I know that when you read the title of this blog – Home Heating using paraffin Inverter heaters, the word ‘paraffin’ alone, will conjure up those childhood memories of Grandad’s ancient paraffin heater running during long cold winters in his greenhouse and the lingering smell of paraffin which always used to follow, however before you hit the back button and leave, the paraffin inverter heaters I will be referring to here, are top of the range, ultra modern safe paraffin heaters designed and manufactured in Japan and of which are even far more safer to use than portable gas heaters using calor gas bottles, and open fires.
 | Inverter 5086 3.2kw Heater | |
 | Tosai-241 Paraffin Radiant Heater. 2.2KW Output | |
| | Zibro LC-2230 Inverter Heater |
A Global Energy Crisis is here and according to Cornwall Insight is likely to result in record breaking energy costs for the rest of the decade, and as a result of increased demand these inverter heaters have seen an increase in price of around £100 since 2022 with the current ‘best buys’ listed in the table above.
However with Electricity now costing 30p per KW/H on a standard Tariff then assuming you can find one, they will save more money than ever for properties with Electric Heating and more than recoup their initial outlay in the money they save on energy.
Many of those who are reading “Home Heating using paraffin Inverter heaters”, may be here out of pure curiosity, but those open minded individuals and savvy consumers who want to save money on their energy bills and who continue to read, will probably find that it actually saves them considerable amounts of money by switching over to paraffin heating for their domestic requirements, especially those trying to heat poorly insulated old buildings and those who are suffering from Storage Heater blues or indeed, are looking to substitute any form of expensive electric heating with something much more affordable.
For those readers with Gas central heating, lucky you!. This article is unlikely to be of any interest to you as you already have one of the cheapest forms of heating known to man – Mains Gas. However even if you have central heating, you may need additional heating in an extension, conservatory, loft conversion, caravan, garage or outbuilding where the cost of extending the gas central heating may not be economically viable or possible, so stick around, as paraffin heating may still also be of interest to you, and will work out far cheaper than installing extra radiators or the huge expense of running an electric panel heater, fan heater or oil filled radiator.
Using a Paraffin Inverter Heater can also work out a lot cheaper than using a traditional gas fire to heat a room. Despite the low cost of natural gas a lot of Gas Fires, even modern ones, can be extremely inefficient, often consuming as much as 6.4kw worth of gas just to produce 4kw worth of heat into a room, and some of the “living flame” gas fires are even worse than this, as the majority of produced heat escapes from the flue or up the Chimney.
So whilst Gas is one of the cheapest forms of heat, this usually only applies to very high efficiency Central Heating system boilers built in the last five years or so, and when compared to a Gas Fire, the increased efficiency of 99% offered by an Inverter Heater, compared to the 50% – 60% offered by an older gas fire, the small extra cost of paraffin or heating oil is more than offset by the wasteful, inefficient nature of the gas fire, making the Inverter Heater the cheaper form of heating one living room or an open plan area.
Home Heating using paraffin Inverter heaters will be of interest to those in rural or remote locations who don’t have access to mains gas, or households who currently use oil fired or LPG based heating systems, but the biggest savings by switching over to heating a home with a paraffin inverter heater will be to those using Economy 7 storage heating, Electric Central Heating or any form of electric heating appliances for their main heating, and this is where 30% – 70% savings can easily be made.
Home Heating using paraffin Inverter heaters
This is where my own experiences begin, I have a rural property which is outside of the mains gas area and doesn’t have any form of central heating, the property is insulated and has double glazing, however it suffers from one handicap, the fact that it has electric storage heaters. Those who have storage heaters will already know, that come winter they are extremely inflexible, increasingly expensive to run and by around 5pm or 6pm they have exhausted all of their useful heat and once night falls, the room rapidly becomes cold. Electricity is supplied on Economy 7 or Economy 10 tariffs, and although these tariff’s give you seven to ten hours of cheap overnight electricity, the cost of the Electricity during the normal day (peak) periods is significantly more expensive than on a standard non economy 7 tariff. Up to three or four times higher per unit in fact!.
This means, that when the Economy 7 storage heaters inevitably run out of heat, by around late afternoon or early evening, or the weather turns unexpectedly chilly some other form of ‘top up’ heating is required which is often also electrically powered, such as a convector heater, panel heater, fan heater or oil filled radiator.
These types of heating appliance use extremely large amounts of Electricity and after several hours of use can soon work out to be prohibitively expensive, which then largely negates all of the savings made the previous night during the E7 / E10 period.
Consuming electricity outside of the overnight off peak period rapidly becomes expensive. This is because E7 customers with storage heaters are openly penalised for their cheaper overnight rates and will pay double or even treble the cost for their daytime Electricity compared to non E7 electricity customers enjoying standard single rate tariffs.
The electricity companies know all about the limited effectiveness of storage heaters and because of these limitations know that there is a very real possibility that the majority of their E7 customers will require some form of top up heating at some point during the evening especially during the coldest mid winter months, at the times when the most expensive ‘peak rate’ periods will apply, and so are laughing all of the way to the bank.
In other words they give a discounted overnight during E7 / E10 off peak period which looks very generous on the surface, but they then quickly snatch most of that generosity back by charging very expensive daytime ‘peak’ rates at double or treble the unit cost compared to non E7 customers on standard single rates. In addition, the discounted Off Peak rate of the Economy 7 period is also rapidly increasing, back in 2011 I was paying less than 5p per kw/h, in 2023 I would be paying 17p per kw/h (and some customers are paying as much as 24p per kw/h) – all far more expensive than mains Gas customers who pay 10.4p per kw/h all day long (Capped Tariff 1st October 2022)
Electricity prices will continue to rise due to UK reliance on expensive Gas for power generation, as do oil prices and LPG, minimum deliveries for both heating oil and LPG may also make fitting central heating boilers powered by these fuels unattractive. Fitting a wood burner is an ideal way of mitigating the ever increasing cost of Electricity, however this is not always suitable in some properties, and also for those living in flats, smoke free zones or who are renting their property from a landlord. Besides, demand for these (September 2023) is now so great, that you will be very lucky to get one fitted before this Winter.
During winter 2010, I was often paying over £100 a month in Electricity costs to heat a 1 bedroom flat, based on running 3 large storage heaters, which was around double the cost of heating a Three or Four Bedroom house with Gas Central Heating. When I arrived home from work late in the evenings I wasn’t feeling any real benefit from it either as the Storage Heaters had exhausted most of their stored heat, and during the coldest winter months I still needed to plug in additional heating for several hours in the Evening just to be warm when reading or watching the TV.
Move forward to Autumn 2023, and I don’t doubt that the £100, I was paying for running Storage Heaters 12 years ago, would now be £300 – £400 a month, which is the reality that many are facing.
A quick calculation soon revealed the painful truth, in that for every hour I was running a 2.4 kw Convector Heater for top up heat during the Evenings, I was mitigating around 3 hours worth of Economy 7 cheaper rate electricity!!, because my Electricity cost during the peak period was 3 times the cost of off peak, so it didn’t take long for the Electricity company to claw back, nearly all of saving I had made on the discounted electricity which it had sold to me overnight, whenever I needed to run additional heating during the following Evening, which in Winter means this was happening almost 7 days a week.
Additional energy price hikes had also been announced for the second time in a year, and I could see the day when paying £700 a month in Electricity would become a reality. I began looking for alternatives to Electric heating, and stumbled across a forum for Boat Owners and static caravan dwellers, who had seemed to have found a solution.
I was introduced to a modern day, Japanese manufactured indoor Paraffin heater. This was no ordinary basic old fashioned paraffin heater like the ones my grandparents had once had heating their outside toilet , but a sleek, safe and odourless fan assisted paraffin heater, with a kw heat output exceeding that of most standard Electric heaters and being fan assisted it was also capable of heating a living area very quickly, and at a fraction of the cost of an Electric equivalent!.
I researched these paraffin inverter heaters further and traced their roots back to Japan, where central heating systems are rare, and where most Japanese families still heat their homes using these clever, safe and portable Paraffin / Kerosene fueled modern space heaters. They are also used routinely in Southern France & Italy, where they are so popular that dedicated pre-packaged containers of kero fuel are sold in most hypermarkets and DIY Stores.
At first my prejudice about paraffin heaters and memories of the lingering small of paraffin came back to haunt me, but I decided that the Japanese were a clever race, and had developed many modern designs as far as appliances and domestic equipment was concerned and as a Country they certainly wouldn’t be using Paraffin Heaters as their preferred, daily form of heating if it was dangerous or ineffective. Npower had also just written to me, announcing their latest price rises (for the fourth year running), I decided that anything to save me money over Npower’s E7 overpriced daytime rates was worth a go.
The manufacturer claimed that because their heaters had no external flue there was no heat to escape which meant that their paraffin heater was 99% efficient in turning fuel into heat, which was actually much more efficient than even a Gas Powered ‘A’ rated central heating boiler, and virtually the same 100% efficiency offered by direct Electric Heating. Unlike earlier paraffin heaters and Gas Calor heaters, this paraffin heater produced no obvious room condensation and had many electronic safety features which made it safe to use an everyday household form of heating, I was now convinced, so I ordered one.
