HI guys,
Can anyone give a guestimate of how much power the heating elements of a typical condensing tumble dryer use up on a) low and b) high power? I'm not concerned with power used up by the motor and control circuitry, just the heater coils. Cheers. cd.
If you are talking about a conventional one, no-one can say, you would have to measure it with one of those plug in meters. Some librarys lend them out.
Condensing tumble dryers use much less electricity. Or just hang your washing outside/in conservatory etc.
In article , Cursitor Doom writes
Look at the spec plate, every appliance has one.
Alternatively, look at sample model data on the manufacturer's website.
A 'typical' tumbly is 1kW low & 2kW high. YMMV.
Try Googling for "tumble dryer element". The suppliers normally quote the power on the website.
Cheers,
Colin.
Normally 1 to 2kw depending on the setting.
Usually they use more... and extra kWh per load is not uncommon. However, the heat is then vented into the building rather than outside of it, which changes the apparent cost somewhat.
The OP asked about power not energy (maybe the answer would have been the same for a typical domestic dryer).
Harry went on to mention "electricity" I don't know if that is power or energy.
I'm guessing Harry was confusing "condensing" with "heat-pump".
Cheers,
Colin.
Well the 1 to 2kw estimates some peeps have made do fit in with my observations. I have two 42 ohm coils and according to which topology I choose, I can wire 'em up to provide between about 600W and 2.3kw. I just needed an approximate idea and how I have one, thanks!
My Beko DCU 8230 condenser is 4.7kWh full load cotton, 2.5kWh cotton partial load. Various efficiency figures are given, all above 89%.
I wouldn't consider it to be a particular eco-hooligan - it's rated 'B' and has lower running costs than the feature equivalent Bosch. And it was less than half the price.
Presumably that includes the power taken by the motor under heavy load, though. We need to strip that part out to make your findings relevant to original question which was related to the power consumption of the heating coils alone.
Ah yes probably - I'm just reading the 'energy consumption' figures from the card supplied. Even so, that's quite a lot from the motor.
To find out the power from the kWh figure you have, you'd need to divide by the number of hours the machine takes to do the drying.
It'd have to be more than an hour and a half to use up 4.7kWh since the maximum allowable consumption from a 13A plug is about 3kW.
Cheers,
Colin.
Indeed, which is why I quoted typical power figures.
I took it to mean "energy". However as a statement it was wrong on both counts, hence why I replied. The power consumption will in general be either the same or higher, and the overall energy consumption (by the appliance) is higher.
The win with a condensing dryer is where all the "waste" heat goes. With a conventional vented dryer you may pay for 4kWh per load, and the lions share of that is thrown outside. With a condensing one, you will likely pay for 5kWh, but all that is then dumped into the house.
I have the worst of both worlds - a condensing washer-dryer. I get to buy more energy and then pump it down the drain...
Cheers,
Colin.
Does it not vent the actual heat to the room then?
Not as far as I can tell. Having a ready supply of water and a drain, it takes the easy option. It uses some kind of waterfall arrangement to do the condensing and then dumps the water when it gets too warm. It spends the whole drying time periodically filling and pumping.
Cheers,
Colin.
I'm no greenie but all those watts are spent needlessly, so a realistic definition of efficiency would give zero.
NT
That probably makes the condensing phase a bit more efficient... but whether its enough to compensate is a harder call.
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