I have an add-on family room which due construction/location was/is heated by electric baseboard strip heaters. Both are 10' long on opposite sides of the room. The one that is under a big window wall has failed. In attempting to locate replacements, I am finding out that (apparently) 10' heaters are no longer made; the longest I can locate are 8'. (One heater is FASCO Comsumer Services, which was bought out by Patton {the other heater} and both unitied under "The Rival Company.) Query 1. Anyone know if 10' heaters are available and where?
If I have to go with an 8' heater, I have always been intrigued by Hydrosil, the fluid filled heater. The 8' Hydrosil, with thermostat, delivered to my door is about 4X the cost of an 8' heater available locally. Query 2. Anyone with experience believe the Hysdrosil is worth it. They offer a lifetime warranty. The electric strip heaters seem to last about 6-8 years. Any savings that way would be very slow in coming, as would be any savings achieved thru cheaper operating costs of the Hydrosil---if they truly are cheaper to operate. Thanks in advance---it would be wonderful if the answer to Query 1 was in the affirmative Roy
Our understanding when it comes to electric heaters is that with exception of whether they are buried in a floor, ceiling etc. which takes time to heat up and more slowly provide the heat to a living area, all heaters are 100 per cent efficient. In other words for every kilowatt of electricity that you put in you get a kilowatt of heat. In an electric heater it's got nowhere else to go; not like if you are burning fuel such as oil, gas, wood etc. where there is some inefficiency and some of the combustion heat goes up the chimney/vent! Very surprised; since none of our approximately 12 (230 volt) baseboard heaters which are all 35 years old has ever failed. Does the electricity supply in your area have a varying voltage? Over the last 15 years or so I have dismantled, resprayed, reassembled and reinstalled a couple of the metal baseboards. Am about to refinish the one in our front hall/vestibule, because it has become a bit tatty. Also got a couple of original heaters which we either didn't install or which we removed as unnecessary (for example we removed one on the basement stair landing and a small one in the hallway outside two bedrooms)! These are virtually brand new and are now unused spares. The total repairs for electric baseboard heat in this four bedroom full basement house have been one circuit breaker, and three AC line wall thermostats. Although one thermostat was changed due to redecorating not electrical failure. Very safe, very reliable and cost of repairs, in comparison to almost any other heating system virtually nil! With the advantage of individual room/area thermostats. BTW although I could have obtained baseboard heaters from my employer at a subsidized price we chose to go with GE type which has individual venting slots not much larger than the diameter of a pencil. We deemed these much safer than the open strip type electric baseboards which can allow bedclothes, other materials or childish fingers to contact the heating element. The choice seems to have been a good one. An associate has had a scorched bedcover from that other more open type baseboard, which fortunately did not cause a fire! Those wax-type crayons which melt can make quite a mess, so we are told, if/when they get into any type of electric heater! In a workshop and also in the garage we have a couple of old (commercial type) ceiling hung 3.5 kW 230 volt fan heaters, used occasionally. Good luck.
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