Towel heater/radiator

[Alice2468]

I would just like to know if anyone has a towel heater (not radiator) in their bathroom and whether or not it heats the room sufficiently. We have a small bathroom 6ft by 6ft and think that a heater, rather than a radiator will do the job. However, we don't want to fit one, then find out that it doesn't.

We do and it is enough, however we did insulate the walls and floor, and the towel rail has big wide pipes not the little skinny ones so has a decent BTU.

It really depends on the BTU needed for your room which is affected by its size, how many windows, how many external walls etc. You can use online BTU calculators and your plumber can also do a BTU calculation for you, then choose a towel rail with sufficient output.

I assume you mean a plumbed in one by the way - electric towel rails are very unlikely to be enough.

If you have a 500W towel warmer, and wrap it in an insulating layer of towels, the insulation will prevent the heat getting out.

We have a towel radiator and a small bathroom. When you're in there with the door shut it's really warm.

I had this in a previous property and the bathroom was like a fridge. I would never opt for a towel radiator over an actual radiator based on this.

The only warm bathroom I personally know of, that has a heated towel rail also has underfloor heating for room warmth.

We have two heated towel rails. I don't hang too many towels on them and it's warm in there. 1 external wall.

I have underfloor heating and a towel rad. Just perfect!

Our upstairs shower room is really toasty with one, but it's in a fairly modern, well insulated dormer.

The actual bathroom is downstairs on the southeast corner of our semi and is bloody freezing with one, even with no towels on it.

Our bathroom is 8x8 with two outside walls, we have just a towel rail and it is nowhere near warm enough.

I have a proper radiator, and hang my towel on it. It keeps the bathroom very cosy, and the towel is bone dry very quickly. When I’ve visited houses with just heated towel rails, I find the towels take ages to dry properly and the rooms are comparatively chilly. Maybe new models are more efficient, but I’m opting for a shiny chrome urban style radiator in my new bathroom. I’m ripping out the 47 year old suite that came with the house!

Our bathroom is 12x10 & has 3 external walls (N, E & S, with a small en suite carved out of the SW corner). There’s also a tumble dryer & a combi boiler, both vented on the E wall (inside a large cupboard).

Unsurprisingly the towel rail really doesn’t heat it very well at all, esp if there’s an east wind

Does dry towels quite well though if not overloaded

Thank you all. I think I'm leaning more towards a towel radiator now. It will be plumbed in, whichever I decide on.

I do and it does fine in my 7ft x 7ft bathroom

We have a tall towel radiator which is probably oversized for the room. We have them in both the en-suite and bathroom. 2 bath sheets are dried on each one daily. The rooms are never cold.

The radiators came from Geyser here you can narrow down by size etc.

Ours are dual fuel so that in summer we can dry the towels. What I loved about Geyser is that when you choose the radiator, the whole working out what things go with it are worked out for you under the accessories bit on the right. This included the valves and the dual fuel packs.

We needed an electrician to do the electrics, they are on a fused timer, also from Geyser. I do sound like I work for them but I just loved their website.

good idea to have an oversized heater. Fitted with a TRV or thermostat it won't overheat the room.

BTW if you are lucky enough to have a hot water cylinder close to the bathroom, you can have the towel rail heat up during and after the time you are having a bath and shower, which is perhaps the ideal time.

Our towel rail heats up our smallish shower room. We have it set up so that it can come on when we have the water being heated and also come on when we have the heating on.

Coming on when the water is being heated (approx 1 hour a day divided in to 4 different times) worked fantastically in the summer when we have the shower room window open most of the time. Dries out the room/towels and keeps room fresh.