Electric Panel Heater Advice Wanted

[Jon 1]

My (approx 15 year old) electric panel heaters are aesthetic enough and working ok.  However, I am looking for advice as to whether there are more efficient replacements, either French or UK.  I am trying to reduce the electricity consumption and/or improve the heating.

The existing ones are fairly slimline so any replacement would have to be similar.

Would an electric towel rail be a more efficient replacement in the bathroom?

 

 

[Quillan]

Actually this is a good question. I have a heater that has gone bang and went to Leroy Merlin for some bits and looked at the electric heaters. They seem to vary in price for a 1500W unit from between 199€ and over 1000€. Could somebody please give an idea of what different types there are and why such a varience in price, rather like a fact sheet. We could perhaps then post it in to the FAQ's.

With regards to the towel rail we have a vertical heater, looks like the others which are horizontal but it has a couple of 'arms' on it to hang towels on. I don't think a straight towel rail wil give off enough heat and we all know what it's like getting out of a hot shower in to a cold room.

[Iceni]

Our electric towel rail certainly heats the bathroom as well as drying the towels and it is on a timer and only active 2 hours a day. Mr B sells them. As an aside, I asked a French friend who has central heating how she heats the upstairs in winter. The central heating is for when she travels and has 'house sitters', she does not use it. She has a log burner and a huge traditional fire in the kitchen.

She only heats the bathroom on the odd occasion when she has a bath, if she has a shower she does not bother to heat the bathroom. She never heats her bedroom. She seems to have either the kitchen fire or the log-burner on.

Before you think she is a warm young thing, she is retired and this year survived a fall which they were sure would kill her. She is slightly disabled but still will not heat the bedrooms, she sees no reason as long as the downstairs is warmish (and her idea of warm is not ours).

Perhaps us Brits are not hardy enough?

[BJSLIV]

The main differences are that the cheaper heaters will be simple convectors, whereas the dearer types will be some form of radiant heat,oil-filled for example, which are supposed to give a heat similar to water radiators ie less drying of the air.

Similarly the cheapest heaters will have mechanical thermostats , which click and as they wear can cause interference on TVs, dearer models will have electronic thermostats. The dearest models will have some form of programmer which can interface with a central device, perhaps allowing automatic temperature reductions when Tempo red days are in effect.

We have some oil-filled panels which give a very gentle heat.

The main thing with electric heating is to maintain even temperatures, and to take advantage of the thermal mass of the building. HOWEVER if the building is badly insulated, whatever type of heater you purchase you will not reduce your consumption, and might as well burn Euro Notes on a bonfire.

In a well insulated house a  1kw towel rail will comfortably heat a room of 600 cu metres volume.

 

 

[Chrisb]

 

Di,

Your friends house sounds exactly the same as ours - we use no heating upstairs and only a log burner in the kitchen. I only succumbed to a heated towel rail the other day because my mother is coming for Xmas and has already threatened to go home if the house isn't warm enough....I think I will have to put an oil-filled radiator in her room!!
Interestingly, we have had far fewer coughs and colds since we have been living in this house - the downstairs living rooms this evening are about 17 degrees, and upstairs it's about 12 degrees: I quite like being******cooned in lots of bedding, altho' getting up in the mornings can be a bit of a shock sometimes..if I remember, I heat the boys clothes up on an oil-filled radiator for 15 minutes before they get up!!
Our builder was telling me about some ceramic radiators which you wire into each room, which he reckoned were quite expensive to buy, but very economic to run, he can't believe that we are quite happy without heating!!

Regards

Chris

PS That's c o c o o n e d by the way...................how did that get thrown out for bad behaviour??!!

[Jon 1]

BJSLIV

As you say the electric panel heater is a convector, and a very simple one at that.  Having cleaned the insides I noticed that the heating element was just a crude coil of wire.  This prompted me to consider whether there was something that was a little more energy efficient.

From your experience with the oil filled panel radiators do you find that they heat the room as effectively and quickly as the convectors, and are they any more energy efficient?

The reason why I ask this is because I found oil filled wall mountable Dellonghis (spelling?) on the WWW that seemed suitable and not too expensive.

If they were suitable should I opt for the highest wattage output?

Thanks for the comments of others but I have to stick with electric rather than wood burning. 

 

[Owens88]

I am not an expert but........

I think it is not only 'efficiency' that you want to consider but also quality of heat.

Briadly speaking a convector heats the air while a radiant heater emits directional heat like you get from a fire.

You will run a convector longer and higher than a radiant in order to give sitting comfort heat, though a fan/convector can be the qickest way to take the edge off a chilly room.

 

Hope that helps

John

[Pierre ZFP]

As an alternative source for heaters, you could have a look at Screwfix.com   they have a good electric oil filled towel rail for about 60 pounds and since we are all on 'eurovolts' it works just fine (and has all the euro standards stamped on it) Just a small point, if you hang towels on your towel radiator it will restrict the heat getting into the room - but you do get nice warm towels when you get out of the shower.

Rain and 2deg C in Luxembourg, snow and -6 deg forecast for the weekend

PierreZFP

[Dave&Olive]

for every one gallon of paraffin burnt you will put seven pints of water in to the air.

                     Damp or what..??

                                Dave

[Anton Redman]

I stand ready to be corrected on this but broadly electric heaters are electric heaters use electricity to produce heat and unlike wood or coal burning stoves you cannot make them more or less efficient. Under floor heating gives a 'better' perception an distribution of heat and you can therefore feel more comfortable/warmer for the same energy input OR use less power and feel as warm.

[BJSLIV]

I agree with Anton's comments, the efficiency of electricity is high because you don't , in simple terms, loose some of it up the chimney, because that loss took place at the generating station. On the other hand the cost per unit reflects all these overheads, so each unit of energy is more expensive.

What does alter with electric heating is the quality of the heat in particular with convector heaters which tend to dry the air too much for my liking.

We have been very satisfied with our Accova oil filled panels, and they do give a heat very similar  to water filled radiators.