Please help me understand : Electric Radiators vs Cheap Panel Heaters

BDEE

BDEE

BDEE

Soldato
Joined
21 Apr 2011
Posts
3,169
OK, so I am in the market for new electric heating.

Underfloor isn't a viable consideration at the moment. There is no gas in the property and no current wet system, so a heat pump is off the table too as not wanting to go down the route of installing pipework in the whole house.

So I am looking at electric radiators, which seem to cost a fair amount.

But what I am being told, but someone I am assuming to be totally incorrect and with no scientific understanding, is that a £50 wall mounted heater from B&Q rated 2kw, will heat the same and cost the same as a £1500 electric radiator rated 2kw, because they are both 2kw.

This just seems total nonsense to me as surely the 2kw is just "peak", and that each device will have it's own method of heating, heat retention (almost none in a cheap panel heater) radiant vs convection etc etc.

But my knowledge is limited to internet articles which most often are written by the manufacturers of each product.

Ultimately I want to fit a decent product with long term efficiency which also makes the property more attractive to a buyer.
 
To be fair, no house fitted with any kind of resistive electric heaters will ever been an attractive thing to buyers no matter how fancy they look. They've got a reputation and rightly so of being very expensive to run.

The only way to 'win' is to use something like a heat pump where you can get 4 or 5kw of heat output for 1kw of electric input. Otherwise you're up against the laws of physics of a normal electric heating being essentially 100% efficient so you put 2kw of electric in and get 2kw of heat out of it.
 
A cheap one will just be on/off whereas paying a bit more you'll get a thermostat and programming which should save you some money. Beyond that there isn't any way to get more heat per watt used.

Storage heaters on an E7 tariff? At least you'd only be paying ~half the price per unit.
 
Electric heating is far from ideal, outside of heat pumps (Id argue that one as well but its a WHOLE other topic lol).

I lived in a flat with a mix of sotrage heaters and one more standard covenction style and it was pretty rubbish. Although that was heading towards 15 years ago energy prices were a lot cheaper than, so cost wise it wasnt actually that expensive to run at all....back then.

It very much depends if you are a homeowner or renting, and if a homeowner how long you planning on living there. If you are planning on living there a while, would be worth investing in a better heating system, if you have to go electric backed up by solar will be good, although your solar will not cover the heating in the winter, offset it a little, then offset the rest of your electric use in the summer. Basically it'll still be expensive to run in the winter and expensive to setup solar in the first place.

Considered a log burner?

I'd honestly be tempted by something like that, then backed up with electric in other rooms where needed.
 
Yeah a log burner would be a good idea, if it was me and i was only planning on staying there a couple of years i'd put a log burner in and then just have a few portable heaters around.

If i was looking to buy the house you'd always be having to factor in putting a proper heating system in if you only have electric heaters so would want the appropriate discount to put up with the faff and expense of having to tear your new house apart to put heating in.
 
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