Infrared Heating for Home

2_4

OK, thanks, I think we'll look to get storage heaters installed. Do the companies come out and give a free quote/advice?

WiserMiser

I very much doubt it, although your local friendly retailer might.

Try this.

https://www.dimplex.co.uk/resources/heating-calculator

If in doubt go for the larger size, you'll soon forget the price difference.

However, if it turns out to be too small you'll be chilly when there's a Beast From The East, or you'll have to use the top-up element at the expensive day rate.

If on E7, best for each heater to have two supplies, one switched by the meter, the other 24h.

Do the programming yourself. If the installer doesn't do a great job, or you use the defaults, you'll be the one that's getting the expensive bills.

EssexHebridean

The Quantum heaters can also have a wifi hub that means you can keep an eye on how they are functioning and make adjustments (I believe) from an app - if you are anticipating being away during the winter this could well be useful/give peace of mind.

Your high ceilings mean that any form of heating is going to have to work that much harder - so you may as well "buy the heat" in the first place as cheaply as possible!

Cailleach26

I must admit, I've only read page 1 and this most recent one…

The keyword for me to respond here was IR heating. As someone who lives in the very far north of Scotland (the isles), I've been using a combination of different heating sources to "balance the books". Houses here are incredibly hard to heat, they are normally not well insulated and the climate can be a bit on the cool, wet and windy side. Electricity prices are eyewatering. Still, most houses (no gas grid up here) must heat with electricity, very common are storage heaters. Often people are on heating tariffs, such as for example Economy7. The problem here (might be different elsewhere) is that storage heaters charge overnight but all the heat they are supposed to release slowly over the day, has long gone comes afternoon. It becomes rather nippy by the time you'd want to sit down and relax. If the houses were better insulated, the warmth would keep longer. On the other hand, it is the lacking insulation that prevents in our damp wet climate mould in the houses. We get "natural ventilation" (a gale blowing out of sockets) that prevents mould but it never gets partcularly warm at the times you'd want it.

Therefore, I have removed all the storage heaters in living room, bedrooms, kitchen, office etc. but have installed small storage heaters (IP rated for use in bathrooms and in the permitted "zone") in our bathrooms. For the bathrooms, the storage heaters are the ideal solutions. The rooms are small, therefore just one outside wall (also small area)… the heat doesn't "vanish" as fast as it would in other rooms.

In the office, I use only an Infrared heater and only when I am actually sitting at my desk. It is an older model, with an output of 300W (low setting) and 600W (max setting). This device is located in a distance of ~ 1.2m from my desk. It has an oscillating option, if needed. Works perfectly. Low setting does the job normally.

Newer models (these look identical to mine) need apparently more power hence I consider myself lucky to have the older model: https://incpi.en.ec21.com/ISolar_Halogen_Heater--158715_158720.html

The good thing with these is that you have instant heat, you sit warm and comfortably and it does not matter when the rest of the room remains cold(ish).

In the kitchen, there is currently no heating at all (since I removed the storage heaters). But since we cook everything from scratch, there is some heat as a by-product from cooker and oven. This does obviously decrease a bit by the time we sit down to eat. That's when again IR heating comes in.

But perhaps in a rather unconventional way. I use IR heat lamps (that are normally for piglets and chicken). We had them anyway (this is after all a farmhouse). In winter these lamps dangle ~1 m over our heads when we sit at the kitchen table for a meal. 100W version does the trick. Instant warmth. Once we leave the table, they are switched off.

What I am trying to say: There are so many factors when it comes to deciding what the best, the most energy-efficient and/or the most affordable way of heating for a property is. Different homes need different solutions, sometimes different rooms in a home need specific solutions. There is never a one size fits all. And the same applies to tariffs. If you have electric heating, you will need to choose the right tariff for your needs and heating requirements.

In our case, that's another issue we need to tackle… since we were on an old RTS meter but that's a different story.

WiserMiser

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82057173#Comment_82057173

The problem here (might be different elsewhere) is that storage heaters
charge overnight but all the heat they are supposed to release slowly
over the day, has long gone comes afternoon. It becomes rather nippy by
the time you'd want to sit down and relax.

Were they the old style Box of Bricks NSHs, perhaps too small and not optimally adjusted?

Might be worth considering High Heat Retention NSHs such as Dimplex Quantum. Very little heat leaks out, you set the room temperature you want and heat is blown out using a fan but only as and when required.

Cailleach26

I would say the ones (were in the house from previous owners) we had removed, were even rather oversized.

But the "warm times" in the house didn't really reflect our lifestyle ;)

It was warm in the morning hours but I am a night owl and not an early bird at all… and often work very late at night

Also, the poor standard of traditional Scottish highland/island homes, makes storage heaters far too expensive to run for very limited effects.

This is what I meant when I said that every property is different. Climatic differences and dfferent lifestyles also contribute to the necessity of individual approaches.

What works for one household, may not work for another.

Our unconventional setup works for us ;) far better than the storage heaters ever did.

squirrelpie

it is the lacking insulation that prevents in our damp wet climate mould in the houses

The old adage is "build tight, ventilate right" and it is still true. It's not the insulation that causes mould, it's the lack of provision of adequate ventilation when the airtightness is increased, itself often only as a side-effect of insulation rather than as a planned effort. So although infra-red heating works well with your compromises, there are most likely better solutions involving insulation.

RedFraggle

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82057311#Comment_82057311

None of what you've said is true for modern high heat retention storage heaters. We run ours for 14 hours a day at 21C with no issues whatsoever as I'm disabled and work from home.

EssexHebridean

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82057294#Comment_82057294

Dimplex Quantums work superbly for many folk in the Western Isles at least - our friends had one fitted at my suggestion, to see how it worked, and rapidly fitted them across the rest of their house (bedrooms excepted) too as they were so impressed. They likened the controllability to that of standard central heating, and found that simply setting the heat level a little higher than most people would consider "normal" they maintained a comfortable temperature through the day with far less need for top-up heating beyond the standard (up there!) lighting of the fire on chillier nights. They also became very adept indeed at load-shifting to take advantage of the cheap overnight hours - being night-owls themselves this didn't prove too tricky!

Western isles Council are now fitting heat pumps to all their newly built housing stock (as far as I know it is "all" anyway) and also retro-fitting it over time to the old stock as well. I've not spoken with too many folk to see how that's working for them, but equally you usually hear pretty fast when things of that type are an issue!

AS Cailleach says of course, a lot depend on the construction type - I assume from what they have said before that they are Northern Isles but the mix of housing will be similar there to out west I imagine. Our friends property was an old stone-built cottage with thick walls - so was slow to warm up but once it was warm it retained the heat well. Newer builds tend to be constructed "inside out" with the basic wooden frame to fit the insulation to being completed first, and then the outer skin being "wrapped around" that.