On Thu, 27 Jan 2005 22:26:51 -0500, someone wrote:

I have no experience with that heater. The one I do have (and really like)
is a ceramic one. Little back box with a fan and air filter in the back.
Really pumps out heat, and supposed to be more energy efficient than the
filament types.

How is it "more efficient" - converting electricity to heat by use of
resistance has essentially the same efficiency for all methods
("filament", "ceramic", "oil-filled", all use resistance).

Blowers may help direct the heat, but so can reflectors for radiant
'filament' heaters. Oil-filled surrounds the filament with the oil to
dampen binary on-off fluctuations but is no more or less efficient in
a general sense.

Each watt = (from memory so bracing for error) 3.41 btu, and the
wattage is limited by the voltage and amperage of a single residential
circuit. Typically they are no more than 1500 watts since 120V x 15A
= 1800W and there is some allowance for a bit of margin plus some
other small thing (lamp etc.) being on the circuit.

Despite the hype, there is not a lot of diference in net effect among
the types. Some may be more convenient than others, I like an
oil-filled myself.


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