Choosing a new dryer

Re: Choosing a new dryer

Hi Chris,

A few things…

Where did the figure of £60 come from and how was that figure arrived at?

There’s a lot of disinformation out there concerning energy labels. 😉

The best advice on energy use possible we give in the brochure, don’t use a dryer to dry clothes if you can possibly avoid it.

Vented -v- condensor is an old debate and, regardless of which you use they are not exactly eco-friendly. There are however pros and cons and, IMO, vented is the way to go.

To get a A rating on a dryer there’s two possible ways…

1. Take hours upon hours to dry, you may as well hang them on a clothes rack or whatever.

2. You use a heat pump type affair, effectively a refrigerant system in reverse. This involves substantial extra cost, complication in execution, weight and cost in production which will, in all likelihood never be paid back in use unless there is substantial use of the dryer and this is unlikely in a domestic situation. Fine in a commercial laundrette or whatever situation but, for domestic use given the current technologies, not a preferred route.

HTH

K.

Re: Choosing a new dryer

jat63 wrote:Do these figures look Ok or am I missing something?

Yes.

The amount of electricity that you actually use will vary dependent on the load, the load size and the dampness and this is especially so with sensor dryers which, by their very nature, are designed to minimise the use of electricity.

You can’t calculate that as it will vary from load to load.

Therefore, a direct comparison isn’t really possible other than a theoretical one based on the doing the same load, with the same level of dampness, under the same conditions repeatedly and consistently. Obviously this is not possible in real world use.

The examples that any manufacturer will give you are just that, examples carried out, usually under optimum or typical conditions. It doesn’t mean that’s exactly what you’ll get every time.

I’m really surprised that Which? didn’t point that out as it’s so basic a premise to explain to people.

HTH

K.

Re: Choosing a new dryer

I didn’t realise that someone was comparing a heat pump dryer against the ISE dryers, that’s like, comparing apples and oranges really.

I think it’d probably be best to explain what heat pump dryers actually are and how they work and, if you Google “heat pump dryer” you can glean a load of info to back up what I’m about to say…

In a commercial, high volume situation they are very worthwhile as an investment, even if the maintenance costs are slightly higher but the savings are attractive enough to make it worth taking a punt on it commercially. In a domestic situation, the jury is out.

Domestic heat pump dryers have only been around for a few years and, as Steve has pointed out, they use what is effectively a basic air-conditioning type reverse heat pump type system. How well that works in the real world is up for debate, thus far I’ve not seen too much support or raving about how wonderful it is from the trade and the long term reliability is, as yet, a total unknown.

How well they work in adverse conditions, especially in terms of ambient temperatures, is unknown, to us at least.

The effect of shoehorning a refrigerant system into such a small space with loads of heat about is, unknown.

The costs to effect repairs or, even an average repair cost for this sort of system is, unknown.

With the unknowns, the chances of getting a long warranty (other than at great cost) is practically zero. In fact, if someone signed that off with an insurer they’d probably get fired for being stupid and, if not, they should be.

IIRC Andy Trigg reviewed the Electrolux version on Washerhelp and he (or his better half) wasn’t very impressed with it.

If you buy one however you do get a warm, fuzzy feeling that you’re doing something right for the environment and saving electricity.

Trouble is, they have a lot more bits in them and take a lot more to actually manufacture in the first place.

You never get a free lunch in energy terms I’m afraid.

As you may have sussed, I’m deeply unconvinced by heat pump based dryer technology as yet although I applaud the effort and wish it were a “magic bullet” cure for the problem of drying, I don’t really think it’s the answer. 😉

K.

Re: Choosing a new dryer

Thanks for all teh advice. So it basically comes down to this:

I may save up to £100 per year in electricity with the Siemens based on my loads.

Over the first 5 years both machines are covered by free parts and labour.
Over the next 5 years ISE will continue to cost zero and Siemens will start to cost – and that cost could be quite a lot.
After 10 years ISE will also cost but at a greatly reduced rate.

So basically if repair costs average less than £100 per year I am better off with Siemens and if more with ISE (I will have a repair fund of about £400 to start with after the first 5 years). At the moment the potential costs for this new type of machine are unknown and some parts could easily on their own use up 2-3 years of this saving potential.

Does this look closer?