Why not heat my house w heat lamps?

If you have a super cheap alternative source of lots of electricity, or live in a very warm climate, NP.

Infrared is radiative heat, mostly only warms the objects exposed, only the side facing the source.

And clothing will insulate you from the radiation.

Very quick source though, for when you first come in from skiing to a bitter cold interior, stripping off your wet clothes with a cup of hot cocoa. Wave propane-fueled catalytic heaters are practical for that, where electricity is not cheap and plentiful.

For long term steady state heating, you want conductive - warming the floor and walls, e.g. hydronic circulation

And thus convective, getting the interior air itself warmed up.

Tile heaters as found in Scandinavian countries are a great example:

https://www.lowtechmagazine.com/2008/12/tile-stoves.html

In a mobile context, forced air furnaces like Propex HS2211 or diesel parking heaters are pretty quick and very fuel efficient.
 
There are much cheaper ways to heat an entire house but I have used localized heating in the past to good effect. If you are primarily in one place a heat lamp aimed directly at you can allow you to lower the temperature of the rest of the house quite a bit. More efficient though is warm clothes, a chair heater and heated mouse/keyboard.
 
I use one for workbench light/heat sometimes, and one on a timer for my cat during winter, but most people like to have the heat come on in the morning before everyone gets up, or staying an even temp at night, etc, when maybe extra light is just an efficiency hit.
 
Hummina Shadeeba said:
N get light too.

Back when I lived in Seattle, in places that only had electric baseboard heat, I realized that I could use as much light as I wanted for no extra electrical cost.

Seattle has unusually low electric rates, from mostly hydroelectric sources.
 
Chalo said:
Hummina Shadeeba said:
N get light too.

Back when I lived in Seattle, in places that only had electric baseboard heat, I realized that I could use as much light as I wanted for no extra electrical cost.

Seattle has unusually low electric rates, from mostly hydroelectric sources.

Are u saying u tapped into the heater wire and added a light in parallel?

Maybe speaking of a similar ideas someone I know, his dad in the 80s made a robot arm like Tesla has and it was powered off the water pressure from the kitchen faucet.it didn’t have electric motors just electric switches and balloons in mesh sheathes. I’m curious how a generator would go.

https://imgur.com/gallery/z0IDSz4

It’s silent and I don’t like hot air blowing. It’s ideal. Maybe point it back at the floor.

Is heating with the lamp more or less efficient than the gas powered air vent method that’s part of the house? My guess is it comes down to electric vs gas power. The bulb is so simple and direct while the gas heater requires a fan motor.
 
Hummina Shadeeba said:
Chalo said:
Back when I lived in Seattle, in places that only had electric baseboard heat, I realized that I could use as much light as I wanted for no extra electrical cost.

Are u saying u tapped into the heater wire and added a light in parallel?

No, I just identified that a watt of electrical heat in the house doesn't care where it came from. To keep the house at a fixed temperature, each watt consumed by a light bulb, toaster, computer, or vacuum cleaner replaced one that would have come from the baseboard heater, but didn't have to.
 
If you want cheap, and have access to lots and lots of wood (tree's, warehouse skids, saw dust, wood clippings) for dirt cheap or free living on some land, or neighbors not so nearby. Make a Biomass Gasifier hooked up to an engine which is hooked up to a generator. Not so environmentally friendly but you'll get electricity for dirt cheap for decades to come.

There are much cheaper ways to heat an entire house

If you have a super cheap alternative source of lots of electricity
 
Chalo said:
Hummina Shadeeba said:
Chalo said:
Back when I lived in Seattle, in places that only had electric baseboard heat, I realized that I could use as much light as I wanted for no extra electrical cost.

Are u saying u tapped into the heater wire and added a light in parallel?

No, I just identified that a watt of electrical heat in the house doesn't care where it came from. To keep the house at a fixed temperature, each watt consumed by a light bulb, toaster, computer, or vacuum cleaner replaced one that would have come from the baseboard heater, but didn't have to.

wouldnt a vacuum make less heat since some of the energy went to mechanical work? and a computer somehow also produce less heat per watt of electricity from the wall?


i never want to use a Biomass Gasifier. sounds awful.
 
