how to save money on water heating?

[mollysmum82]

I'm a little confused about how this works. Do you think it is better to set a timer, for say 2 periods a day for hot water? Or is it best to leave the heat on all day (I remember someone once telling me it costs more energy to heat up a whole tank of water from cold as opposed to maintaing a hot tank)

What do others do?

Many thanks

[mumblechum1]

We have our water heater (CH boiler) on twice a day, but rarely put the central heating on (because it's crap and costs a bomb to run).

I don't know the ins and outs, but as our water's only on for an hour in the morning and an hour in the late afternoon I doubt it would be cheaper to keep it on all day; sometimes none of us has a shower in the morning as we're going to the gym on the way to work or whatever, so it isn't heating up from ice cold in the afternoon, and vice versa.

[dontwantanickname]

if your tank is well insulated it would probably be cheaper to heat twice a day for an hour or so. the insulation will retain the heat so youre not heating form cold each time. Since our water tank has been properly insulalted and the timer set for two hours a day, the gas meter has been running a lot slower (we have no temperature control on the water tank)

maybe you could take meter readings for both scenarios then you can work out which uses less

[mollysmum82]

Thanks both of you for your posts. That's a great idea about taking meter readings, I hadn't even considered the insulation aspect.