Zone Heating

[GardenWeasel]

Here's my story. Rambling cold brick house, DH on the road 5-6 days a week, electric heat pump that blows cold air, skinny cold, old woman. Read about zone heating and just ordered 2 Pelonis ceramic space heaters. I can't stand the thermostat below 72 in the day and much less than 70 at night, have RA and carpal tunnel. But for gosh sake it's just me and I can't be in 2 places at once so figured why heat to my comfort if I can use a space heater where I am and turn it down. I will let you all know if my bill goes up or down.

 

[~gd]

I am a old man living alone in a 3 bedroom house. The kitchen/living room is a big openspace using propane forced air heating. I spend most of my time in a office that ajoins my laundry room. The thermostat is in the open kitchen/ living room it is set at 6oF The air ducts for the bedrooms is kept off and are heated by sunlight and heat leaking from the rest of the house [NC yesterdays low 31 high 66F] I like a cold bedroom and have a space heater only in the bathroom and it is only on while I am using it and feel the need. When I get up in the morning I make a beeline to the office and run the load of clothes in my dryer. I have to run it sometime and the extra heat takes the chill off the office. I run a fan blowing out of the laundry and into the office. there is a ceiling fan above where I sit and that is set to blow the heat down on me. as the day goes by extra heat is claimed from sunshine.
Supper is cooked in the kitchen and the heat is trapped and again blown down from above to warm me as I read or watch TV. If I feel cold watching TV I have a rhrow wrap on the back of my chair, if reading I move to my bed.
The only problems I have had is with rainy days when I don't get much heat from the sun.

 

[Marianne]

The biggest problem I had with zone heating was that the cold air from another room was coming into the warm area where I was. In the evenings I'd have one side of my body toasty warm and the other side was catching that cold draft. I always had a fleece over me, but eventually half my face would be cold, too. Unfortunately, the way our TV has to be placed and the angle of our chairs, there's no easy fix.
It might be a lot colder in the winter here than in your location, so as they say, YMMV.

I use a heating pad for some low cost extra warmth, too.

 

[FarmerChick]

I don't blame you Garden Weasel.

If it is you mostly and you don't want to heat the large house cause you use X rooms, yea I would sure try something.

I definitely want to know how it affects your bills.

Right now we are using the whole house and only room that ends up cold if I use my propane heat is the master bath. I have a oil radiator heater in there. Flip on a bit when shower time and it warms up nice. I also agree a heat pump 'heat' is not that warm.
And heaven help the electric bill is that heat strip kicks in.

 

[Marianne]

That's the truth! FC and I talked about that on another thread. Big electric bills, still a cold house.

I would hate to publicly admit how much money we have spent over the past six years trying to figure out the cheapest/best way to heat this huge place.

 

[FarmerChick]

oh wow Marianne I hear you.

you try and try to find that better situation and it can cost so much in trial and error.

that is why I am so slow at changing big ticket items in my life. One website says it is wonder, another says don't bother you won't save doing that.....and the confusion kicks in.


I went to Lowes to check on my timer for the water heater. The guy in electrical said it is not worth it. I won't save. Then I went to the water heater aisle and talked to a gal. She said I would save money...haha...talk about confusing. NOW THEY have water heaters with timers built right in them. Tony wanted to buy one. $407 for 50 gallons. I said NO. Until this one dies how can I justify throwing out a good one and buying another. ugh

 

[hqueen13]

We live in a leaky trailer, with a poor heating/ac, so we struggle to keep the house insulated. I'm always cold, so that doesn't help (he could care less, I suspect!) Last year my mom found a sale on thermal curtains, and we put them in the kitchen and living room, and it made a huge difference. I think all told, we spent about $150.00, which was enough panels to cover a quadrupal window in the kitchen, a double window and a picture window in the living room. We didn't buy curtains for our bedroom, but I think that will be a purchase for this year.
we purchased ours from www.annaslinens.com
Specifically this style: http://www.annaslinens.com/product/...anel.html?utm_source=gcs&utm_term=10084-47326 which is the least expensive style, and they work very well. They aren't the highest quality, but the do the job very well.

 

[Emerald]

I only heat the rooms downstairs that we use and I have curtains on all the doorways to other rooms and in those rooms have the vents closed. I keep the gas fireplace on low (65F) and we have twin sized quilts for every chair/couch etc. in the living room if ya gets cold.
Our house is a 5 bedroom two story 100+ year old monster.. it cost us last year and the year before, during the coldest month even, (our highest bill) for our gas.. $118 first year and $119 last year. We heat water and cook with gas.. our electric is usually under $50 in the winter.. higher in the summer tho we have all our fans running!
But we have a tankless water heater (also called inline water heater) that I got for $500 on sale before they became all the rage to have.
I had the money at the time, always thought it was a good idea and luck would have it, the next week our old tank heater sprang a leak and we had to get rid of it anyhoo.. They do take a bit of getting used to tho.. you have to run the hot water till it kick in and then start adding the cold till you get the temp you like.. and if you turn on too much cold for some reason the hot will turn off! (seems to be a water flow sensor thing).. but when we are gone on vacation you sure can tell on our bill that month. When our daughter got her own house and moved out the gas bill dropped again.. Well worth it .. I just wish I had sprang for the bigger model so that when I need a bit of water while the shower is on I can just draw it and not worry about person in shower getting cold! lol

 

[moxies_chickennuggets]

Ohh...this is a good thread. Last year, DH and I bought a 1 acre property with house and several buildings. The house is an old drafty 1952 Jim Walters home. No insulation, remuddled additions popping out everywhere. Yes, we have issues like you speak of. Now, our kitchen....I bought one of those curtain panels from the Dollar store. Wide weave synthetic...with the huge round holes for hanging it. We put it on the kitchen door, and use a Lil' Buddy propane heater to heat the kitchen. I also use the crockpot alot, in the winter, as it heats this kitchen up nicely.
Layers of clothing, socks, shoes or slippers. I hear you about being cold, athough I have never been accused of being skinny. I am going through peri-menopause, and I get freezing cold during visits from Auntie Flo.
As for the rest of the house, we keep our bedroom door shut, and have a heater in the 1 bathroom area. The one bathroom is too small for zone heaters, and has no outlets anyways.

 

[Hinotori]

We have an old 1900 house. Lucky for us it's only 900 sq ft. Our heat is a wood stove. I know there is no insulation in the walls. We have nice insulated curtains on the windows. We have curtains instead of bedroom doors, didn't have doors when we bought this place.

I keep the back room blocked off good. No use heating it fully and burning more wood. It stays about 50 degrees. I have my pantry in there.

The front bedroom is by the wood stove and heats up more even with the cu.rtain. It stays about 62, perfect for my hubby.

The living room and kitchen stay about 70 to 75. I have to keep the bathroom door shut as our gsd is nosy and likes toilet paper. We keep a tiny space heater in there that keeps it comfortable and the pipes from freezing.

We had some issues last year (when we bought this place) and couldn't run the stove so we had to use just space heaters. With just heating where we needed we still spent less on heat than we did at the apartment we lived in before that, and we kept it warmer.