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space heater efficiency

While on the subject of energy use, let me ask about space heaters. Can a ceramic type really be more efficient than the glowing wire-element type? The wire type loses a bit via light, but that must be very little. Otherwise all the electricity is converted to heat, right?

Real losses can come from the fan, and from any motor that makes the heater oscillate this way and that. But how can ceramic be better than wire?

Besides all of that, I don't quite get the benefit of warming up an oil-filled radiator - which is a whole different kind of model.

(Thanks for all the replies to my previous post (on laptop power consumption.))

Reply to
RJ_32
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A space heater of any type is the only 100% efficient device known to man - after all, ALL of the energy it consumes winds up as heat one way or another, and that's the point, right? ;-)

Bob M.

Reply to
Bob Myers

Any heater is 100% efficient. The energy doesn't go to any other form, and if it did, it is miniscule.

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Reply to
Peter Hucker

NO. All energy becomes heat eventually including that red light.

NO. The motor gets warm and supplies heat too.

There is no benefit other than it has thermal inertia. Takes longer to warm up, longet to cool down.

So all electric heaters in a closed room supply exactly the same amount of heat regardless of type.

Graham

Reply to
Eeyore

That is a drawback, not a benefit.

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Reply to
Peter Hucker

Tell that to a storage heater.

Martin

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Reply to
Fleetie

Those are the stupidest invention ever. Completely uncontrollable. If someone invented a perfect insulation, then they may have a use.

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Reply to
Peter Hucker

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