Not unless your computer is a AMD Athlon FX :lol:
Especially the 9xxx series :wink:


Hummina Shadeeba said:
and a computer somehow also produce less heat per watt of electricity from the wall?

i never want to use a Biomass Gasifier. sounds awful.
 
Heat from a lamp is an inefficiency. If you're trying to reduce the inefficiency you want less heat from the lamp. So why would you WANT to use it for heat? You're turning the LIGHT itself into an inefficiency.

I work with light for a living. At the time they discontinued incandescent fixures (They are supposedly much better now) you would need some 1,600 watts, or more, from incandescent to get the amount of light that 1,000 watt quartz can produce. And the quartz quality is better. Then the 200 watt LED matches the 1,000 watt quartz. Again, better quality light, too. You can guess which gives you the most heat, right?

LED is much the same performance as HMI lights without the UV problem. (Unless there's something they aren't telling us.) Again, the LED is better light overall, a film camera would need to sync with HMI. But what do I mean by "Better light?" Is that more than just an opinion?

So the sodium vapor lamps give broad spectrum of light at low energy usage to beat LED's, but inhibit color perception. You might not recognize someone even in bright light from them. Police can't read license plates under sodium street lights. Mercury vapor lamps are not considered 'Flattering' on humans because of color distortion.

So I might wind up using any of this on a set for a specific look, but mostly I've used quartz over my entire career. Probably would mostly use LED's in the future. Using the energy for the intended purpose is a good thing, so why should I let the light create unnecessary heat? I can put gels on it for a different look.

And a dedicated heating unit if there wasn't enough coming off the lights.

And there are worse things than using a biomass gassifier. Such as having no heat or power at all in an emergency, which is why FEMA promotes people being able to build their own gassifier.
 
Hummina Shadeeba said:
wouldnt a vacuum make less heat since some of the energy went to mechanical work? and a computer somehow also produce less heat per watt of electricity from the wall?

It's all heat. Moving air, moving data, whatever. When the accounts are settled, all the heat is in the room, unless you go out of your way to blow it outside.
 
My opinion:
To use heat lamps in order to get light and heat is feasible, but usually happens that the light points position is not the optimal for a heat source and viceversa. So most cases it is more efficient to have them separately.
 
Wait can someone tell me this basic thing: isn’t all the electricity going into a bulb either turning to heat or light? If so I don’t see how an incandescent bulb would be inefficient at producing heat as I think the energy in the actual emitted light is very small.

Also wouldn’t some electrical appliance that’s doing work or maybe even a computer be less efficient at producing heat as the electricity is going towards other things than heat and light?


And..I still am wondering if heating with a bulb would be more efficient or maybe cheaper than the burned gas with forced air through vent heating my house has.
 
https://endless-sphere.com/forums/download/file.php?id=242231&mode=view
my favorite heater is under the kitchen table :bigthumb:
it radiates heat like magic - it curls up, warms my legs, chest, and on to the table. i only use it for 10-15 minutes at meals - gets too hot if i leave it on longer. around 745 watts on 120v
 
Matt Gruber said:
https://endless-sphere.com/forums/download/file.php?id=242231&mode=view
my favorite heater is under the kitchen table :bigthumb:
would that be as efficient as a lightbulb? why or why not?

I’m not trying to be efficient as possible just figure what is so I understand what’s what. Rather use the bulb for its silence and lack of hot air blowing
 
:bigthumb: silent and no fan :bigthumb:
under the table you get convection, radiation, and some conduction. BUT could burn a pet!
it is just a spare GE oven element normally 240v, but i use it on 120v.
i don't try to heat the whole kitchen, so cost to run is pennies.
PS- i bake, but i don't broil. So it is just the upper element from my GE oven. So no cost :D well i did add an on/off switch 8)
 
Hummina Shadeeba said:
Wait can someone tell me this basic thing: isn’t all the electricity going into a bulb either turning to heat or light?
Yes nearly all anyway.

The primary function of most is the light part

the heat is inefficiency, unwanted in summer if you are using energy to cool the space down.