The £250 that I paid for the Corona Inverter Paraffin Heater back in 2010, seemed a lot to pay for a portable space heater, especially one powered by paraffin, but it turned out to be an astute decision which in turn, eventually paid for itself over just one average winter, recouped entirely from the savings on Electricity.
The Paraffin Inverter Heater really gave me the best of both worlds, I could reduce my reliance on (and use of) the expensive to run storage heaters, and then instead of using the Convector Heaters on an overly expensive peak rate electricity tariff to top up the heat when I got in from work, I simply fired up the Corona Inverter Heater to quickly and efficiently deliver heat whenever I was at home, at around a third of the cost of peak rate Electricity.
I read that standard Paraffin / Kerosene fuel burning at almost 100% efficiency will produce at least 10kw of heat from every litre of Paraffin / Kerosene it consumes with all of that heat going into the room (its actually 10.3kw of heat per litre but lets not quibble). So lets do the maths, and let me actually prove the savings to you from my own personal experiences.
I currently buy Electricity during the ‘peak’ periods from Npower, at around 21 pence per KW/H (Edit: This would now be around 40p / Kwh in October 2023)
I originally bought Paraffin from a local allotment society for 70p a litre. I get 10kw worth of heat from each litre burned which brings down the price for heating to 7p per KW/H. (I now pay 5.3p per KW using standard home heating oil kerosene @ 53p a litre but i’ll get to that later)
My Corona Paraffin Inverter heater produces 3200 watts of heat, or 3.2kw so on its full setting, for one hours worth of use it costs 3.2 x 0.07p to run = 22.4 pence per hour to give out 3.2kw worth of heat at almost 100% efficiency, enough to heat a fairly large living room or open plan lounge-diner very quickly.
To run an Electric Convector Heater rated at 3000 watts (3.0KW) it would consume 3 electricity units every hour, which (back in 2010) would cost 3 x £0.21 units per hour to run – so £0.63 per hour to run a single 3kw heater when using peak rate electricity. By using a 3.2kw Corona Paraffin Inverter heater instead of a 3KW convector heater, actually saves me £0.406 per hour in real terms – cold hard cash!, plus I get an extra 200 watt worth of heat from the 3.2kw Paraffin heater over the 3kw convector, which isn’t a lot, but does add up over a period of running during a typical evening (an extra 1kw worth of heat for every 5 hours it runs to be exact)
So by using the Corona Paraffin Heater during the Evenings for an average of just six hours at a time, saves me £2.43 in heating costs per night, just by changing the way that I heat the room and the fuel that I use to do it, and trading Peak Rate Electricity back to good old fashioned Paraffin, burned in a state of the art heater.
Couple this with an average of 10 hours worth of use per day (when home at the weekends) and that saving adds up to £4.06 per weekend day, so the potential saving by using paraffin adds upto £20.27 per week (£2.43 x 5 nights + 2x £4.06 per day at the weekends) – that’s an amazing £81.08 per MONTH in savings from my own usage pattern, just by turning the convector heater off and the paraffin heater on, and avoiding the use of expensive Electric heating.
The figures speak volumes, and in just three winter of average use during the Winter, i’ve effectively recouped the cost of purchasing the inverter heater and beyond that point, the savings are in my pocket for many winters to come!, and the money is far better in my pocket than those pockets belonging to the shareholders of the expensive utility companies!.
So there you go – what more can I say? other than that I paid off the original outlay for my paraffin heater during the first half of its first winter, meaning that the savings that I am getting at the moment – upto £81.08 a MONTH are now mine to keep as the paraffin inverter heater is still going strong, and still saving me money, and the room is lovely and warm, I have made no other sacrifices to do it nor had to turn down any thermostats or put on extra layers of clothing or huddle under throws!. As a result of switching to an Inverter Heater my £100+ monthly winter E7 Electricity bill is a nightmare from the past and has dropped to a more manageable, summer-like £25 – £30 a month, now i’m no longer using it for heating. In fact so sudden was my drop off in usage during the first few months that they sent out somebody to check my meter!!.
It is even possible to obtain paraffin far cheaper than the initial 70p / litre example I gave and so stretch those savings further, but i’ll move onto that shortly. Also bear in mind that the savings and comparisons I made are for one heater in a small flat, if you have the requirement for more than one electric heater, and replace it with paraffin the total savings will increase even further by using a Paraffin Inverter Heater, in place of each Electric Heater, noting that the heaters are also portable and easily carried by one person, so it is possible to move it from room to room, living room to bedroom or even to the shed or caravan, and these heaters are also ideal for heating a conservatory, where Electricity has previously been the only option.
These heaters are also ideal for Tenants, as they are portable appliances and require no expensive installation or landlord permission, simply unplug them and take them with you to your next property, just the same as you would with any portable Fan or Convector heater.
Lets examine the features of the Corona Paraffin Inverter heater.
Safe and Reliable, being 99% efficient and having no external flue or chimney means 99% of the heat produced from the fuel actually goes into the room, not out of the flue. Far more efficient than portable gas heaters, LPG fired central heating, older gas fires and virtually just as efficient as more expensive electric heating, but at 50% – 75% of the cost – FACT.
Portable – requires no installation or outside flue, just fill with paraffin / kerosene and plug it in to a standard mains socket
Has flame failure sensors, CO2 detection and switches off if it falls over or is knocked, making it far more safer to use in the house, shop, workshop or office than conventional Gas Bottle heaters, open fires or newer Bio Ethanol fires.
Produces little, if any condensation, unlike earlier paraffin heaters and gas bottle calor heaters
Little servicing or annual maintenance, and no service contracts, safety checks or repair bills – just an occasional fuel filter clean.
No wicks to replace or trim (Inverter model)
Fan assisted for rapid room warm up (Electric Fan requires 22 watts of Electricity, about the same as an energy saving light bulb)
Digitally Thermostatically controlled, which switches to a paraffin saving eco mode (800w) when the room reaches the selected temperature. In Eco Mode the heater will run for an amazing 45 – 48 hours on one fill of fuel.
Has a digital timer, set it to come on after work or before you get up in the morning.
Virtually odourless in normal operation. Just a quick whiff when starting / stopping.
Fan Assisted and Radiant Versions (which require no Electricity) available
The Paraffin Inverter heater is ideal for use in Conservatories, Porches, Outbuildings, Garages, Shed’s or any location where extending central heating is too costly, its also a very viable and cheaper alternative to very expensive normal indoor Electric room heating in bedrooms, living rooms, kitchens, loft conversions etc and in these applications it does stand to save the average household anything upto 40% – 50% off the cost of standard tariff electricity and a massive 75% off the most expensive E7 peak rate electricity tariff. In short if you are plugging in any form of Electric Heater on a regular or semi-regular basis, then replacing it with one of these inverter heaters WILL save you money – between 40% and 70% depending on your current Electricity tariff.
Finally, lets see how the cost of running the Corona Paraffin Inverter heater compares with other fuels (This update takes into account current prices in October 2023)
Paraffin Inverter Heater – 9.5p per KW (based on 95p / litre for small quantities of Heating Oil or Paraffin from a pump)
Corona Paraffin Heater – 8.3p per KW (based on 83p / litre for bulk purchased 28 second domestic home heating kerosene)
Average Economy 7 Daytime Rate – 40p per KW
Average Economy 7 Off Peak Rate – 17p per KW
Standard Single Electricity Rate – 30p per KW
LPG Central Heating (tank) – 16.5p per KW
LPG Central Heating / Gas Fire (bottle) – 19p per KW
Oil Fired Central Heating – 9.9p per KW (factoring in boiler efficiency / Flue losses)
Mains Gas – 6.9p per KW
Wood Burner – 8p per KW
Also compare the £2500 – £6000 installation cost of installing Oil or LPG fired central heating, or the average £3000 cost of a Wood Burning Stove with the low cost of the cheapest Paraffin inverter heater. Even if you bought four Paraffin Inverter heaters for use in a four bedroom house, it would still cost well under £1000, that’s almost a sixth of the £6000 average cost of fitting a LPG based central heating system, and the savings made on the outlay will buy a lot of Fuel.
As you can see, the Corona Paraffin Heater is worth considering as a portable, money saving room heating alternative to either Economy 7 or Standard Electric Heating, as well as LPG heating. Its also ideal as temporary heating for outbuildings or for using on Boats and Static Caravans where LPG may prove very costly. It is also ideal for supplementary heating in short term rented accommodation as no flue or building modification is required and being portable you can take it with you when you move.
First, let me state clearly that the Manufacturer of these heaters advise using only expensive prepackaged Class C1 Paraffin in these heaters, however outside of the UK, Paraffin is also routinely known as Kerosene and the fuels are virtually identical. Thus it would seem to be acceptable to burn cheaper 28 second domestic heating oil Kerosene instead of Paraffin, and stretch the savings and make it easier to obtain (Heating oil is also generally more readily available than C1 Paraffin).
