Upgrading to Electric Central Heating

[SimonH2]

... and quite expensive.

http://www.tlc-direct.co.uk/Products/ERADL4024.html[/QUOTE]
Ouch, you're not kidding !
Would be nice in our office though.

 

[JohnW2]

Ouch, you're not kidding ! Would be nice in our office though.

Perhaps nice, but I would have thought that it's in the home, rather than an office, that the greatest potential advantage would probably exist (because of the common domestic need for primarily evening heating).

Not only expensive, but (understandably) a bit weighty (121 kg for 16kWh, 277 kg for the 40 kWh one) - I wonder if they come with the bricks separate?! ... in fact, given the fairly small footprint, quite a high floor loading!

Kind Regards, John

 

[SimonH2]

Not only expensive, but (understandably) a bit weighty (121 kg for 16kWh, 277 kg for the 40 kWh one) - I wonder if they come with the bricks separate?! ... in fact, given the fairly small footprint, quite a high floor loading!

That's the thing about storing heat, it takes a lot of mass to do it (phase change materials aside). So yes, all storage heaters are "quite heavy". It's not just the small footprint, the ones we have at work are sat on feet - two on teh smallest, three on the larger ones. So all that weight on a footprint the total size of the palm of my hand
At work we have one that got taken off the wall (not required and in the way of server racks), it's only a tiddler (smallest size used in the building), but it's barely liftable by two people.

AFAIK the bricks come separate. You mount the casing and then stack the bricks round the element. I think I've seen it done, once, a lot of years ago when I was a young lad.

 

[JohnW2]

That's the thing about storing heat, it takes a lot of mass to do it (phase change materials aside).

Indeed so. I guess the ones you linked to are pretty good, with storage capacities seemingly around 0.15 kWh/kg (about 0.55 MJ/kg). Since latent heats can be high, 'phase change' approaches would obviously be great, but I imagine that it would be very difficult to find materials which changed phase at the right temperatures (and pressures for liquid/gas transitions), and to control the process satisfactorily. Maybe the day will come when battery storage becomes a viable, adequately efficient and cost/space-effective solution - since that would obviously eliminate most of the downsides of thermal (or even phase-change) storage.

Kind Regards, John

 

[big-all]

I personally have a distrust of gas, probably for no good reason, but
I always worry about potential explosions!

suspect you have more chance off being electrocuted to death dying in a road accident a house fire taking your life or winning the lottery when you don't enter it
a gas leak is not very often fatal as to much wont wont explode as the air gas mixture has to be within quite a small percentage margin
in other words 90% off the time you have a gas leak no real damage will happen so the odds will be several millions to one that any one off the 66 million people in the uk will die from a gas leak ??

 

[SimonH2]

Since latent heats can be high, 'phase change' approaches would obviously be great, but I imagine that it would be very difficult to find materials which changed phase at the right temperatures (and pressures for liquid/gas transitions), and to control the process satisfactorily.

I know people have been experimenting with PCMs in wet systems - effectively filling the hot water cylinder with 'pebbles' of PCM so you get a phase change (and associated latent heat exchange) at some convenient temperature. I believe, as is often the cae, that "cost" is a significant factor.

Maybe the day will come when battery storage becomes a viable, adequately efficient and cost/space-effective solution - since that would obviously eliminate most of the downsides of thermal (or even phase-change) storage.

Hmm, lecky storage - something even harder than heat storage !

a gas leak is not very often fatal as to much wont wont explode as the air gas mixture has to be within quite a small percentage margin
in other words 90% off the time you have a gas leak no real damage will happen so the odds will be several millions to one that any one off the 66 million people in the uk will die from a gas leak ??

Indeed, I recall having a conversation with someone caught up in a gas "explosion" (or what many would incorrectly call an explosion). He had a leaky valve on the gas range IIRC, got up one morning and could smell gas, and as he was walking across the kitchen to turn the gas off, the time clock for the CH switched on and ignited it. Took his eyebrows off as the flame front passed, but otherwise he was unhurt and the house was almost undamaged.

I guess gas suffers from the same problem as Nuclear. Mention nuclear and people think of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, or places like Bikini Atoll.

Mention gas and people (at least my age) think of Ronan Point.

