Is it true, thermostat for heating/water boiler

Hi guys

A builder told us a good way to save money on the gas heating bill was to keep the thermostat switched on 24 hours a day at a low heat, he said it was cheaper than switching it on at medium/high heat at different hours each day....

Does this sound right to you or is he talking out of his something arather?

Thanks

Nope - he's talking sense. Our water heater is on constantly and on maximum. We only shower (no bath, so less water) and run dishwasher and washing machine once a day so use quite a lot of hot water. I dread to think how much my electricity bill would be if I heated up a whole tank of water from cold to boiling hot every day! I suppose though, it would depend on your useage.

Cheers

I've heard that too Ingrid. Apparently, it's the 'firing up' of the boiler that takes alot of power, whereas if it's 'ticking over' it is supposed to use less power. Don't know whether it's true or not though

The thing is, once it reaches it's temperature, thanks to the thermostat, it stops trying to heat the water and just goes into "rest" mode. It makes more sense to me to keep it on all the time, plus I never have to worry about there being enough hot water

we are the same always on, it does save money too

Excellent, Thanks Ash, Vicky and Kerrie for confirming

Giving it ago right now but struggling with the heat Got the windows open - have it on 15 degrees - not used to it being this warm

Thank you guys, after British Gas's unbelievable price hike we are going to be prudent with the gas

Check the lagging in your loft Ingrid because the minimum insulation thickness you should have is 6" (150mm) and this is the second most common place for heat loss (1st is the walls-cavity wall insualtion solves this though).

Spending an average £100 on loft lagging is easily recouped through gas savings in less than 2 years.

Keeping your heating on low does stop your boiler having to heat up an entire house from cold,but is dependent on individual circumstances.
I dont leave my heating on low because during the day-i open a couple of windows to ventilate house and this would be wasteful,but im blessed with being south facing so kitchen/diner etc on rear of property gets roasted by the sun!

Good advice thanks Steve.

You are very luck to have the kitchen southfacing for sure!

Thank you!

Although run by the same method, my heating boiler and my hot water boiler are actually separate. For years I thought I had to have the heating on to heat the water.....quite how the water got heated in the Summer months was a mystery I decided to ignore. Whilst having the boiler serviced I plucked up the courage to ask the engineer, and it turns out there are actually two boilers within the one outer casing - one for the heat and one for the water - so - it's the water one that's on all the time. You should check that you don't have the same system. Don't be as ignorant as me - unless it's really ancient (mine's over 20 years old) it should have both - and it'll prevent you having to have heating on when you don't need it.

Cheers

Mine's ancient and has two systems but it is now faulty because if you switch the water heater on the central heating comes on at the same time, it shouldn't, it never use to - a technician was called, £80 later to tell us it was faulty and didn't know what was wrong with it Idiot - we already told him we knew there was a fault.

I think until we get it fixed (find someone who can fix it) we are going to have it on timed as I don't think we will save any money having both systems on.