Comments on: How long do you leave your heating on each day?

By: Kat

Kat — Fri, 11 Feb 2011 23:52:17 +0000

i had 1000ltrs delivered 12/01/11 when we ran out of oil over the coldest days at xmas , had to wait as the depot had run out themselves at that point.( left some in so it didnt suck up sludge in older iron tank ) after new load i hadnt checked for a few weeks the level , when i did it was 3/4 full then it got milder put it back to twice a day only and at 18-20 on dial sometimes less when log fire going or during day none at all. then i found this tues. 7/02 1 day short of 4 weeks- since last delivery ( costing £635.25 ) i had COMPLETELY RUN OUT AGAIN ! i phoned a boiler servicer, noting new filter fitted by prev. owners 2009 he said on 7 rads- old or new- AND the use of a log burner- there was NO WAY i can have used up that ammount – he said if i had a leak ( tube to boiler thru garage ,not under concrete ) i would know about it as would be swimming in it. He recons its been stolen. Look on the web police blogs – it is happening everywhere . keep tabs on what your using- i’m not filling up again until i have a padlock on lid etc. luckily i have electric as an option. theres no way electric is going to cost me £160 week like this last load has done !!!???? i’m sitting here with a coat on- not intending to fill up at least until March the theiving bar stuards can go freeze . i was born in a council house with a coal fire and crittall windows – i’ll survive ! hot water bottles are my only needs around here from now on until spring , to save some of our money back…

By: Mike

Mike — Thu, 13 Jan 2011 12:45:32 +0000

800 ltrs per month, not that outrageous considering the really cold weather we’ve had lately. My place is reasonably large, reasonably well insulated although solid wall construction and we were using around 20-25 litres per day in the coldest spell in December. We don’t have a combi though and it’s a pretty inefficient old boiler. If you really want to know if you’ve got a leak, turn the boiler off for a day or so and see if the level still drops…

By: Oliver

Oliver — Tue, 11 Jan 2011 05:49:24 +0000

We have a Worcester with a heat-bank in a modern 5 bed house, admittedly we have a few leaks however we are burning 1000L a month in Dec type weather. It comes with the territory Four/Five years ago – when we rebuilt – Oil was less than 25p a litre. We burn 6000L a year so annual cost of £1500 not too bad. current price of 69p £4130 per year – bang goes the summer holiday, the new clothes, and even the food shopping has seen a credible impact. Thermostats are down thermal undies on and the local trees are quaking in their roots.

By: Steven

Steven — Mon, 03 Jan 2011 06:38:20 +0000

I’ve recently moved into a large, stone built, farm house, constructed around 1910. The loft seems to be very well insulated, all windows double glazed and draft free etc I have just calculated that I am using an alarming 400litres of oil every 2 weeks! I find this very worrying and a lttle hard to believe, is it possible for a worcester heatslave combi to burn oil at this alarming rate? I’ve had a close look around the tank which is a modern bunded plastic version and no signs of leakage.
On moving into the property approximately 2 months ago I had the boiler fully checked/serviced. I’m actually hoping that I do have a small leak on the tank as burning 800ltrs per month is rapidly becoming a major financial drain.

By: Heating Services

Heating Services — Wed, 15 Dec 2010 08:32:47 +0000

My house is over 100 years old and due to the age I lose a lot of heat through the walls and flooring. Last year I got my roof insulated for the winter and I didn’t notice that I wasn’t losing a lot of heating. My husband and I work 9 – 5 and both are home around 6 – 6:30. I don’t have the heating on all of the time as it is a waste and it can be very expensive as I do end up having to pay for heat that escapes. I set my boiler to come on at 5 so when we wake up at 6 the house will be warm and the hot water for the shower will be warm up quicker. The heating goes off 8:30 when we leave and comes back on at 4:30 so when we are home it will be warm. I did hear that it can be cheaper to have your heating on all day then on and off as it can waste power and money with the system having to turn on and off at set times.