Of course, more recently, there's cases such as the one in Manchester not long ago. But these are rare, I think more people die each day on our roads than die in gas explosions in a year which should rather put things in perspective.

 

[ban-all-sheds]

The real problem with Ronan Point was how the building was made and how it failed, - the actual gas explosion did not do the damage you see in all the photos.

 

[ban-all-sheds]

http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=phase+change+wallcoverings

 

[JohnW2]

Since latent heats can be high, 'phase change' approaches would obviously be great, but I imagine that it would be very difficult to find materials which changed phase at the right temperatures (and pressures for liquid/gas transitions), and to control the process satisfactorily.

I know people have been experimenting with PCMs in wet systems - effectively filling the hot water cylinder with 'pebbles' of PCM so you get a phase change (and associated latent heat exchange) at some convenient temperature. I believe, as is often the cae, that "cost" is a significant factor.

I don't doubt it, since it certainly is, in theory, a better approach than mass thermal storage.

[

Maybe the day will come when battery storage becomes a viable, adequately efficient and cost/space-effective solution - since that would obviously eliminate most of the downsides of thermal (or even phase-change) storage.

Hmm, lecky storage - something even harder than heat storage !

Only, I would suggest, in terms of current battery technology. In theoretical terms, electrochemical storage is a very promising, and potentially very efficient, method of storage - and obvioulsy has the great advantage over heat storage of longevity of storage (at least in the mediun term) without appreciable time-related losses.

Kind Regards, John

 

[SimonH2]

The real problem with Ronan Point was how the building was made and how it failed, - the actual gas explosion did not do the damage you see in all the photos.

I know that, you know that, trying to explain that gas isn't really that dangerous to some is like trying to explain to them that civil nuclear power is nothing to do with the mushroom clouds they've seen on TV Some people just want to believe the sensationalist press and loudly shouting "anti" groups.

 

[Numptynuts]

Hi all,

I have heard some utter rubbish claims by manufacturers that simply cannot be justified. there are a number of companies including ecopower heating and economy radiator company who are claiming that their products are up to 60% cheaper to run than storage heaters. Buyer beware! If they were that good wouldn't they be promoted by everyone inc Amazon!

 

[big-all]

Hi all,

I have heard some utter rubbish claims by manufacturers that simply cannot be justified. there are a number of companies including ecopower heating and economy radiator company who are claiming that their products are up to 60% cheaper to run than storage heaters. Buyer beware! If they were that good wouldn't they be promoted by everyone inc Amazon!

heeelllooo and welcome numptynuts

spot on electricity is probably 98 or 99% efficient at delivering heat to an exact point with little losses between meter [ where your cost per unit start]and point off use

so no heating with the same cost per unit can be more efficient

 

[bernardgreen]

I seem to recall the Philips Experimental House

http://passipedia.passiv.de/passipe...sive_versus_active_measures_in_europe_america

used phase change from liquid to crystal in saturated salt solutions.

Or it might have been the House for the Future that Granada TV created in the 1970's

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/property...-credits-to-roll-on-a-star-of-the-future.html

The results were good in theory but ( from memory ) the first crystals to come out of solution during phase change formed solid layers which prevented the remaining liquid circulating around the heat exchangers unless the tank was mechanically stirred during phase changing

 

[SimonH2]

spot on electricity is probably 98 or 99% efficient at delivering heat to an exact point with little losses between meter [ where your cost per unit start]and point off use

so no heating with the same cost per unit can be more efficient

At turning lecky into heat, no; at turning lecky into wanted/useful heat - possibly.

As I may have mentioned before, ordinary storage heaters with mechanical heat controls are pants at control - so you get heat when you don't want it which means waste.
It is quite conceivable that a good, well insulated store, with precise electronic control of heat release could mark a significant improvement on the old s**te "box of bricks" storage heaters we have in our office at work. In a domestic setting those old "box of bricks" heaters would be heating the house quite nicely while the owner is at work - and then run out of heat when the owner gets home

 

[phatboy]

In a domestic setting those old "box of bricks" heaters would be heating the house quite nicely while the owner is at work - and then run out of heat when the owner gets home

Dependent on tariff - I have a tariff that charges them 4 hours over night, 2 during the day, and 2 in the evenings.