Hot water cylinder or heat battery

Kiwi12345

Hi All
I need to replace my hot water boiler asap. I live in a 1 bedroom flat and there is only electricity. I have been quoted £4000 for a sunamp heat battery which I dont think I can afford. Apparently these are so much cheaper in the long run. Does anyone have any suggestions for anything cheaper but also efficient to run. My current one runs off economy 7 at night. (its a pulsacoil) Thanks in advance

QrizB

A replacement hot water cylinder will be far cheaper, possibly under £1000.

A Sunamp is not "so much cheaper in the long run" and will never pay for itself. It's a niche product for people with limited space.

I'd choose the replacement cylinder.

(In my opinion heat batteries like the Sunamp products have missed their chance; electrical storage batteries are now cheaper, in terms of cost per kWh of energy stored, and far more useful.)

lohr500

Hi there.

I don't know a great deal about Gledhill Pulsacoils or Sunamp heat batteries, but I would be very wary of any claims that the Sunamp unit will be so much cheaper in the long run if the comparison is being made to a Pulsacoil.
It may be cheaper to run than a traditional poorly insulated hot water cylinder by virtue of having much better heat retention capabilities through better insulation, but that may well not be the case when comparing to a Pulsacoil. 

As far as I can tell from the specification sheets both are rated at an energy efficiency of C.

Unless someone with more knowledge can advise otherwise, I am sure both will be converting mains electricity into heat using a 1:1 ratio. 

So for every 1kWh of electricity used, both systems will put 1kWh of energy into heating the water.
My gut feel is that any savings from one system over the other will be mainly down to how well insulated the systems are compared to each other.

Have you had a quote to replace the Pulsacoil with a new Pulsacoil?

Scot_39

Does the sunamp do all HW - including wet space heating - or is just tap HW ?

DO you have a bath / hot fed mixer / power shower or cold fed electric shower ?

The store main advantage will be using E7 / TOU tariff type time shifting - but £4000 is a lot of kWh to recover cost at say 15p E7 night to day rate difference - decades.

If a really compact flat - say no bath and cold fed electric shower, and only need HW for bathroom basin / kitchen sink taps - is their equivalent on an inline or mini under sink heater used in some small unit kitchens to drive both taps for low volume use.