By: Mark Vaesen

Mark Vaesen — Thu, 18 Nov 2010 15:58:24 +0000

We live in a 3 bed 1930s semi, original windows and we get a problem with the draught. We have our heating on first thing in the morning and in the evenings til about 7.30, then once the kids are in bed we get the real fire going and that keeps us toastie for the rest of the night.

Can’t beat a real fire burning quality seasoned hardwood logs!

By: Paul

Paul — Fri, 22 Oct 2010 19:14:11 +0000

I have a question! We have a boiler that services our house (Old, very large house with 40 radiators) The system that we have in place to turn the radiators on is a pump that we manually plug in or out that pumps hot water directly from a large hot water tank through the radiators and back again. I am wondering if it would be more efficient to leave the pump plugged in full time. When you unplug the pump and the radiators go cold you then have a huge volume of cold water that returns to the hot water tank once you re-plug the pump in a few hours later.This seems like a large strain on the system and maybe it would be better to keep the hot water circulating all the time…Any thoughts?!?

By: John Oglesby

John Oglesby — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 13:39:55 +0000

Reply to:
Simon Green May 31st, 2010 10:56 am

Hi Simon
Finally, another sensible post (see my Post 2/3/2010) using science and not emotion!!

You make an interesting point regarding the accurate measurement of oil use. Throughout the winter I was taking daily cm readings from the sight on the tank and (whilst there were some strange readings) I was able to determin approx oil use relative to heating time and weather and saw that science prevailed.

However, that was when I only had <500litres in the tank. Now I'm back up to 2000ltrs again the fluctuation of a few degrees in outside temp can cause the oil to expand/contract by up to +/- 1.5cms (i know because the heating is off) making any readings at this time of year (with minimal usage) impossible.

By: Simon Green

Simon Green — Mon, 31 May 2010 09:56:07 +0000

It is unfortunate that nearly all of these posts are from people without any understanding of thermodynamics but the two or three that do are right in saying it saves money to turn it off part or most of the day. The rest are just unreliable anecdotes to justify having the heat on for comfort. The weather varies so much that week to week variations in oil use (how do they measure that accurately without a flow meter?) will not answer this question.

The laws of thermodynamics show that the amount of heat loss (and hence amount of oil burnt and cost incurred) depends on the difference between indoor and out door temperatures at any time if insulation and draft proofing remain the same. The only other factor will sometimes be windspeed. This is true whether you have good insulation or bad but obviously in the former case you will burn less oil in any particular circumstance.

Say the temperature outside is 10C and you want to maintain 20C in downstairs rooms most of the time. You set the stat to 10. When the inside temp is 20 you will lose heat at a certain rate. If you turn the heating off for a few hours such as when you are at work or snug in your bed at night, the temp will after a while be 15 C and your heat loss will halve. When the heating comes on it will initially just have to warm the air in the house up to 20C which does not take very long (even in our poorly insulated leaky house it’s about 30 minutes) after which you will need to use enough to sustain that double rate of heat loss.

If you are at home all day and don’t want to bundle up (I am wearing a sweater on 31 May!) then you may want the heating on occasionally and you can use the 1 hour button. Why on earth would you need the heating on when you are in bed unless it is raging cold outdoors? Set the stat to go off an hour or two before you go to bed and on again 30-60 minutes before you get up.

You don’t actually need an excuse if you want to have the heat on all day if you can afford it but please don’t pretend it will save you money compared to being sensible – it’ll cost you and the planet more.

By: Shaun

Shaun — Wed, 28 Apr 2010 22:54:53 +0000

I am in the process of renovation work on my house of 26 yrs.I have fitted a thermal store instead of my old water tank,fitting a wood burner with back boiler. The oil consumption is down by 50%. My next move is solar panels to bring the oil down to hopefully 0% during the summer and help out during the winter.Oil prices WILL continue to rise so we need to come away from oil only heating systems in the future.
I believe that air to water heat pumps will be the replacement to oil boilers and can be powered by photovoltaic panels.The government to offering a deal to make these panels a interesting investment starting from April 10.
If I decide to go down this path, if I can afford the set up costs, it would mean a negligible heating bill. Next question is can we afford not to investigate this technology. How much was your oil bill last year ?