Do you believe these BTU's?

A watts to BTU conversion is pretty straightforward:

It looks right and takes maybe a 40a fuse, do you have the right wiring and circuit. It will only cost a few hundred a month to run.

Sure sounds reasonable to me. Consider the size of a hob on an electric range. They can be that much over a much smaller area. I'd guess at that output is gets very warm though. And you need 240V.

Your Runtal sounds wimpy for 2000 Btu and being larger. A 15A apace heater is about 5100 Btu.

It looks right and takes maybe a 40a fuse, do you have the right wiring and circuit. It will only cost a few hundred a month to run.

Made in England so you can figure is it 240V or 15A draw. Did you see the prices though? The big ones runs about $1500 US. The Pound is 1.38 right now.

I've been assuming that the heater is hydronic. What leads you to believe it's electric?

I assumed that they were electric for the same reason - I've never seen watts as a unit measurement for anything other than an electric heater/radiator. After a quick Google I found the technical specs and it is indeed a hydronic radiator. The specs have installation instructions and reference PFTE tape and valves, so that's pretty definitive.

I wonder why they give both BTU/h and watts...

Those crazy Europeans. They use kW for motor ratings instead of horsepower too.

Going back, I saw this Description You Square by Eskimo is a stylish and contemporary design that is suitable for any heating system.

They must mean any hot water or steam system.

Or nyooklear. ;)

OK, now that we've established their hydronic nature, do you believe the BTU ratings?

The heat output does seem to be on the high side given the size of the unit, but since I know nothing about the construction and the amount of radiant surface, or how they calculate the heat output...my belief means nothing.

Take a look at the technical information, contact the manufacturer, etc.

The units are rated in watts. That's how we know they are electric.

The one I am familiar with, is 1500 watts gives 5,200 BTU. That's a normal, household heater sold in the USA. These don't seem to have any advantage. I like the black box "ceramic" heaters, they seem safer. They are supposed to also be higher efficiency, but who can tell?

And when it breaks do you ship it over the ocean and wait 6 months.

Hey ransley you dipshit. They make these really strange hunks of aluminum now that dont go in the water. They actually move above the water. They call them jets. Strange how fast they go too. They have these services that cost extra too but you can get things overnight now. Obviously something that you are too cheap to ever spring for. Bubba

Electric resistie heaters are normally essentially 100% efficient at converting electricity to heat at the rate of 3413 BTU/hour per kilowatt.

Differences in heater type/style largely affect only where the heat goes. If the heat is heavily radiant, some may go far (into other rooms through open doorways and archways), and a bit could be optical band infrared and a trace could be visible light that escapes the house through windows. Some radiant heaters may be good at heating a targeted area, maybe including one person or a couple wanting the warmth. Non-radiant heat is usually mostly either convected upward (may easily disproportionally heat the ceiling) or is fan-blown (where it goes depends on various design and heater placement factors). Electric blankets have same efficiency of 3.413 BTU/hour per watt, but can target warmth to what they are adjacent to.

- Don Klipstein ( snipped-for-privacy@misty.com)

Changing electricity into heat is pretty much 100% efficient regardless of the way it is done. Perhaps the ceramic heater is .0001% more efficient at it, but as you say, "who can tell".