In the UK, “Kerosene” is known and sold as 28 second heating oil, the same heating oil that home central heating oil fired boilers use. I have been buying and using standard 28 second heating oil in my heater frequently for over 10 years since my first purchase when this blog page was created in 2010, with no accidents, no fires, no spillage and more importantly no obvious adverse effects to either the heater or to myself from excessive fumes / odours as have many people leaving comments on this page, however you do this in your own heater at your own risk.
By buying heating oil kerosene from a local depot reduces my cost of the fuel from 70p per litre to 53p per litre, this means that the real cost of running my Inverter heater falls even further, from 7p per KW to 5.3p per KW – making it almost as cheap as mains gas, and even less than the cost of Economy 7 overnight electricity which my (useless) storage heaters use. You could probably reduce this to below 5p if you shopped around, and had the space to store a bulk heating oil delivery.
However, once again I must stress that if you choose to use domestic heating oil in your own heater instead of premium paraffin you do so at your own risk!. If you wish to stick with the manufacturers recommendations on fuel, it is still possible to buy the recommended C1 paraffin at 70p per litre, try contacting your local allotment society, and looking in the yellow pages for local oil and fuel brokers, or if you are happy with Heating Oil instead of paraffin, simply buy it in bulk from a heating oil supplier or from a friend / relative who uses heating oil fired central heating and a growing number of heating oil brokers have a self service pump available for small quantities.
For those who aren’t able to purchase small quantities of Domestic Heating Oil locally, we now have a growing list of Vendors who sell Heating Oil Online and offer delivery of small to medium sized containers directly to your door, with no large minimum order quantity.
For those who wish to continue to use the manufacturer approved premium paraffin in their heaters, Premium Paraffin can be purchased online using the vendors listed on our C1 Premium Paraffin Page, who offer a saving over buying the small 4 litre pre-packed containers from DIY Stores!.
If you do decide to use standard heating oil in your inverter heater, then I do strongly advise filtering the kerosene into the heater tank using a“Mr Funnel”. The Mr Funnel filter will ensure that any dirt and rust particles are removed from the fuel and that any trapped water caused by bulk tank storage is filtered out which ensures longer periods between cleaning of the heater filter and also prevents the heater from showing an “E4” error warning (which indicates water contamination in the fuel). You can buy a Mr Funnel water and dirt filter from Here
During the 2018 / 2019 Winter period I trialed a fuel additive product called Dipetane (which was mentioned by a few people over the years in my comments), with an open mind, I began adding 10ml of the additive to every 4L tank fill of Heating Oil. Despite my tendency to routinely consider all additives as snake oil, I actually noticed a significant reduction in carbon around the combustion chamber in all of my heaters when I did my service of them during the spring. So, Dipetane is the only additive which I would actively recommend for those burning standard heating oil in their heaters, and it can be purchased online from Here.
Finally, we all like to get a bargain and save money on the initial cost of buying a new heater and so I constantly search the UK and European inverter heater stockists in order to find the best deals every season. Obviously prices do change, as retailer stock levels and demand vary between the winter and summer months and to address this we now have a table below which is frequently updated with the current best offers.
| | Inverter 5086 3.2kw Heater | |
| | Tosai-241 Paraffin Radiant Heater. 2.2KW Output | |
| | Zibro LC-2230 Inverter Heater |
If you have any questions, comments or wish to share your own experiences in relation to using Paraffin / Kerosene for domestic home heating in these heaters, then please leave a comment. (You can also read hints and tips, as well as the experiences of hundreds of other Inverter Heater users in the comments below)
Hi Jerry, I imagine that there are laws against passing off regular heating oil as premium fuel these days, years ago some dodgy forecourts in rural areas used to “water down” diesel with Kerosene or mix in a bit of Red Diesel into their main tanks so i’m not surprised that “Which” found the same thing happening back in the 60s and 70s with burning oil but I think that has been stamped out these days. One way of comparing the two fuels these days is by looking at the MSDS Datasheet, and there are subtle differences, but not enough to make any real difference in the application that we use the fuel in, the biggest difference between the two is largely down to the odour removing process used to produce the premium stuff, but that is only really noticed when burned in lamps.
But at the end of the Day, it is all Kerosene. Premium Kerosene, Regular Heating Oil Kerosene, even Jet A1 which is used in Helicoptors and Small light aircraft will all happily burn in our heaters and the MSDS for them will all show the same CAS number for the base fuel, its just the amount of refining which changes between the different fuels, and Premium Kerosene or Premium Paraffin is just higher graded Kero, which has gone through an additional refining process to remove a lot of the odour, and the extra refining removes a bit more sulphur – not that there is a lot of Sulphur in any fuel to start with, due to strict EU regulations since the mid 90s.
There are still places selling Paraffin, which is actually 28 second heating oil. Again, they are the same thing – Kerosene is basically the American word for what we know as Paraffin. Prior to using Stoddards at Cheadle, I used to visit a Fuel Broker to buy my fuel. They had several pumps side by side, dispensing everything from Industrial solvents and Red Diesel to Heating Oil and paraffin. I used to buy three containers from the Paraffin pump and Three from the Kerosene pump, amazingly when decanted into two glass containers and placed side by side the two fuels were indentical in smell and colour and although I have nothing to prove it, I wouldn’t be surprised if both pumps weren’t fed from the same underground tank.
What Peter has described is basically a domestic version of the odour removing process, filtering through Charcoal, I believe, removes a lot of the odour and is clearly a cheap and easy DIY method of making Odour reduced fuel from domestic heating oil without the silly prices of the pre packaged stuff and so is well worth trying.
I was just about to buy another sre300 from bricobravo on ebay, and realised that it is not the same ebay seller that I bought from last year. The seller of the inverters on ebay is “bricobravo_eu”, while the one i bought the sre300 from in nov 2014 was simply “bricobravo”. “Bricobravo_eu” has no recent feedback, and looks like it has not traded since 2011, whereas “bricobravo” has feedback from this week. Confused!!! I may wait until feedback’s left for this company before I take the plunge.
You are right to be cautious but I think you are worrying unnecessarily. The company contact and address details on the Ebay (Bricobravo_eu) listing match those on the Brico Bravo website. They also list an email address of helpdesk@bricobravo.eu on this current Ebay listing and the WHOIS for the bricobravo.eu domain registration shows that it is registered to Brico Bravo SRL at their genuine trading address in Italy, a few months back.
Brico Bravo are a big company, a bit like Argos is in the UK, and I imagine *if* one of their old Ebay account from 2011 had been hacked or otherwise hijacked and populated with over 400 items by a person or persons unknown, they would be aware of it by now. Its really not that unusual for a large company to have multiple trading identities, and perhaps they have resurrected the old “EU” side of Ebay and registered the .eu domain in order to keep all of their export business separate from their domestic trade, especially given the whole sour grapes fiasco last year!. If nothing else the two different accounts would allow the various products to be listed with two different currencies and in two different languages.
If things did go wrong, then purchases done in the EU via Ebay & Paypal are just as protected as those done in the UK, so if the item is fake, poor quality or doesn’t turn up, then you can file a dispute, and get a refund just the same as you would from any other UK vendor.
Either way, there have now been 3 purchases for the heater on that listing, and no doubt with over 400 other items also listed, it won’t be long before recent feedback begins appearing. Give it a week or so, and i’m sure that we’ll see that its genuine.
just read this on description of sre 300 inverter.IMPORTANT! This kind of heater can work with any type or brand of liquid fuel (isoparaffin,it was on amazon under product description, mine should arrive this week,
it arrived this afternoon, filled it up with heating oil, pressed start and away it went, no smell at all as there is a deodarant light on it, its preset at 20 so ive left it alone, it went up to 20 from about 14 and its settled there, the fan not so vigorouse as when it was getting to 20deg, now do i just leave it at this, will it adjust automatically or have got to start messing with the ,save,min,auto buttons, i no if i want it higher temp i will have to adjust but 20 fine for me, it says on instructions to use kerosene, so guarantee might be ok on this, it even came with a euro plug adapter, very pleased at the moment,
Glad that it arrived OK, hopefully this will give peace of mind to others who want to buy from this listing too, it might be a good idea to leave feedback on E’bay once you are satisfied that its OK, as that is obviously what was causing the concern in Jerry’s post.
The SRE300 has various modes of operation, you can leave it set at the desired temperature, and once that temperature is reached, the heater will switch down to its lowest heat output (800w) but run continuously at a low fan speed keeping a low level of back ground heat which should hopefully keep the room at the set temperature, however it will automatically switch itself back up to a higher heat and fan output if the room should cool significantly below the set temperature. This is the mode that you have it set on at the moment.
Alternatively you can select “Save”, and the heater will automatically switch itself off completely once the temperature is reached, and then switch itself back on again when the temperature drops, this is similar to the cycling done by a thermostat in a conventional convector heater.
It all depends how much heat is lost from the room, I live in a 1890’s built poorly insulated farmhouse so in ‘Save’ mode the heater switches off and on every 5 – 10 minutes or so anyway – such is the huge heat loss from the fabric of the building, and so the frequent cycling on/off can become annoying and defeat the object of saving kero, so I leave it in Auto mode. In a better insulated building then “Save” mode may be better as it will only be turning itself on and off two or three times an hour, and of course when the heater is off, its burning no oil at all so that mode, will be much better in fuel saving (provided the room holds the heat long enough to make it viable).
