Infrared heaters: any good?

A towel rail suggests you want to store and dry towels on.

How do you propose to achieve this with an IR heater ?

I don't propose anything 🙂

So you can't stick towels on an IR heater then? That would be a negative mark I suppose.

The pictures on this link would suggest that storing towels is possible.

https://www.herschel-infrared.co.uk/product/select-xls-infrared-towel-heater/

We have one in the kitchen and above the dining table, both on the ceiling. They are absolutely brilliant, they feel much more comfortable than normal radiators, and use much less power to achieve a nice warmth. The one in the kitchen (3m x 4.5m) is only 800w, but keeps the room very cosy when on, and more importantly only takes a few minuets to achieve a nice warmth from cold. I will 100% be getting an IR panel in the bathroom when it comes to redoing it.

Have that ^^^ exact heater in our kitchen and its brilliant. We only installed one of the rails due to location by a cupboard, but would be great in a bathroom for towels. It dries teatowels quickly but also heats the room, unlike a traditional towel rail where the towel stops any heat escaping.

Well worth it in my opinion. We also have another panel for mounting above the stairs when we get around to finish painting

Thanks folks, that sounds quite positive!

We'll have to get hunting for something with integrated towel potential within the same ballpark of price as the cheapo towel rail I had in mind 😉

That Herschel one only heats 6-12 square metres, so only flat surfaces.

That Herschel one only heats 6-12 square metres, so only flat surfaces.

Only flat surfaces?

That's humour, that is.

Rooms are usually cubic metres...

@epynt I've been wondering about real life experience of these things. Thanks!

I hope you don't mind me asking:
1) Is the panel the only form of heating in the area you use it?
2) Possibly difficult to tell from your set-up (since both panels are on the ceiling), but is the warming effect lessened by distance?

Ta!

The only other heating source in the rooms with the rads are wood burners. A wood cooker in the kitchen, and a stove in the other side of the lounge. We don’t have any central heating so the IR panels were put in to heat the spaces directly beneath them quickly when we don’t have a fire going. They do this job beautifully, although the 300w panel above the dining table is undersized. I will be moving this one to my garden office when it is built and replacing with a 800w panel.

The warming effect is massively reduced by distance. Stood underneath the 800w panel in the kitchen, it feels like the lovely warmth of a late summer setting sun on the nape of your neck. I don’t think you’d be able to feel much directly at floor level tho. This doesn’t stop it being effective at raising the temperature of the whole room.

Costs aside, I wouldn’t hesitate to use IR panels to heat the entire house. No noise, reduced dust, no maintenance, near instant heat. What’s not to like?

This video does a good job describing how a full IR heating system works.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0Nb5AfCh0GI

Didn’t realise IR had come so far. I was assuming it was all the type of things in smoking shelters.
And I put the signs on the Herschel office/warehouse. I should have asked a few more questions. 🤦‍♂️

Thanks so much @epynt interesting feedback.

I was thinking that I would use panels in conjunction with the central heating: The CH would be basic 'frost protection' style heating, keeping the house warm enough so we don't have to wear coats inside/the house plants don't die, but the IR panel would heat specific areas where we sit in the evenings and possibly above the beds.

I've no idea if that would save money or not to be honest!

I bought 2 far infrared panels earlier this year. 700w each. I'm using them for localised portable heating rather than having them fixed anywhere permanent at the moment, so if I'm sat in a chair watching the TV I can prop up panel up near by and heat me rather than turning the central heating on. Wi-fi connected so I can alter the temp and timers remotely. The only thing that is slightly annoying is I can't turn the beep or the backlight off so if I use it in the bedroom and programme the panel to turn on before I'm awake it beeps on activation and a led light lights up the room which wakes me up 😭.
A full winter review might appear here next spring.

Sounds good @retrorick. What make are your panels?

Panels I purchased are Electriq 700w. From a company that imports and sells them in Yorkshire.
I think if I bought again I'd get a glass panel and a picture version.

I used a 2kw fan heater for warming the bathroom up this morning. It just needed a quick blast from the landing whilst I was in there. Noisy compared to the IR panel.

Just looking at these for our bungalow. We have no heating at all in the (pretty small) bathroom so maybe one of these on the ceiling or a mirrored one may be useful. And one in the living room either wall or ceiling mounted. There seem to be a lot of positives about them - no condensation being a big one. Has anyone who has used them got any negative feedback?

Ours is in a cold corner of the living room where MrsF's desk is. They are good for heating you and not everything else - used as a top up if MrsF WFH. If you want towels on one, then a standard panel isn't ideal.  Not so sure how good they are at heating an empty room - probably OK ?

I use a 350W one in my (roughly 2x2m) garden office.  The main disadvantage is that it takes a while to really warm up - say 30 minutes or so to feel the heat radiating off it. So when it's properly cold, like this morning, I give myself a 10 minute blast from a fan heater to kick-start the day.

That might be unique to my situation - other brands (mine is 'PION' branded) might heat up quicker, and I bought slightly below the minimum recommended power for the space (which works well in a switch-it-on-and-leave-it-alone way, but limits how quickly you can bring things up to temperature).

I'd say in a bathroom it depends how you want to use it.  If you want to heat the room up to a chilly-but-usable temperature and hold it there, then it would be perfect. The radiant heat does allow you to be comfortable at an air temperature slightly lower than would be ok without it. OTOH, if you want to keep the bathroom cold most of the time and just blast some heat in when you're in there, then something like a fan heater might work better.

I have memories of my nan having a bulb in her bungalow bathroom in tbe 70s that gave off heat. Was that early IR tech?