Electric towel rail

Slightly surprised to hear this, but provided they are adequately sealed it shouldn't matter.

Not entirely surprising, as you can have a conventional towel rail on your central heating system, with an additional electric element for use when the heating is off in the summer. It's probably easier to supply one of those with the pipe connection holes bunged up than a dedicated, oil-filled one.

SteveW

Water filled? Really? Seems an odd choice especially when you consider a failing thermostat might cause boiling!

Brian

Question, what is the real point of a heated towel rail? It will surely only dry the bit on the rail. Brian

Yes but in the central heating ones they are not sealed up are they? Brian

Yes but in the central heating ones they are not sealed up are they? Brian

As long as there is an air-gap for expansion. Thinking about it, it would be quite possible for a towel radiator that has been fully bled to then be isolated at the valves - which won't happen with an electric only one.

SteveW

Mine is polished stainless steel. Think it came from TLC. Runs off the central heating. Many years old, and still fine.

Convection. Same way as any such rad works.

Well, one thing it does, apart from drying towels, is warm the bathroom.

I see now that oil filled towel rails, made from the most suitable metal are much more expensive than the mild steel, water filled variety. And for the larger, more accommodating sizes, many hundreds of pounds dearer.

But not much, if covered with towels. I have a rad too.

Depends on the details, though. Mine (on the heating) does in fact provide enough heat (although it isn't normally completely covered with towels, since we mostly use a separate shower room).

That doesn?t heat or dry much of a towel tho. Tho I spose it does heat or dry the middle of the towel which is where its mostly wet after use.

I have a large CH rad in the bathroom for fast heat and a fancy designer towel rail with an electric element and integrated adjustable thermostat on a time switch for drying/warming the towels especially in the summer. Installation instructions were to almost fill with water , heat up to max with bleed plug out for a while then top up and close bleed plug . I added a little fennox rad treatment as well !

My current towel rail is a small oil filled electrically heat one. It's switched on all the time. It not only dries the couple of towels it will comfortably hold, it warms the whole bathroom easily, even through a layer of toweling. It's just that I want a much larger one that will double as a clothes dryer.

That seems to be the type of towel rail that I've seen most of in my searches. To save a few hundred quid I might settle for one of those.

The heat output of a typical towel rail tends not to be sufficient to cope with the heat loss of the room in winter, unless you have a very well-insulated property.

Neighbour made the mistake of replacing a 600x600 double panel bathroom radiator with a towel rail as part of the bathroom refurn, and wife soon decided that the bathroom was too then cold.