I suppose you have to try each mode to see what works best for you, as every building is different.
I think the European retailers are a bit more open minded, or are turning a blind eye to the grade of Kerosene used in the heaters (Certainly the fuels our European counterparts are using is very variable with several French users professing to running them on a cheap Spirit based Solvent called Shellsol D60 as well as the aforementioned Jet A1 obtained from airfields), at least I don’t see the bold “Premium Paraffin Only” warning on the EU websites, unlike the UK retailers who have decided to add the warning this season. Whether running the SRE300 on ordinary heating oil will become a topic or issue if you try and return it back to Brico for any warranty work will be the acid test, so probably best to assume that it won’t be covered if it is used on Standard Heating Oil, however what is written in the user manual will of course be a useful ‘defence’ should that problem ever arise.
Hmmm, looks like the Ebay listing for the Inverters have now been removed although all of their other listings, for hundreds of other products remain, I guess the whole problem from last year has arisen again – I had a feeling that it would. Looks like you were right to buy when you did Peter.
its in the kitchen with a dog flap near it,dogs in/out all the time so ill leave it how it is, its kept it at 20deg since 3 oclock,front room open, ive let the multifuel stove go out and its keeping that room warm as well, it usually costs me 30 pound to heat one room with the multifuel stove 7 days a week and if I use calor gas or leccy 15pds to keep kitchen warm so aprox45 pounds for heating and aprox 20 pounds a week lecy for lights etc, so ill save 15pounds minus paraffin for one room and if it saves me 1 bag of coal a week theres over 10pouns saved,if I use a gallon a day 2.50 it will only cost me aprox 17.50 on full power which might heat kitchen and front room, so might save nearly 25/30pounds a week.just noticed like you said. advert on ebay ended,
This is my first time on this blog forum. Very informative and much appreciated.
I have a question – hope it is not a stupid one:
Once these paraffin heaters start up, I understand that you need a continuous supply of electricity to run the fan. Where we live, power outages are common. Would it be possible to hook up the paraffin heater to a UPS so when our power goes down, the UPS would supply the energy to run the fan?
Brian
Hello again, I bought an sre300 last night off ebay from the bricobravo_eu seller for £146 inc. delivery, and as you say, it’s now been taken off. It’ll be interesting to see if they honour the sale or cancel. It’s showing as ‘paid but not sent’ at the moment. They may have realised it’s not economically viable to include delivery at that price and are reassessing their options. We may see it back on with a £30 delivery charge or similar.
Hi Brian
Yes, it should be possible to run the heater from a UPS, the combined continuous wattage of the fan, fuel pump and control panel run to around 22 watts – 32 watts so its not a huge load, but the duration would of course depend on the size of the UPS, and the battery capacity / condition as to how long it would actually run for, under a power failure condition.
The Inverter Heaters do have a built in heating element, rated at around 600w – 700w which preheats the chamber when the heater is first switched on, to help with ignition and combustion from ‘cold’ (very similar principle to the glow plugs in a diesel car), this element only runs for less than one minute as a preheat though, and won’t be a factor if the outage occurs when the heater is already running. However you may like to size the UPS accordingly to at least 1000va – 1200va, just in case you need to start the heater from cold during a power failure.
I have friends who use an inverter heater in a caravan – powered from a 12v leisure battery and mains inverter, obviously there is a much higher capacity available from a large leisure battery but the UPS principle is the same, and their heater runs perfectly fine from this configuration.
Alternatively, there is also the radiant versions of the Kero heaters available, they lack the features of the Inverter Heater and are more basic, but they don’t require any mains supply at all.
ive had mine now 7 days, ive only used i bag of coal on woodburner so saved 16pds on coal and used 10pds heating oil aprox, so im at least 20pounds a week better off and warm, befor i used a wick paraffin heater, brilliant but only heated the room it was in, where as this blows it from kitchen to liveing room, e4 code on my model is when i knock it not fuel related so a few veriations on models. The air quality is normal as well where i use to worry on the other model i had but that never smelt either.
still cannot get more than about 14/16 hours out of a tankful no matter what mode its on, ie save min or auto if temp set to 21. now I can see if I set it low temp on save it would save fuel as it would not be on, in min it still goes to 21 and so does auto.so to get 40 odd hours out of a tankful do u set the temp very very low and put it on min.I can not see any benefit by doing that only to save fuel and no heating hardly.
Having just measured roughly what my SRE300 uses, using a glass measuring beaker, I can say that on its highest setting, running continuously it used approx 340ml, whilst on its lowest setting, again running continuously, it consumed a little over 100ml. These are slightly higher figures than the manual, which state 0.3L (300ml) per hour on high, and 0.07 (70ml) for low, but like MPG figures on cars, the real world consumption data, is probably going to be slightly higher than a lab environment, consisting of perfect conditions which will make up the figures used on the specification.
That said, even at my own measured consumption of 100ml per hour on the minimum setting, you should still get 40 hours of running time from the 4 Litre Tank if you are using nothing but the minimum setting, give or take an hour or so.
The figures that you are giving, indicate that the heater is running on its highest setting, and therefore consuming 300ml – 340ml of fuel per hour. This would give roughly 13 – 16 hours of running from the 4 litres in the Tank which is in the same ball park to the number of hours from a tank that you have found in practice.
Its reasonably mild at the moment, and i’m only running the heaters for a few hours in the Evening, and around 6 – 8 hours each day at the Weekend, and the 4 litre tank is lasting me around 5 – 6 days. Which would currently work out at around 30 – 35 hours from a 4 Litre tank, using a mixture of High and Low settings. 4 Litres of Kero currently costs me £2.24 (based on 56p per litre).
I just leave mine on Auto, on a temperature of between 19 and 21c (Depending on how cold i’m feeling), the heater runs for around 25 – 30 minutes at full power, and then switches down to minimum power automatically, where it remains for the rest of the evening (Unless I open an outside door and the room temperature drops).
You mention that the heater is able to reach the selected temperature of 21c even when running on its minimum setting?. If this is running on Minimum from cold, then something doesn’t sound right if its able to heat a room to 21c purely running on minimum – the minimum setting of these heaters gives 800 watts of heat, that’s 200 watts less than an old fashioned 1 bar Electric Fire.
Whilst 800 watts would probably be enough to maintain a constant temperature once the desired room temp had been reached, i’d be surprised if that was enough heat to reach 21c from switch on in a large room space. I suspect that for some reason, the heater is still running on its highest setting, which would confirm the number of hours that you are seeing from the 4 litres in the tank.
It might be worth, using a room size heat calculator entering in the actual room dimensions in order to actually work out how many KW of heat your room requires in order to heat it. You will get around 10KW worth of actual heat output, from every Litre of Kero burned in these heaters, so a room which requires 3kw per hour of heat energy input, would be heated for just over 3 hours using 1 litre of Kero.
The rooms it heats are a kitchen and liveing room aprox 25ftx18ft, it heats both of them perfect and maintains a temp of aprox 22 if set at 21, on save it goes out but comes on again after about 5mins as there as usualy the back door keeps been opened or large dog flap keeps been used so i dont use save,just auto, I dont mind it only doing 12/14 hours as it saves me loads of money and keeps bungalow warm,on min do i turn therm down to below 21 or just leave it,thank you.
Set the temperature to the setting which is the most comfortable, and leave it on Auto, the chances are that the combination of heating quite a large area and the opening door / dog flap mean that the heater is having to switch to a higher output on a frequent basis in order to compensate for the heat loss, hence the consumption.
The temperature of a room is a personal choice, some people are warm enough at 18c, others need the heating set at 25c. The idea of any thermostat is to set it at the lowest setting which is the most comfortable, this gives an ideal balance of saving money whilst keeping warm.
If in doubt, set the temperature to 18c or 19c, when this temperature is reached if you still feel cold, then increase it in 1c stages until the point where the room temperature feels comfortable.
I keep it now at 21/22 and the rooms are lovelly and warm and all for 2.50p a day, its a different kind of heat out of any paraffin heater, I find I never ache or stiff which at 67 is not bad,been using them for years but this one is brilliant and heats a much bigger area than others,
Had a good chuckle over Matt’s posting of 16 Feb 2014 in which he stated.
“There is a health hazard to use this device as the main source of heating”
It seems from his subsequent response that poor Matt twisted his words which should have read “Is there a health hazard…” which makes a world of difference to his posting.
I have been using an Investors 5006 in my home office for 10 years without fault but recently it has developed an E7 fault. Do you have any idea what this is as I can’t find any maintenance manuals online?
It was brilliant but had one fault. It would come on at full output for 20 mins before settling down to the temperature settings. This meant that I had to leave the door open for the first 20 mins otherwise it would overheat and cut out. Is this a common feature in all inverter heaters?
