit to it. There's very little to an older NSH: it's basically a tin box of bricks with an element and a fuse.

BobR64

matelodave said:

TBH hot water probably isn't your major cost. It takes around 9kwh to heat an average 150 litre tank from stone cold to 60 degrees, but a single person would have to be a pretty dedicated waster of hot water to get through 150 litres a day so it's probably only 4-5kwh a day to top it up = less than £1 a day.

I would have to look at the numbers again. I don't know if it makes much difference to the calculations but I think the water heating isn't done by heating a tank of water but by storing the heat a bit like a storage heater and then using that to heat water when needed. I forget the make and I can't find it with a quick Google search, otherwise I would be able to confirm my understanding.

Thanks for what you have written. You are tending to back up my inclination, which is towards a new storage heater. I suppose the main questions that remain for me are: how well do they actually work in practice - i.e. do they really retain heat for longer and so on; and can we rely on E7 still being around for the foreseeable future.

BobR64

macman said:

There is another option. All new NSH's now have to be LOT 20 compliant, which means they need a peak rate supply as well to supply the boost on demand, and to work the electronics. However, it is possible to buy refurbished ones, which will do the job of the existing ones, but with better control. It's still legal to install these as replacements.
This is a perfectly feasible option without the extra expense of a LOT 20 NSH, and the additional cost to run the additional peak rate circuit to it. There's very little to an older NSH: it's basically a tin box of bricks with an element and a fuse.

Thanks. It's a good suggestion, but I suspect I'd have problems persuading my mother to buy a second hand heater!

I am less worried about the electrics than I was when I first started to look into this as there are at least a few models that can take a single circuit - including some of the Dimplex ones. The idea is that you wire into the peak rate circuit and rely on timers in the heater to charge at peak times. This relies on the E7 arrangement at the property being such that all electricity is charged at E7 rate overnight irrespective of the circuit. Some adjustment is needed at the consumer unit to move the heater circuit from one of the E7 ways to a spare 24 hour way.

Gerry1

With an old style NSH the principle should be to turn down the output control before going to bed and turn it up if it gets chilly later in the day.  If it's still too hot in the morning then turn down the input control a bit.  However, if your mother is less mobile this may not be very realistic.

However, it's not generally known that there are meters that offer a Boost at the touch of a button, i.e. the off peak circuit can be livened up for an hour during the day, albeit at the daytime rate. 

That might be a workaround, allowing the NSH input control setting to be reduced and then occasionally using the meter button to top up if it gets chilly.

If your mother is on the Priority Services Register that would probably help in getting the appropriate meter.