Best way to heat water with Megaflow Boiler

[Katieraeburn123]

We live in a 1 Bed Apartment and our water is heated using a megaflow boiler.
When we initially moved in our boiler was broken and the gentleman who fixed it advise the best way to heat the water was by using our central heating.

Our heating is powered by heat miser which we have never used but would love advise on whether this is in fact the best way to heat water. We have a hefty electric bill on our account after the most recent meter reading! Any advise would be greatly appreciated

 

[ericmark]

There are two ways to electrically heat water, resistive or heat pump. Since you don't have a heat pump the aim is to reduce loses, so the main an immersion heater will have less loses than using a boiler and circulating water.

With some systems like the Willis the water is heated from the top of the tank down by using an external immersion heater, so there are exceptions to the rule, but in your case the immersion will be cheaper to heat just DHW, however since the loses heat the home, at this time of year both methods are equal.

 

[winston1]

Have a look again at your electricity bill and see how much you are charged per kW/h. Then look at your gas bill and see what you are charged per kW/h. You will find electricity is four (yes 4) times approx of gas. OK a gas boiler is 80 to 90% efficient whereas an immersion is 100% efficient. That still leaves electricity costing around 3 1/2 times more.

 

[Katieraeburn123]

Thank you, we do not have gas, just electric!

Perhaps we can do some A - B testing with the immersion v central heating and see how it works out in price Pray for us, this electric price increase is NO JOKE

 

[winston1]

Thank you, we do not have gas, just electric!

Eh, OK. In that case the immersion heater is the way to go. All the heat goes into the water. The other way there is heat loss from the pipes and the additional cost of running the pump.

 

[ericmark]

After the Ronan Point accident gas was banded in many flats, so we are stuck with electric heating, in the main the Mega flow cylinder is very well insulated, my brother-in-law had a pair of those for his central heating, the idea of the tanks in his case was to combine solar, wood, LPG and electric fuels for a single central heating system. The Mega flow stored heat not only for DHW but also central heating, with just electric it allows one to use off peak power, better than the storage radiator as it retains the heat better so the 7 hours of energy gained over night is released only when you want it, it does not leak out during the day.

However can't see if using that methods why you would have this I would have expected maybe multi-immersion heaters but not an external un-lagged boiler.

 

[stem]

Just an observation, but the pump is set to to constant maximum speed III, which seems a bit excessive for a 1 bed apartment. [Unless it's a special requirement of the Heatray Sadia electric boiler.]

I have the same UPS3 pump in my house, a large 3 bed detached with 9 radiators and 2 towel warmers, and I find speed I is sufficient to keep all of the radiators toasty.

Speed III will of course use more electricity than speed I, [albeit, a tiny% of the power required to actually heat the water] but if you use the immersion heater, the pump won't be running at all to heat the hot water. So, even better.