Many thanks for any help you can give
Hi Ian
I’d love to find a service / maintenance manual for an Inverter Heater – any Inverter Heater as it would be a bonus to be able to refer to it when giving advice here, but i’ve so far drawn a blank, even when approaching a specialist company whose business is to try and track down hard to find and obsolete manuals for appliances and Electronic equipment. I imagine that they are few and far between and only issued to Authorised Dealers (even if they exist outside of the manufacturer at all).
According to the 5006UK Manual, an E7 error is listed as “Trouble with Electrical Parts, Refer to your Dealer” – one of those non specific error codes, which could be anything internally and given the advice in the manual may as well be a “£££” sign!.
Interestingly an E7 error on another model is a bit more specific and leads to an overheating issue, given what you have said about your Inverter overheating previously if the door wasn’t open, i’m wondering if the thermal cut out inside the heater has perhaps tripped or failed. They look something like the component on the link below, and there may be one or more of them inside the heater to sense the running temperature and are designed to break the circuit and stop the heater if a certain temperature is exceeded. Usually they will be mounted on the internal metal work somewhere, either on the case, or on metal fittings close to the burner chamber. (On mine, its on top of the burner chamber outer skin)
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Thermal-Thermostat-Temperature-Switch-NC-or-NO-Range-from-50-C-to-150-C-/151084725893
Sometimes they have a small red or white button on them, which, if the temperature reaches an upper level, they will click out and open the circuit, requiring the button to be manually pushed back in to reset it. On other models they may be designed to reset automatically, but if the heater has been frequently overheating, it may have failed internally, and the circuit left open.
The other thing to do also, is to check any internal fuses, on the PCB inside the heater, if you have not done so already. The manual indicates that there are two 5a fuses inside the heater.
I’m not saying that this is the problem, but its worth looking at, given the vague advice given for the E7 error in the manual. Does the heater actually ignite and run, prior to the E7 fault?, or does it just not do anything but display the error code?.
I’m heating quite a large space, in a poorly insulated building, so i’ve not experienced any overheating issues in normal use as i’m probably needing the full 3kw, however i’ve read about others having similar problems when researching other faults for this blog. I suspect that its down to the design, as these heaters are made to heat rooms up to 120m3 – in fact the manual for the 5006UK advises a minimum room size of 67m3 – how does that compare with the size of the room where it is being used?.
I think a good feature for these heaters (which seems to be lacking on the 3kw and 3.2kw heaters), would be the facility to manually select the heat output using control panel buttons, a bit like a convector heater or oil filled radiator, so you could select 1kw, 2kw or 3kw heat output directly from switching on, and it would maintain that setting until its put back to Auto or another setting is selected, this would prevent the heater starting off and running continuously at full power and being too powerful for a smaller room. My SRE300 does have the facility to manually select the minimum setting, but that only gives the option of (low) 800w or 3000w (high) and nothing inbetween until it reaches the set temperature, and 800w is not enough to heat a room from cold.
I’ve the SRE300 at my workplace which heats up a 4.5m x 3m x 2.5m room and so far no issue over the past 2 years running it on regular kerosene, using a Mr Funnel as advised here.
On my heater, the ‘Min’ setting seems to run it on a reduced output rather than 800 watts. For example, if I set the temperature to 30C, its fan goes faster and produces noticeably more heat than with its temperature very low, e.g. 10C where its fan is barely audible. I assume this is what the 1890 watts refers to as its maximum heat output is not as strong as when on the Auto setting.
I did a test run this morning, which also gives an idea of how quickly it heats up this chilly room and had it set at 30C to force it to run at maximum output. I included the humidity readings to show it doesn’t have the problem I previously had with a Calor gas heater, where reading quickly went above 80%, steamed up windows and damp paper caused printer paper jams!
10:00am – 14.2C 58% – Heater switched on ‘Auto’, Window open.
10:15am – 16.2C 51% – Window closed just before this point.
10:30am – 19.2C 53%
10:45am – 20.6C 48% – I set the heater to ‘Min’ at this point.
11:00am – 20.8C 49%
11:15am – 21.1C 49%
11:30am – 21.4C 49%
When I lowered the temperature at 11:30am, its fan slowed down and the temperature fall back to about 20C 30 minutes later, so I assume it put out its minimal 800 watts until the room temperature dropped back.
Before I got my heater, I initially wondered about potential health issues, but then realised that workshop heaters run on ordinary kerosene and some are rated at over 40kW which only run at full power. If these were causing health issues, I’m sure we’d be hearing about them like the health stories about mould, germs, passive smoking, etc.
I had noticed that many of these inverter heaters are being sold second-hand on Ebay and Gumtree at £60-£100 but I have been made aware (thanks to this blog) of potential problems (especially with the electronics) from fuel misuse. Now being cautious of buying second-hand, I decided to buy new and (again thanks to this blog) bought direct from Brico-Bravo at £146 each inc delivery.
I have just taken delivery of two SRE-300 units from Brica-Bravo to replace a couple of Zibro radiant wick heaters that I’ve been using as the building I’m in is electric only and previously relied on ineffective storage heaters.
The Zibro units proved to be a fine alternative but the output could not be regulated down much, so they would run hot at 2.5-2.8 kw and would need constant turning off and on (about every 30-60 minutes) to maintain a steady room temperature, and to keep running costs down – problem with this being the kerosene whiff given off by repeatedly doing this builds up and becomes much more noticeable, especially as I’m using the C2 heating oil version. This is even more of a problem as I live on a busy road and traffic noise becomes a big issue by leaving a window open.
Having read the reviews and advice given in this blog I decided to invest in a couple of these inverter units instead. I was concerned about the electronics involved and that various ‘E numbers’ would appear once I ran them on filtered 28 sec heating oil; but so far so good… I have been using them for about a week now. Both have been running for about 12-14 hours per day and set to the minimum 800w (as it’s quite mild at the moment). They have kept the whole flat at 21/22C on this setting alone. The kerosene whiff compared to my Zibro wick units is virtually non-existent.
I am still concerned that by using the filtered heating oil, the electronics will eventually start messing around but I take heart from posts made on this blog to the affect that some have been running for 4-5 years without an issue.
I suppose if I had an oil or gas fired central heating system I would expect to be pay £100-150 each year on boiler servicing/maintenance. Factor this into the equation and ‘misused’ SRE-300 units only need to run for a year or two before they’ve paid for themselves. Therefore if a unit packed in after this time from running on heating oil then so-be-it, just replace it…but I would hope (and expect) to get a few more years out of them.
Thank you to everyone involved in this blog.
Hi Alan
Yes, I’ve been using these heaters since 2010 and in fact this blog started life in 2011 as just one page intended on sharing the cost benefits of using these heaters, especially to all electric households, and those like me who were stuck with only the E7 or E10 options. The Winter of 2010 was one of the coldest for years, and during the worst of it I was saving around £60 per month over the cost of using the Storage Heaters. Whilst the 2010 Winter was exceptional as being one of the Coldest on record, even the average to mild Winters that we have had since will recoup a £35+ Saving every month for me by keeping the Storage Heaters off, so adding that to your annual Gas / Oil Boiler Maintenance estimate, the payback period of the heaters is quite quick.
Given that Heating Oil is currently sold for around 50p – 60p per litre from the Pump (And as low as 36p per litre in a 500 litre bulk delivery), this equates to around 5p – 6p per KW/H based on the current pump price for the heat produced from these heaters, this compares very well with the current unit cost of E7 Off Peak Electricity, but with the added advantage that it can be achieved at any time of the day!. For those in flats and households using Standard Electricity for heating at the UK average of 12p per KW/H – the savings are 50% per KW/H by using an Inverter Heater instead of an Oil Filled radiator, Fan Heater or Convector Heater.
My Corona 3016 Heater is now 5 years old, and has only required a replacement flame rod during its life, my SRE-300 is a year younger, but has required no spare parts whatsoever – not bad for what was then a £150 ‘investment’ and of which has been run on heating oil from its first tank fill. Using your own estimate, I reckon that since 2010 i’ve saved £500 – £750 in boiler servicing costs alone, but by adding five years worth of monthly Electricity savings into the mix during the Autumn and Winter months, I would say they have saved me well over £1500+ and counting. Even if both existing heaters failed tomorrow, £300 would buy me two more SRE-300’s, i’d still be significantly better off with what i’d saved overall and I wouldn’t hesitate to do exactly the same thing for the next 5 years!.
I have no idea as to the reason why I’ve managed to get 4 – 5 years worth of largely trouble free use from the same heaters, I put it down to either luck, or the fact that they are both drained and stripped down and all parts cleaned internally at the end of every Winter season as per the guide on here. I honestly think that the key to the longevity of these heaters is regular servicing and preventative maintenance, and unlike a gas fire or boiler, all servicing on these heaters can be done legally by the owner with only basic DIY knowledge and tools.
Its worth mentioning that others have reported (both here and the French forums) of having E based error code problems even when using the correct recommended premium fuel, with one visitor emailing me a picture of his inverter heater’s badly gunked up burner and stating that it had only been run on pre-packaged fuel. When I read comments like that, I think i’ll continue to take my chances running on standard heating oil bought at 56p a litre locally, compared to circa £1.80 / litre for the premium stuff given that the expensive fuel isn’t a magic solution to avoiding issues down the line.