> If so I don’t see how an incandescent bulb would be inefficient at producing heat as I think the energy in the actual emitted light is very small.

Actual infrared heat lamp bulbs is better if that is your intent, but see my post above as to the limitations of radiant heat

plus electricity in 99.99% of locations on the planet is **totally** unsuitable for producing enough heat for a living space, if energy efficiency or budget are at all a concern.

> Also wouldn’t some electrical appliance that’s doing work or maybe even a computer be less efficient at producing heat as the electricity is going towards other things than heat and light?

Again, the heat production **is** the inefficiency, people above were joking about that.

> And..I still am wondering if heating with a bulb would be more efficient or maybe cheaper than the burned gas with forced air through vent heating my house has

Totally different type of energy source, so the term "inefficiency" gets a lot muddier.

But no, directly burning any fuel will be 100x cheaper and more effective for heating a living space than first creating electricity, then transporting it long distances (**huge** losses most of it wasted).

Unless you live in Iceland, have your own wind farm, live someplace Amazon/Microsoft/Google or a Bitcoin mining operation would place a server farm, energy from big hydro dams, geothermal turbines sources like that.

But these are 0.01% of human-settled locations on the planet.

Passive solar combined with super-insulation is the really best way to go if you are constructing from scratch

I have designed and/or built many homes along those lines, eliminated between 75% and 95% of the need for active energy inputs, both heating the space and water.

 
An old logging mechanics trick.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBlD0WrFMKE

Another way to cheap out on heat.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jck4NbidhbY

Or make your own if you gots the math skills.
https://www.fasttech.com/product/4239200-authentic-ud-nichrome-heating-wire-for

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qn7pDrjZpgw
This was a good laugh " R G 7 months ago Soooo, you still need to wear a wolly hat indoors then."

Personal geothermal piping is another way to heat the house.

Proper design of home architecture, window placement and sun path is another way to heat a house.

Lots of people are building their homes under dirt to help retain heat or cold.

I had in floor heating and it was good, but I was also in a condo that was pretty well sealed up nice. I dont think I ever really turned the heat up at all except in -40C weather.
 
Hummina Shadeeba said:
Wait can someone tell me this basic thing: isn’t all the electricity going into a bulb either turning to heat or light? If so I don’t see how an incandescent bulb would be inefficient at producing heat as I think the energy in the actual emitted light is very small.

Also wouldn’t some electrical appliance that’s doing work or maybe even a computer be less efficient at producing heat as the electricity is going towards other things than heat and light?


And..I still am wondering if heating with a bulb would be more efficient or maybe cheaper than the burned gas with forced air through vent heating my house has.
Don't matter how ya cook it, a watt is a watt. 1500W heater makes the same amount of heat as 15, 100W light bulbs. Old style incandescent light bulbs that is.

Depending on what you paying for utilities. Almost always cheaper to heat with natural gas then electricity.

To save money on heat. Try some warm clothing and a hat. That's what I am wearing as I type.
 
I think kwh/month tells you real world costs.
had a very cold Dec here in central FL. heat needed every day. i heat my favorite room which is 11x14' to 70-72F -24/7, the other rooms get heat only as needed. used 350 kwh for 31 days. cost $37.92 inc base fee of $5.65.
2019 was more typical of Dec in FL, used 255 kwh for 34 day bill. just under $28 :D
Anybody with lower heat costs, please post your numbers and fuel type :bigthumb:
 
Not sure if you own your house, if you do, the best way to heat your house is insulate it better. I'm lucky, live in the south, but at high altitude so we do have real cold in the winter. My house has no gas line, no propane, so its all electric. The first winter we paid out the ass for heat, it was quite a shock. That spring we blew a lot of cheap insulation into the attic, and it cut out heat and cooling bills by more than half. The next thing we did, was stop running the central furnace except for an hour or so in the morning. After that, our go to electric heater is the portable electric radiator. No noisy fan, just an element in an oil filled radiator. We heat the room we are in, thats it. We have electric blankets on the bed, so if the house is cold all night we are fine with that. We cover the bedroom windows with sheets of foam board at night, once its below freezing at night.

