Model Railway Forum

i have 2 of the new breed of rads. that use little leccy. Each one has frost control. Big one is in the train room, and smaller in adjoining fly fishing room. Up to now, they have only cut in once, but keep both rooms , frost free, and take the worry out of winter. Our walls are 18 inches thick, in the house, but both these rooms are made from old barn, with walls and ceiling insulated with 4 inch fibreglass. Only cold, underfoot, as below is the garage. Keep talking about insulating joists below, but thats as far as it gets.

Interesting post on RMWeb about a heater with a moulded on plug getting hot and going awry. The problem apparently fixed by just cutting of the plug and fitting a decent MK plug.
Worth cranking up your heater to max chat on test and seeing if any have hot plugs. Better safe than sorry later.
I have just done my two and they are OK.
Rob

Malcolm 0-6-0 wrote: ↑Sun Dec 30, 2018 9:55 amThe furry kind have a habit of expropriating heaters.

It gets worse when they want food, cosy beds, blankets and then knock the trains over... -_-

RAF96 wrote: ↑Sun Dec 30, 2018 11:17 am Interesting post on RMWeb about a heater with a moulded on plug getting hot and going awry. The problem apparently fixed by just cutting of the plug and fitting a decent MK plug.
Worth cranking up your heater to max chat on test and seeing if any have hot plugs. Better safe than sorry later.
I have just done my two and they are OK.
Rob

Thanks for the tip Rob. I will do a test and see how it goes. So far the heater has been fine, but then so has the weather

Will be keeping an eye out for the little furry critters. I might put up a trespass sign. That should keep them away

Before you use any electric heater in a shed, make sure it's as sealed/insulated as much as possible as you will just be throwing money away. Can also be worth getting an energy usage monitor for the heater. https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00G955V0E/ ... 0702632799

But, as for running cost will depend on how well you're sealed up. But, Per kw per hour, will be around 15p X 10 hours a day = £1.50 per day X 1 / 30 day month £45 a month minimum. per 1 KW . The other thing to watch out for when putting a heater in is the condensation it will create.

Something I once came across was a heater designed to take the small camping A4 type gas bottles. I was tempted to buy one but didn't really have the money at the time.

A good tip I found was to fit one of these after plug and before heater as it’s more accurate
https://www.screwfix.com/p/flomasta-wir ... stat/7593g
And mount it at a average height

Re my post if 18th Dec, I actually bought one of the £29.99 oil filled radiators from Lidl and used it for the first time this morning in the garage....... gave off quite a good heat for the short time I had it on, and with the roller castors and long cable it is very easy to move it in close proximity to where one is working........ still a few left in my local Lidl and also a new variant with an external thermostat control which adds some £10 to the price.

I did see the Lidl heaters and was very tempted till I saw a notice on the box saying "For occasional use only" which put me off a bit. I purchased one from Argos which was a Dimplex. Very happy with it so far and on it's lowest setting with the thermostat almost at minimum it maintains a temperature that seems to be ideal. It also doesn't create condensation at that setting.
I also checked the plug (which isn't a moulded one) and even on the highest setting it didn't get hot when left for a couple of hours. The shed is pretty well sealed with only the door and the windows being the weak points, but I will be addressing those at some point.

The trick to avoiding condensation is to only heat the room to keep it just above the dew point (the temperature at which condensation will form).

This site provides a dew point forecast - it’s pretty low at present.

https://www.weatheronline.co.uk/weather ... L=C&SI=mph

However, if you heat the space too high the air can hold more moisture which will condense on cold surfaces such as windows - as evidenced in the bathroom when you have your annual bath.