The other advantage being that the standard heating oil price varies depending on the market prices, whilst the Premium Fuel remains at the same price, despite huge cost reductions of oil throughout the industry.
Hi i have been running my inverter heater on paraffin for the past 2 years since i got it mainly because i could not find a supply of heating oil close by. The 2 places near me that sell paraffin from a pump charge 94 ppl and £1.12 ppl so it is not cheap. I am sure you can imagine my delight when i finally found somewhere that sells heating oil from a pump with a current price of only 35 ppl, a saving of 59p 0n a litre is a serious saving so i got 80 litres yesterday.
Now for my main reason for posting. As i said until now i have used only paraffin in my heater and reading this blog i see it is recommended to filter heating oil before using it in the heaters so is it just a Mr funnel that you use or some other form of filtering ? Thanks.
Hi, Thanks for taking the time to comment. I use a ‘Mr Funnel’ because in addition to filtering out dirt and rust particles, it is also fairly unique in being able to remove / separate any water contamination from within Kerosene (Heating Oil) fuel.
When fuel is stored in large metal tanks, as the level of fuel drops, the increasing airspace above it can create condensation which drops into the fuel. The amounts are small in relation to the fuel stored in the tank, but these heaters are very sensitive to even tiny amounts of water, plus any water contamination can cause corrosion of the internal parts of the heater & burner and if amounts are large enough, damage or prematurely wear the small pump inside the heater.
The Mr Funnel was the only filter I found that could separate out any water as well as filter out dirt passing through it, but if you can find a filter with the same properties, then there is no reason not to use it.
Thanks for your reply admin. Better to be safe than sorry so i have ordered a Mr Funnel off ebay. It should arrive on Thursday so i hope there is enough fuel left in the tank to last me till then or maybe just be very careful and take a few litres from the top of the drum to avoid getting any water (hopefully)
Great article, but you should not use standard home kerosene in these heaters. There is special C1 grade kerosene for this purpose with no smell and little sulphur in the fumes. So here in Ireland that works out at 35€ for 20 litres.
Can you work that one out for me.
Hi Shayne
Thanks for your comments, I do state many times throughout the various Inverter Heater pages on this blog that following my lead and running on standard Kerosene heating oil is done at entirely at your own risk, in addition to the chances of voiding the heater warranty, however i’ve been running two heaters on nothing but heating oil since 2010, and have suffered no detriment to my health or my property, you will also find many people doing exactly the same thing, not only on this blog but also on several Ex Pat forums in Europe and also on the Money Saving Expert Forums, I don’t see a single case where anybody has reported falling ill because of it. I also don’t find the smell to be much different either, there is no smell with either fuel when the heater is running, all that you get is a quick whiff of smoke when the heater starts up and shuts down, but this clears in around a minute.
By using regular heating oil, I reckon i’ve saved well over £1000 in kerosene fuel costs since 2010, just compared to the cost of buying the same amount of premium fuel, The cost in the UK for Premium Fuel is just ridiculous costing as much as £1.70 per litre (about 2.23€ per litre) compared to standard heating oil, which currently costs around £0.45 per litre (about 0.57€) that is a huge difference in cost, especially at the moment with the standard heating oil currently costing four times less than the premium fuel and when buying 100 litres at a time the saving is obvious and noticeable. After almost six years of doing this, both my heaters still work, and I still have good health. The cost of Premium Fuel never reduces here either, currently the price of oil is at record low levels and i’m paying about 20p less per litre for heating oil than I did this time last year, but the Premium Stuff never reduces in price, despite it being produced and refined from exactly the same oil base.
I will also mention that there are many commercial space heaters, designed to be used in Workshops, Garages and Marquees and Torpedo style heaters such as these are designed to be run on heating oil or even commercial diesel and vent into the air in the room, and don’t use or require an external flue, just the same as the inverter heaters. These larger commercial heaters can be bought or hired with no safety warnings, or risk to health, if there was any risk, the EU simply wouldn’t allow them to be sold. The key, is to ensure plenty of ventilation into the room when using any kind of combustable fuel based heater, and that also applies when running on premium paraffin!.
Unfortunately, running these heaters on premium fuel makes them unattractive cost wise, after all you need a mains Electricity outlet to run this kind of heater in the first place, and ironically the Electricity works out cheaper to plug in a portable electric heater than it does to buy premium fuel to run the heater on. Before I changed over to using the inverter heaters for my home heating, I spent a lot of time working out the costs and the only way I could get these heaters to save me money – quite a bit of money on my bills was to use ordinary heating oil in them. I’d love to use the recommended premium stuff, but at almost double the cost of Electrictity that won’t happen because I want to halve my heating bills, not double them. Besides, the heaters are running fine on it.
I have no idea how much Electricity costs in Ireland, you will need to check your Electricty bill to find out the cost of each KW/H. I can however tell you that your C1 Kerosene costing 35€ per 20 litres would work out at 1.75€ per litre, which converts to a cost of €0.175 per KW/H to run your Inverter Heater (1 litre of fuel produces about 10kw of heat). So if the Electricity cost shown in your bill is below €0.175 per kw/h, then it would be cheaper to just run an Electic Convector, oil filled radiator or Fan Heater to produce heat than to use your Inverter Heater.
Hi i have now been running my heater on heating oil for around 3 weeks and the heater is running just fine and i do not see any difference in it’s performance. I do however see a BIG difference in my pocket, the heating oil i am using cost me 35p a litre and the cheapest premium paraffin i can find is 93.9p a litre.
I have never really bothered to look at the fuel tank in my heater closely before but as i was filling it the last time i noticed the words KEROSENE ONLY stamped in the metal. Funny how the manufacturers put that on the tank and the people that retail them say to use only premium paraffin. My heater is a inverter 5096 model, it would be interesting to know if anyone else has that stamped on the fuel tank of thier heater and yes it is the original fuel tank in my heater.
Hi Neil, yes my Corona 3016 Inverter also has “Kerosene” stamped into the Metal on the Fuel Tank, I guess its down to its Japanese origins, these Heaters are extremely popular in Japan where there is no such thing as Central Heating, and where they have been used for more than a decade as domestic home heating.
When originally researching these heaters, I found many Japanese websites discussing their use, and what did soon become obvious was that there doesn’t seem to be such a thing as Premium Paraffin or Premium Kerosene over there, all of the fuel for these heaters seems to be bought from the pump, either at a Hardware Store, or more commonly, a standard petrol station!. So that doesn’t seem much different to how Heating Oil is purchased over here, certainly they aren’t paying £5 or £6 for a 4 litre container of premium paraffin, if I did that, i’d also have to hire a skip at the end of Winter just to get rid of all of the pre-packaged empties – a very wasteful and certainly not environmentally friendly method of buying fuel.
I’ve almost completed what will be my fifth winter of heating my home with nothing but two of these inverter heaters, and both have been run on domestic heating oil for four of those, saving me £100’s not only over the cost of Premium Paraffin, but also £100’s over the Electricity which I would have had to have used if I hadn’t changed over to these.
When you think that heating oil is currently 35p a litre, that works out at about 3.5p per KW/H for heat, which compares very well with Electricity at around 11p per KW/H and Gas at 3P per KW/H, (especially when the loss of efficiency is taken into consideration with Gas). However if you were paying 94p per Litre for Premium Fuel, that would increase to 9.4p per KW/H for the heat given from exactly the same heater, certainly not as attractive as 3.5p and for many people, its actually costing them more to run these Heaters on Premium Fuel per hour, than it does to just use an Electric Heater.
That said, you did very well to find Premium Paraffin for 94p per Litre, most of the pre-packaged stuff still works out at £1.45 per litre, even when you bulk buy 128 litres worth!.
Hi admin and thanks for your reply.
The premium paraffin at 94p per litre was from a garden centre and not pre packaged, they have a pump and you need to take your own container.
I live in a static caravan and the gas heater in it was pretty much useless so i ripped it out and installed a wood burner for when it gets really cold but it is too much when it is above about 8 to 10 degrees outside, that is when my inverter heater comes in. It is also very useful to put on a timer for the mornings so it is warm when i get up.
On a different note i was reading some posts about these heaters on money saving experts forum and i can’t understand how so many people that have never had or even seen one of these heaters can give advice to other people saying how bad and dangerous they are and how they must generate a lot of condensation as they are burning a fuel with a flame and not just heating up elements or oil (in a radiator). I really did want to make a post to point out the mistakes that they were making with what they said but i was not prepared to register an account just to make one reply to some incorrect information. OK rant over and i am sorry if i stepped out of line with what this thread is about.
Hi Neil. Yes, I also had a period in a Static Caravan and the fire inside was fueled by a 47KG Cylinder which also powered the Hot Water boiler and Stove. The location of the Van also meant that the delivery driver couldn’t get very close so it meant rolling it upright down a wooded path, then rolling the empty one back!. I was a lot younger and lighter then! and hadn’t discovered the Inverter Heaters, so there was very little option other than expensive Electricity but I can certainly appreciate the advantage of using these heaters now.
