# 200W or 300W element in my towel rail?



## Triggaaar (28 May 2010)

I've bought a 500 wide x 800 high filled towel rail. They used to be supplied with 300W elements, but the suppliers found that a 200W element was enough for the small sized rad so they now ship with 200W elements.

So my rad arrived today, but came with the 300W element. The shop will take it back and give me a 200W element if I like, but I'm wondering whether I'm better off keeping the 300W.

It's for a wet room that has no other heating, so it would be nice if it gave off lots of heat, but with towels on I'm not sure it'll warm the room any more than the 200W element, so instead it'll be a waste of energy.

Can anyone who has experience with these things give me any advice?

Thanks


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## Oryxdesign (28 May 2010)

200 is probably enough to keep your towels warm and dry them, 300 will not provide enough power for any useful heating imo.


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## AndyT (28 May 2010)

We've got a rail in our wet room - with a 600W element in, as it's a bigger one - and it makes no difference to the room at all, which is not surprising when you look at room rads and see their output in Kw.

I certainly would not bother changing yours. The thermostat will probably mean it spends less time switched on than a 200w one would, so the running costs will be similar too.


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## Triggaaar (28 May 2010)

Thank you both for the reply. I've just had a frantick call from the supplier who was worried I'd already posted it back to them. Apparently he made a different mistake to the one we thought he'd made  The 300W is the element they like to supply with my rad, and they supply the 200W with the smaller 400 wide rad. So sorted, I'll install the one I have.



AndyT":et8fwcpc said:


> We've got a rail in our wet room - with a 600W element in, as it's a bigger one - and it makes no difference to the room at all, which is not surprising when you look at room rads and see their output in Kw.


If you've got towels on it, I doubt it would let much of it's heat out. But without towels, I'm hoping this will heat the room - the room is 10'x3', whereas the rest of the building is about 20'x18' (area 30:360 = 1:12). The rest of the building is heated adequately by 2 1000W rads, so less than 7 times as much power for 12 times as much space.



> I certainly would not bother changing yours. The thermostat will probably mean it spends less time switched on than a 200w one would, so the running costs will be similar too.


Good advice, thanks. I didn't actually realise these little elements had a thermostat (I'm feeling stupid now) which is handy, so the 300W will probably be better for me.

Thanks


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## Eric The Viking (28 May 2010)

> I didn't actually realise these little elements had a thermostat (I'm feeling stupid now) which is handy, so the 300W will probably be better for me.



Ours don't, and I haven't seen a simple one that does have a thermostat. 

I was worried about heating our bathroom, and fitted 2x300w ones to a pair of towel rails (we need the towel space, with three teenagers). At this time of year you daren't leave them on for any significant time (>an hour) or the room turns into a sauna. It's pretty well insulated though, in the middle of the house, so that may make a difference.

The shower room downstairs (wet room with a shower screen) has 150W, and that does warm it too with or without towels. In both cases the rads work off the CH in winter, and give out more heat then..


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## jasonB (29 May 2010)

You can buy what is in effect a dimmer switch for these elements so if you do find its too hot then you can fit one of them. IT MUST BE OUTSIDE THE ROOM 

http://www.tlc-direct.co.uk/Products/JVHRS.html

A 300w one should put out a reasonable amount of heat, certainly the same sort of heat as if it were on a wet central heating system . Room temp will depend if the long or short wall is an external wall.

Jason


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## Triggaaar (29 May 2010)

jasonB":ifql54vi said:


> You can buy what is in effect a dimmer switch for these elements so if you do find its too hot then you can fit one of them. IT MUST BE OUTSIDE THE ROOM


That looks good, thanks. If I find it's too hot I can fit one later.



> Room temp will depend if the long or short wall is an external wall.


Both  Heat loss through floor, ceiling and 2 walls. It's a self contained little guest house and in the winter we've just had there was no rad in the shower room at all (only actually had anyone staying there over christmas as it wasn't fully finished). The insulation is up to standard, so while it's not as good as a lot of the projects I've read about on here, it's not like an old building either. I'm happy with it being 300W, should do the trick.


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## Mrs Oryx (29 May 2010)

It doesn't sound enough to me to be honest.

0.3kW = (approx 1000 BTU)

a bathroom 6ft by 6ft by 8ft (assumed N facing to account for your 2 ext walls) required 2200 BTU according to here:

http://www.home-radiators.co.uk/Radiato ... htm#result

In a previous house OryxDesign and I had a (very) small shower room heated only by a wet system towel rail. It was OK as long as the control (not TRV) was turned up full.


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## Triggaaar (29 May 2010)

Thanks Mrs Oryx. I don't have any faith in the old calculators any more, they either expect you to have no insulation at all, or they expect you to want your room to heat up from freezing in 3 minutes flat. In the past I've found that going with their specs is way over the top for my needs.

I don't exactly have much choice anyway, as I only designed it with a small towel rail in mind. I may just have to have towel pegs for when the rad is needed to heat the room, as covering the rad in towels stops it heating the room at all.


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## jasonB (29 May 2010)

If you put the actual room sizes (10ftx3ft) into that calculator it comes down to 1260Btu and several other calculators will give you around 1000Btu which is approx 300w. Yes there are probably some losses from the 300w input of the element to the actual output from the rad but not much.

I probably do at least 6 bathrooms a year and have never found one wanting in heat even larger rooms which I would put something like a 600x1500 ladder type rail in or a pair of smaller ones. Then again I do quite sometimes batten out external walls and fit 50mm or so of kingspan if the room can take the small loss in area particularly if its an older property with solid walls or no cavity insulation.

Jason


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## Triggaaar (29 May 2010)

jasonB":qmdcrn08 said:


> I do quite sometimes batten out external walls and fit 50mm or so of kingspan if the room can take the small loss in area particularly if its an older property with solid walls or no cavity insulation.


Good idea, while many nice older properties can't take 50mm of kingspan on the walls because as well as losing valuable space you lose nice skirting and coving etc, that doesn't mean it's not a good option in bathrooms - not thought of that (for other properties, not this new guest house).


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