Lastly, we noticed the warmest room was always the living room, which has a large window facing south east. On either side of that window, I attached a simple 2x2 frame to the wall, and screwed a sliding glass door to that frame. A hole in the wall to the inside on the top and the bottom created a solar thermal panel. The vents are covered at night, but if the sun comes out, I open them in the morning. Cold air from the floor enters the panel, gets quite hot, and convects out the top vent. This also circulates the air in the whole room. A sunny day with a high of 50f, gets me 80f in the living room. Very nice. A 40f day tends to be cloudy here, so it doesn't work while the storm goes through so great. But we get 4 -5 sunny days a week here, most of the winter.

Re light bulbs, even LED lights do make some heat, and old fashioned lights like a halogen make lots of heat. I have used such lights to gently warm a porch full of plants on the really cold nights. But in that case, the light is actually wasted heat. Most efficient, is again, electric blankets, electric radiators, and such.
 
I have ducted aircon in my house. And the unit works in reverse too. In fact it's more efficient as a heater than as a cooler. It pulls 4000 W at full tilt; that's cooling a hot house down from about 32°C to about 25°C. Split systems are more efficient still, but more expensive to install. The coefficient of performance is about 3 to 1, so for every kWh of electricity it uses, it produces 3 kWh of warmth by extracting warmth from the air outside.

Light is the tiniest proportion of my home energy use. Heating and cooling is #1 and charging the EV is #2. If you needed serious brightness in the home, you could use floodlights and heat will be a free byproduct. But those radiant heaters are okay too. Better in humid air though.

But I have 6.6 kW of solar on the roof and an 18 kWh battery with a hybrid inverter. So we draw virtually nothing from the grid. And these past few weeks in Perth have been pretty hot, so it's been nice to run the AC all through the night and never touch the grid. That will change come the dead of winter though, when we'd be lucky to generate 12 kWh in a day.
 
marty said:
Hummina Shadeeba said:
Wait can someone tell me this basic thing: isn’t all the electricity going into a bulb either turning to heat or light? If so I don’t see how an incandescent bulb would be inefficient at producing heat as I think the energy in the actual emitted light is very small.
Don't matter how ya cook it, a watt is a watt. 1500W heater makes the same amount of heat as 15, 100W light bulbs. Old style incandescent light bulbs that is.

Okay, the REAL story. Heat from any light source is thermal loss, same as heat from your electric bike is thermal loss. It is an inefficiency, only a pure accident that it also is useful in a cold house. Any light from a heat source is light loss, an inefficiency. More light, less heat.

A 1500w heater makes MUCH MORE heat than 10-100w lamps. How much more depends on the type of lamp. The old style incandescents would produce so much more heat and less light, which is why they are gone. Your car headlight produces I think as much light as a 60w incandescent would, but it's not as hot. Because it creates the light on lower wattage and doesn't waste as much on heat.

Matt Gruber said:
https://endless-sphere.com/forums/download/file.php?id=242231&mode=view
my favorite heater is under the kitchen table :bigthumb:
it radiates heat like magic -

Low is the best place. Because they just keep expanding at higher and higher temperatures, the warm air molecules are pushed upward by the denser cool air. High pressure front in weather is cold air, a low pressure front is warm air.

The air at the floor is warmed and rises as the cooler air settles to the floor, then is warmed and rises. This is a wave effect, causes desertization in Texas, New Mexico, etc. But makes Mr. Grubers' heater very effective. If I was having a house built, I'd want heating from below and air conditioning from above.

marty said:
Depending on what you paying for utilities. Almost always cheaper to heat with natural gas then electricity.

To save money on heat. Try some warm clothing and a hat. That's what I am wearing as I type.

I don't heat my house anymore. I run an electric coil with a fan on the floor for a bit at night and have warm air when I go to bed. I replaced the 60 gallon gas water tank with a 19 gallon electric that's the biggest 120v they have while ramping up for solar power and a 240v connection for the water to go tankless and run at a third of the cost of a tank, but things kinda went buster for me and that's on hold.

And doesn't cooking give off so much nice heat. More than lights. Still not enough.
 
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