Electricity query

Caribs

Now that we are begining to emerge from our 9 month long winter spell and we get to give the oil fired heating a rest for a while does anyone know whether its better to heat your water using the immersion heater (set on sink) or to boil a kettle. Kettle seems quicker but you hear horror stories about the amount of electricity it uses.

Same question applies to using an electric shower Vs immersion?

gerrycollins

well an electric shower is much cheaper of them all,and a kettle should only be used to boil the amount of water needed not the full kettle every time.

Ill assume you are speaking about hot water for a sink full

Well a kettle is better for this as a shower would take longer to fill up a sink,plus a small amount of boiling(not warm) mixed with a lot of cold water should fill your sink

An immersion is normally 14-16KW ie. it uses 16 units of electricity per hour of use and considering you need to have in on for about 2 hours before the water gets hot you will at least us 32 units of electricity

A shower unit which is supplied water from the mains tank(cold) in your attic is normally 11KW and considering the above you will really use it for what 20 mins a person so do the math yourselves

If you have any fears about your kettle find out its wattage or rating and do the math from there
1000W = 1KW
1KW = 1 unit of ESB charge per hour of usage

Caribs

Thanks for that Gerry - all makes sense. Anything to keep a few bob in my pocket rather than ESB..!!

masterK

I remember reading an article which stated that the average cost of each electric shower in Ireland is just under 5 cents.

gerrycollins

Caribs wrote:

Thanks for that Gerry - all makes sense. Anything to keep a few bob in my pocket rather than ESB..!!

too bloody right

gagalina

What about immersion vs gas heating to heat up the water tank for showers?

Sadly enough we do not have an electric shower in our house, so we tend to heat up the water for shower via the gas heating... for the summer months, we switch off the heating in most rooms, as obviously it is not needed.


Gagalina

gerrycollins

gagalina wrote:

What about immersion vs gas heating to heat up the water tank for showers?

Sadly enough we do not have an electric shower in our house, so we tend to heat up the water for shower via the gas heating... for the summer months, we switch off the heating in most rooms, as obviously it is not needed.


Gagalina

that is cost effective as long as Bord Gais dont get their 40% price hike

also so long as the heating in the rooms is turned off your only heating a small amount of water which takes very little effort and time.

Some people will say that the turning on and off the gas burner will use up massive amounts of gas just to get started but so long as you burner is serviced regularly and relatively new you wont have this problem

set the heating/burn dial to max just so it burns until its done (otherwise its on for a min then off then on again then off)then it safe to turn off plus you can use this as a guide line for how long you need to keep it on i only keep mine on for one notch in the timer now which is 15 mins so its set to do it at 5am so when i get up the water is still hot(lagging jacket)

BTW do you have a small ball like tank along side your main tank if so this is cheaper as this is used for the shower while the bigger tank is used for the rads in most modern houses

my electric shower is in my bath but wifey is nearly ready to burst with bun in the oven so she cant be climbing over bath edge so we still have to use shower in en suite

The shower i got was a trition TS90i which comes with built in pump and got it second hand for €200 and it took half a day to install(even tho my dad did it he made it look simple lol) you will save money in the long run especially if you have a plumber mate to do a nixer on it