How do i heat one room all day cheaply?

[ssd]

Ds is studying at home, hes cold during the day. We're in Scotland. I put the heating on yesterday but it heats all the house including radiators that are broken and I can't turn them down.
So is it cheaper to buy him a wee heater for his room alone? Rather than turn the house heating on all day?

It doesn’t take that long to heat up, and as it takes longer to cool down, it is still heating the room when it is no longer using electricity. It’s a fairly basic principle of physics.

Perhaps you should familiarise yourself with the first law of thermodynamics.

It can only give out what is put in. Just like any other electric heater.

@BoredZelda

Those wee fan heaters cost an arm n a leg to run believe it or not

15 pence per hour, and that assumes they are running constantly which, if you have one with a thermostat, it doesn’t.

Cost to run a 24kW boiler (average size for a 3 bed house) for an hour is about 90p.

So, cheaper to have a fan heater in one room than heating the whole house.

However, I tried this in my wee office and I find the noise really distracting, and the warm air isn’t good, very dry. Worth trying but doesn’t work for me. I’ve resorted to having the heating on.

A 24kW boiler will also not be running continuously at full power.

I have one and it mostly modulates itself down to 8kW, and turns off when the thermostat indicates target temperature is achieved.

I have a heated throw which works really well and I tuck everything in so vest tucked into trousers, trousers into socks. I look ridiculous but I'm sat not moving most of the day and I get cold!

I think those patio heaters mostly heat up whatever they're pointing at (radiant heat) rather than the air around them. Should be OK in a smallish room though.

Can anyone link to the heated clothes airers they have? Might be an option if affordable. Thank you.

I use onesie, fluffy socks and drink tea.

Heating is too expensive for me to have it on all the time. It comes on in a month. Human right? I'd like to eat as well. Already down to twice a day.

Hi, we have a HomeFront electric clothes airer which claims to cost 4p an hour to run. It cost under £50, maybe a bit more with the cover (the cover is useful as it stops the damp from the clothes escaping and causing the house to go moldy).

It doesnt have a timer on it, so we also bought a plug-timer for a fiver which just let's you set on/off hours for whatever is plugged into it.

Honestly in a small-ish room, that clothes airer is very effective. Our home office has no heating at all in it, and is really bitterly cold in winter. We have enough laundry that it can be on most days in winter for a while, and obviously kills two birds with one stone as dried the washing whilst warming the room.

We also do the things with layers and blankets on the coldest days too. And I second having a ten minute break to do something really physical to warm up.

Get an oodie. I live in mine in winter and my heating bill came down a lot!

Make sure his room is insulated, and this might involve one of those 1970s stuffed snakes to put across the door when closed.

Use the central heating when you are all getting up in the morning and leave all the doors open so it warms the house, but before it goes off get DS in his room door and windows shut, it will be warm and stay that way for a few hours.

Lots of layers for ds including fingerless gloves.

A hot water bottle he can put on his knee and warm his hands will help and he should have a flask or some means to make hot drinks.

Oh and studying in bed can also work.

I agree with him having

www.lakeland.co.uk/21736/Dry:Soon-Standard-3-Tier-Heated-Tower-Airer

This is what I’ve got. I feel like it’s gone up in price, but I don’t have a tumble drier.

You don’t need the sheet over the top just use a bedsheet.

I have a Sherpa fleece throw I got from Amazon which really helps, plus fleece lined slipper boots. If I'm really cold I'll add a fleece dressing gown or thick fleece jacket.

We had no heating last winter (just the fire) and it was bloody freezing in the mornings!

If you can afford it would get the radiators looked at so that you can opt to just heat your sons room - I think that'll be more cost effective long-term than any other solution tbh.

I bought a heated throw last year because of excatly this issue. It was £20 from Weeklydeals4less. I've just got it out again for this year.

My Ds is also studying more at home and keeps trying nick mine, so I have ordered another one.

They're machine washable.

My other top tip are warm feet. Heat holders socks (I wear leg warmers too when it's bitter) and a hot water bottle under my feet makes all the difference.

Hope you find the solution.

Thanks @JuneOsborne I've ordered one from there, £20 is a great price

Ah, you're welcome @TiddleTaddleTat it is a good price! My sister has just told me she's ordered one too! (Her weighted blanket isn't machine washable and we were chatting about mine and the fact it is machie washable and she was in!)

And mine lasted all of last year and is like new ready for this year. Can't moan at that, can you?

I like the air temperature to be agreeable, so a blanket wouldn't work for me - my asthma is triggered by cold temps.

If you can afford to install Hive (supposed to pay for itself in a year to 18 months), you can just put the heating on in the room you are in from your main system if you fit their TRVs.

Thanks to this thread I have remembered that I have got two TRVs out of a pack of three that I haven't fitted.

I put one in the kitchen last year which has a stone floor and is cooler than the rest of the house and it was a game changer.

Have never been so cold as when I lived in an Edinburgh tenament. I often wonder if the 'put a jumper on' lot live in SE England. I live in England now and the winters are so much milder.

I know. Putting a jumper on when your nose is turning blue doesn't really help. I want his room to be cosy, not wrap him in gloves and hats and blankets all day when the air around him is icy. That's just miserable. We're in the west of Scotland, it rains an awful lot and its cold and damp.

DP suggest what he calls Dartmoor Central Heating.

Tshirt, plaid shirt, fleece or gilet, hat and as many animals as you can collect to weight down the corners of a blanket over your legs.

@RampantIvy

I'm one of those people where if the ambient temperature is too cold, no amount of jumpers, gloves, blankets etc will keep me warm.

Exactly and I can't work or do things properly with gloves on. I need heating unless I'm in bed.

Agree with PPs that no matter how many layers, if the air is cold it's just miserable really. I'm going to try heating on in the morning for a couple of hours with door closed in the box room (study) then heated throw with no heating for the rest of the day. That side of the house does tend to warm up over the afternoon as it's west facing, though don't know how much that's going to help in the depths of winter .

Watching the football just now on telly from Manchester it is dry but looks cold. Outside Glasgow here its been pouring for ages. Its the dampness up here thats the problem. Being cold i can cope with, but the relentless rain and damp is just shit. I want his room to feel cozy when its relentless drizzle Outside his window.

I live in hill country and it is the same here ssd, wet and cold. Oil filled radiator or hive will sort him out. I added my hive TRV to my office this afternoon.

That sounds cozy!

To the anti-brasero person, most countries I have ever lived in (except UK) heat the person space not the room. Possibly to do with wealth etc. If you are cold when your entire body is wrapped in the huge fug of hot air surrounding your feet legs, waist and upper torso from a brasero, there might be something wrong with your circulation!! Or the blankets don't reach the floor all the way round. My circulation is fucked (heavy smoker) and I regularly have to get up and go outside simply to cool down again.

OP did say it had to be as cheap as possible and adding layers fits that bill.