I’ve also had countless run in’s with people who fall into the category you describe, not only through comments left on this blog but also on various forums also. Often you will get a statement such as ‘That’s dangerous” or “It will explode” or even the popular emotive “You are putting yourself and your family at risk from being poisoned in your beds”. Generally, nothing is given as an example of why, or any experience and effort used to describe how they have formed that opinion. Sadly people like to create and script their own little soap operas, especially on the internet and a lot of the biggest self proclaimed armchair “experts”, on any subject are always the ones who have never owned, used or even seen the item they are being so vocal about let alone be running a blog centered entirely around it, but that pretty much sums up forum discussions on any product or service though.
Surprisingly, some of those who are so vocal about these heaters are perfectly happy to remain silent when portable LPG ‘Calor’ fires are used or being discussed, which have been used for decades and also have no outside flue and exhaust directly into the room in exactly the same way as the Inverter heaters, but often without the built in safety features!. I am a big advocate of promoting safety and always advise using Carbon Monoxide detectors as well as regular annual cleaning of these Heater at the end of every season wherever possible but that’s not scaremongering, that is just basic common sense whether its an inverter heater, open fire, wood burning stove or even a Domestic Gas Boiler. Regular maintenance saves money and smoke and carbon monoxide detectors save lives. But yes, there are people who will twist that advice or take the issue too far and see problems in what others are doing, but at the same time also have to embellish it to suit and add a bit of shock and awe into the mix.
I’m more than happy to accept that there are owners of these heaters who want to use the correct recommended fuel and will continue to do so, whether its to preserve their warranty, a fear of the unknown or just because they don’t want to stray from what the manual tells them, and that’s fine. Sadly though, a lot of them are spending well over the odds by doing so, and since this blog is all about saving money on heating, it is always pointed out to them, along with an average calculation proving why!.
To be fair, I stopped defending the point on MSE a year or so ago, life is too short and its easier to just agree to disagree and move on!. The fact remains, that i’ve saved a small fortune over the last five – six winters and will continue to do so into 2017, my original heaters are still working on domestic heating oil, have all of their original factory parts (including the fuel pump) and i’m still alive, enough said.
40p a litre now at rodgers brown edge
I just thought i would bring this thread back to life by saying that i was just having a browse on Ebay and saw that BricoBravo have started selling inverter heaters on Ebay again priced at £200.28 with free postage.
Yes, they have been selling that one on and off throughout the summer – its the Corona 3016 model, i’m holding off actively advertising these on the relevant pages in the hope that in the next few weeks they’ll start selling another batch of the SRE300 at £146.00 again, as they have done for the past two winters, and unless the need for a heater is urgent I would advise anybody considering a purchase to wait for at least a couple of weeks to see whether the cheaper heater becomes available.
Hello admin
I placed an order for a Toyosan SRE 300 from ebay and have received a Toyai SRE 301 CE made in China instead. I rang the firm who supplied it and they say it is exactly the same. I thought the Toyosan was made in Japan. I have heard that Chinese products aren’t as good. Should I send it back? I haven’t opened it.
Thanks
Alison
Hello Alison. I have an SRE 300 inverter heater, which is also made in China i’ve used this heater as part of my daily winter heating provision for the last four years, and in fact its now starting its fifth winter with no problems. I may just have been lucky, but i’ve actually found it to be just as reliable as my Corona heater, which cost £100 more and is a ‘brand’ name, in fact I often openly advertise the Chinese one on this blog, when it is available from Brico on special offer.
The only difference is, that mine wasn’t advertised or sold as a Toyosan it was simply advertised as a Kero SRE-300 the part number was the same though and it is definitely made in China.
There are a lot of heaters which seem to share the same part numbers, SRE300, SRE3001, SRE301, SRE302 and SRE304 all seem to be / have been available from various manufacturers at some point and badged as Kero, Tayosan, Tayomi, Ruby etc and they all look physically the same. However I cannot comment on whether they share the same design, and internal components as I have not had the opportunity to do a tear down of each one. Interestingly, I have come across a Zibro heater which contained a Tayosan circuit board, so certainly it seems that components are shared across brands.
If you want to return the heater to your vendor on the basis that it hasn’t been supplied with the badge it was advertised with then that, of course, is still your choice, however if you are returning it on the basis that you don’t think it will be reliable, then my own experience with a similar heater of Chinese origin may serve to put your mind at ease.
Hi, thank you so much for the all information, I used this heater 10 years while living in Japan, and I just bought one, but I’m struggling to find the fuel, I live in gravesend Kent, I just found a company that just sell 500l to much for my place, any recommendations or alternative about fuel? Thank you
Hi, this is the only place I could find in the Kent area at the moment, its about 15 – 20 mins away from you and its expensive as its premium paraffin, but it still works out far cheaper than B&Q and a lot of the online vendors. http://www.cheaptyresmedway.co.uk/paraffin.
At this price though, running a cheap Electric fan or convector Heater on a competitive electricity tariff will probably cost about the same (11.5p per kwh) as running your heater on paraffin from this vendor at the current price, so only you can decide if its worth the journey to go and collect the fuel, or just plug in an electric heater. Kerosene (heating oil) is course a lot cheaper, but it is difficult to find outside of rural areas in small quantities. I will keep looking and update here in the next few days if I find anything.
Oh it’s a shame, anyway thank you found this place, I will keep looking here Thank you!
Hi there,
I have the Inverter 4600 which works great. I don’t currently use the heating as my house runs on oil but the radiators are so old, having the heating on full constantly, will only heat my house to 14 degrees!
I wondered if anyone knew of somewhere in Surrey to buy kerosene at the pump?
I need to run my Inverter at max and have got through 16 litres of parafin in about 14 hours which is currently unaffordable for me.
Many thanks in advance.
Sophie
Hello again. Just to update you, the ‘royal’ branded heater I bought in November 2014 from bricobravo is still working well on 28 second kero. I’ve done nothing to it apart from vacuum out the air filter and clean out the fuel filter from time to time. I bought another inverter more recently (kero branded) and this seems to burn cleaner than the older one, and seems to be slightly more economical. Really pleased with both, and will probably try a corona wick heater (with kerosene filtered through charcoal) as a heating ‘boost’ as it gets colder.
Feels like a colder winter this year!
Thanks again for the advice over the last 2 years. I’m actually in credit with the energy company! Unbelievable!
Hiya,
many thanks for this very useful info, I have a large (6,500 sqft) house that has standard oil heating (58kw burner) but one 1,200 sqft area is reserved for my pet cats and currently is heated by use of electric heaters. £2,900 a year later in electrical bills and I stumbled across these paraffin heaters and wanted more information. After reading this page and digging into any safety aspects I could find out about (and finding they are perfectly safe) I got myself a 3kw inverter heater for the cats. Living in West Wales we know about about it getting cold here ;)
Currently we pay 29p a litre for Kero28 as we get it delivered in bulk for our main household oil tank (2,000 litre) so getting hold of oil is no problem. The savings on heating for my cats have been amazing to say the least
Brilliant write up and very much appreciated :) if you ever get to West Wales, the beers are on me :)
Further to my post of 20th December last year, one of the two SRE-300 units I bought from BricoBravo has now started playing up.
I noticed that BricoBravo ceased making these units available for shipping to the UK last August. I was reluctant to pay £210 for a replacement from Grundys, so I contacted BricoBravo through the Italian version of Ebay. I am pleased to say that although they no longer do the SRE-300, they do the SRE-3001 which is exactly the same, the only difference being a child lock feature added; price being 139 Euros.
I contacted them directly through their website about shipping to the UK and was pleased that they were happy to do this for a further 35 Euros. The unit cost me a total of 174 Euros including delivery, which equated to £153; not much of an increase from the pre-EU Referendum price of £146.
Should anyone else want to pursue purchasing this unit from BricoBravo, I found emailing Debora – Centro Assistenza directly at BricoBravo fruitful. She communicates in perfect English.
I’ll add this just on the off-chance anyone has had the same problem: The SRE-300 that is playing up still works but the fan symbol randomly comes on with beeping every five/ten minutes (this can be after just an hour’s use or sometimes several). Momentarily setting the room temperature higher so the fan kicks in seems to clear the problem, but again, this is just a temporary solution.
I’m not sure what the problem is but I regularly clean the rods and maintain a good stable combustion by the occasional eighth of a turn clockwise on the small white nylon screw on the PCB (I assume this is a regulator adjuster?).
I can now only assume that the problem lies with the PCB’s control of the fan, or the fan itself. Has anyone ever had this problem or know if there is any jumper on the PCB which causes a factory reset? I’ve tried pushing the small black button near the top of the board but I don’t know what this is supposed to do (I’m curious as to the purpose of the three pin holes to the right of this button).
hi, ive pressed the black button and turned the white screw and the heater is now working for the last 2 hours, good bit of information,thank you,no idea what they do though
Quote:
‘the cost of the Electricity during the normal day (peak) periods is significantly more expensive than on a standard non economy 7 tariff. Up to three or four times higher per unit in fact!.’
