Help re electric heating charge times

aclarkson13

Hi all,

I upgraded my very old storage heaters to new dimplex ones and am looking for some advice. My previous heaters I just had to switch on and that was it but with these new ones I have to input charge times. I am on economy7 heating with Scottish power which is from 22:00-07:30. This is what I have set it to, any advice at all re changing times to make it more cost effective would be really helpful.

Thanks.

QrizB

The forum Dimplex storage heater expert is @EssexHebridean - hopefully they'll be along in a minute!

xeny

It's a while since I used storage heaters, but I worked on the basis of charge them until as late as economy 7 allowed, and for as long as necessary to store enough heat, so I'd start with an 07:30 off time, and then experiment setting the on time progressively earlier until they were warm enough during the day.

Minimise any operation at the non economy 7 rate so far as possible.

Be_Happy

Just a word of warning.  SP rate just now is 24.00 - 08.30 in Scotland.  When the clocks change, it will be 23.00 to 07.30.  Whatever area you're in it will still only be eight and a half hours.

pochase

Why are you setting it to charge from 20.00 to 21.30 during day rates?

aclarkson13

Be_Happy said:

Just a word of warning.  SP rate just now is 24.00 - 08.30 in Scotland.  When the clocks change, it will be 23.00 to 07.30.  Whatever area you're in it will still only be eight and a half hours.

I didn’t know this, thanks for letting me know. 

aclarkson13

xeny said:

It's a while since I used storage heaters, but I worked on the basis of charge them until as late as economy 7 allowed, and for as long as necessary to store enough heat, so I'd start with an 07:30 off time, and then experiment setting the on time progressively earlier until they were warm enough during the day.

Minimise any operation at the non economy 7 rate so far as possible.

So if I charged it from midnight right through until 7am would there still be some heating on overnight (sorry if this question is stupid the user guide wasn’t much help).
Also, I work from 7am-8pm 3 days a week out this house but surely the house would still be warm when I get home?

QrizB

aclarkson13 said:

xeny said:

It's a while since I used storage heaters, but I worked on the basis of charge them until as late as economy 7 allowed, and for as long as necessary to store enough heat, so I'd start with an 07:30 off time, and then experiment setting the on time progressively earlier until they were warm enough during the day.

Minimise any operation at the non economy 7 rate so far as possible.

So if I charged it from midnight right through until 7am would there still be some heating on overnight (sorry if this question is stupid the user guide wasn’t much help).
Also, I work from 7am-8pm 3 days a week out this house but surely the house would still be warm when I get home?

Can you telll us the model of the storage heater?

Given its features, I'm wondering if it's a High Heat Retention (HHR) model. If it is, it's much more likely to keep the heat in during the day when you're out.

macman

So Scottish E7 is 8.5 hours, not 7?

EssexHebridean

QrizB said:

The forum Dimplex storage heater expert is @EssexHebridean - hopefully they'll be along in a minute!

Too kind!

aclarkson13 said:

Hi all,

I upgraded my very old storage heaters to new dimplex ones and am looking for some advice. My previous heaters I just had to switch on and that was it but with these new ones I have to input charge times. I am on economy7 heating with Scottish power which is from 22:00-07:30. This is what I have set it to, any advice at all re changing times to make it more cost effective would be really helpful.

Thanks.

OK - so I presume this one is on a single electric feed rather than having the secondary feed installed also? Mine are easy - two feeds - one of which is only active during the E7 hours, so my quantum (same as yours, by the look of it?) can ONLY charge during the "cheap" (well, it used to be!) times with no need for me to do anything. Obviously that's MUCH easier!

One thing I would observe is to make absolutely certain that you're correct on your E7 timings, too. It's certainly possible that in Scotland you get an extra bit of time over the "usual" 7 hours due to the tendency for it to be slightly (!) colder and windier up there but I confess I've not heard of that. At the moment down here we're "on" for night rate at 0115 and "off" at 0815 - that is obviously specific to our meter but does fit in broadly with what most people on straightforward E7 seem to be experiencing from what we've seen discussed here. On setting yours up, personally I'd got for a "safe hours" block of time - so say 0200 > 0700 which should give enough time to allow the heater to fully charge - you'll be able to experiment with that ahead of the properly cold weather though - without a risk of it running into pricier times. You certainly don't want that 2000 > 2100 timeslot in there though - you might as well burn £10 notes to keep warm! 

Your heater is indeed a HHR model so it'll "lose" relatively little outside of its set output times - and again make sure those are set to benefit you the most. On days we're both out at work I set mine for "out all day" and work on the basis that there is little point in overlapping output time with charge time - there is still a little heat leakage while the thing is actually charging up - the the bulk of the heat output from ours is set for the late  afternoon/early evening in a bid to ensure that the place is cosy when we get home. 

Keen an eye on the weather and amend the temperature setting as needed - the heater will also do some of that work for you based on ambient temperature too but best not to let it second guess things too much. If worst comes to worst and you're hit with an unexpected cold snap or just one of those days when you're feeling the cold more you can use the "boost" function to give you a little extra warmth, but do remember that will be at day rate so again, we're back to burning those £10 notes. 

Be_Happy

macman said:

So Scottish E7 is 8.5 hours, not 7?

Yes.   Used to be called simply Off-Peak but now called E7 to standardise name.