Can I suggest you switch electricity supplier, I’m on an economy 7 tarif and, yes, it is more expensive than a standard, non E7 rate but only by about 2p/unit. It certainly isn’t three or four times higher. I currently pay 11.2p/unit for peak rate, 4.9p overnight, the cheapest standard rate I can find (in my area) is 9.3p/unit. Plus I run all my heavy use appliances (washing machine, tumble drier, dishwasher) overnight at the cheaper rate.
Hi Peter, I’m glad you found the info useful. I’ve found that the problem does come back after a week or so of using the heater but by turning the white screw back to its original position buys another week or two’s use without the problem. This is not an ideal situation, but at least by repeating this process it allows for the heater to be useable.
By the way, I’m in Belfast and was wondering if anyone knows of any petrol stations in the area which sell heating oil from the forecourt or pump? (my usual source is becoming a bit unreliable).
Hi Everyone,
Really great site here and thanks to all that take time to contribute, especially Admin.
I live in the countryside like most people on here, but I just moved from the suburbs of London a month ago, where I lived in a gas central heated semi. It was blissfully warm. Now I’m living in a poorly insulated, single glazed, one bed flat that has bottle Propane Gas fired radiators and hot water. The oven, hob and shower are electric.
I’M FREEZING!!
Basically I have figured out that if I wanted to be cozy and warm here and not care about my consumption, I would probably use a 47kg gas bottler per week. These cost me £62 each. On top of that I would still have my electricity charges, which I estimate to be around £2 per day. So another £15 per week, giver or take.
So now I also find myself on a cheaper heating quest.
If I owned this flat, then without delay I would install an Wood Burner, as I have access to heaps of fuel here. As I don’t know how long I will stay, it would be too much of a gamble to install one and front all of the costs.
Then someone told me he had an inverter heater and said he loved it, and my quest brings me here.
I have a few things I would like to be sure of or clarify though. So if anyone can help me, especially with the calculations (as I’m struggling with them so far), I would be very grateful.
So firstly I would like to be sure on the correct size of Inverter heater I should buy for my needs. My living room is the largest room and measures 5 x 4.5 x 2.5 meters. Single glazed and is in a poorly insulated loft flat. Will 3kw be enough?
I was thinking to place it in the doorway, so that it has plenty of fresh air from the kitchen, landing and stairs, and maybe some of the heat will take the chill from these areas.?.
Secondly I’m trying to figure out costs.
I’ve heard rumours that its possible to buy heating oil localy, in small quantities, for around 40p per litre. If this is true, and I run a 3kw inverter on full power for 8hrs, how much will it cost?
I have managed to figure out how much it costs for 8 hours every evening to run my electric, 2.2kw oil filler radiator (which fails dismally to even near heat the room), and that is about £2.20, or on the cheaper off peak tariff £1.15 for when I’m sleeping. It works just fine in the tiny bedroom.
I would like to completely switch off my gas heating and only use the propane for hot water, which I mostly use for washing dishes once a day. If I can do this, then I think I can make a bottle last at least 6 weeks, maybe longer.
I want to be warm again!!
Hi Dave,
As you are probably aware, when you write a blog its a good idea to include every situation and not just expect that everybody else is in exactly the same as your own. I refer of course to pre-payment customers, which in the UK are around 5.8 million of – quite a few i’m sure that you agree and I suspect there are quite a few of those on Economy 7 – certainly there are in a rural area where I am. Sadly you have forgotten to include them in your list of tariffs, but often these prepayment customers are prevented from changing to a credit meter due to a debt with their supplier, their credit situation or their tenancy agreements. Yes i’m aware that a landlord cannot legally stop a tenant from changing from prepayment to a credit meter but a quick Google shows a lot of them still do, and legislation is only as good as how well it is enforced. I can tell you from personal experience, that when such a block or term in a tenancy agreement is reported nobody is interested, and when I eventually did find somebody to take an interest, I was then told it would take around 18 months to be reviewed as such Tenant – Landlord disputes over Meters is not considered a priority.
So, at the time the blog page was written (2011) and revised (2013) I was ‘trapped’ on a Prepayment Economy 7 tariff, with Npower, able to move supplier as long as I didn’t change the meter type. I then moved to Ecotricity, which saved me around 1p per kw/h on both day / night rates. I’m now a householder on a standard tariff and so no longer in that unenviable tenancy, but i’ve checked the current price with Ecotricity and it still remains at 21.54p per kw/h (peak) and 6.53p per kw/h (off peak) close to what I was paying years ago, so my original equation still stands. Further more, i’ve just checked a popular comparison site, and yes over the last few years there is now a cheaper tariff than Ecotricity, but not by much.
I’ve linked a screenshot from an Energy Comparison site to my current best tariff based on my previous situation, namely Pre-Payment and Eoconomy 7, even now the best tariff for those criteria is 16.26p (peak) and 6.28p (off peak). Current Ecotricity prices are also on there too, for clarity that the equation based on my situation in 2011 – 2013 wasn’t exaggerated, as it is the same today.
https://s27.postimg.org/t0fw9z95v/rsz_energy.jpg
Which is nothing close to what you are paying, but then again I suspect that you are comparing credit tariff with prepayment. If you can find a better tariff than the one on the screenshot, then please do share the info!.
Incidentally, posting up prices of what you are paying, and the standard rate tariff you have found isn’t helpful at all, without the crucial information as to who the supplier is. So on your next visit could you please post up the missing information?, especially the 9.3p standard tariff that you have seen, as i’m sure that it will help a large number of our visitors, looking for information on the same. Thanks.
On the plus side, you could still be saving quite a significant amount of money by changing to an inverter heater. My last supply of Heating Oil was priced at 47p per litre, which equates to 4.7p per KW/h for heating, less than half the cost of your day rate electricity, and also marginally cheaper than your E7 too, although if you don’t need to use supplementary heating during the peak rate then the margin is probably not worth it. Even as a standard tariff credit customer today, I still use these heaters in two rooms, as its still much cheaper than using a convector heater, and even 9.3p per kw/h doesn’t compare to 4.7p per KW/h.
Finally, I appreciate the advice / temptation to run heavy consumption appliances overnight, but I won’t encourage the use of Tumble Dryers unattended and neither it seems does my local fire brigade. I’m sure that you have seen the huge number of fires in the national press, some of them resulting in fatalities and nearly all of those reports happened with an unattended machine, and I honestly don’t think saving a few quid is worth putting your safety at risk. This is Cleveland Fire Brigade’s advice on the matter.
http://www.clevelandfire.gov.uk/safety/home-safety/tumble-dryer-safety/
Hi JJM,
Information available widely online shows that a litre of heating oil produces 10kw worth of heat when burned, these heater manufacturers seem to claim close to 100% efficiency as there is no external flue which would normally mean that some heat is exhausted to the outside when venting any fumes. Some perfectionists in a science department may argue that its never going to be exactly 100% and is more likely to be in the region of 99.5 – 99.9% efficient but I suspect that its close enough to be considered 100% in a cost equation with such marginal differences. So on that basis, you simply divide the litre cost of the heating oil by a factor of 10, in order to get the per KW running cost of the inverter heater on fuel.
So, if you can buy oil for 40p per litre that equates to 4p per KW when burned in an Inverter heater for an hour, so running at full power a 3kw inverter heater will cost 3 (kw) x 4p /kw per hour to run = 12p per hour and so for 8 hours use, it would be 12p x 8 hours = £0.96 total for the period.
Based on your description, and poor insulatation I would recommend that you consider a larger 4kw inverter heater for your flat, but also bear in mind that these heaters automatically regulate their power output as the room temperature increases, so once the room is warm the heater will no longer be running at its full 4kw power, it will vary its output accordingly in response to how warm the room is, and when it does reduce its heat output, its fuel consumption will obviously reduce also. I think it would be very unlikely that a 4kw inverter heater will need to be running at the full 4kw output for the entire 8 hours that you are using it, However, for peace of mind lets look at a worst case situation and just assume it does consume its full 4kw constantly for an 8 hour period non stop, and never reduces its output. This way, we get the maximum cost of the heaters’ oil consumption over the 8 hour period.
4p per kw x 4kw consumed = 16p per hour. Run for 8 hours will be £1.28 which is still far cheaper than your other methods of heating, and unlike the oil filled radiator you will actually be comfortably warm in return for that cost. But like I say, that is the worst case figure, in practice it will probably work out cheaper than £1.28 as the inverter will not be running at 4kw constantly for that period even in a poorly insulated room, as it will automatically vary its output power based on room temperature and so there will be periods in your 8 hours where it is only running at between 1 – 3kw once the selected room temperature has been reached, reducing the oil consumption accordingly.
Also, why are you heating an entire room whilst you are asleep?. Instead, I would advise getting a good quality high TOG Winter duvet on the bed, and if this still isn’t warm enough then an Electric Blanket would be. Modern Electric Blankets have several safety features which make them perfectly safe for overnight use, it will also use a fraction of the Energy that your radiator uses, roughly 140W for a double Electric Blanket compared to 2200W for the radiator, andon an E7 tariff the Blanket would consume about 8p worth of Electricity per night or possibly less depending on your off peak tariff.
So my advice would be, to get a 4KW Inverter Heater for your main flat heating whilst you are awake, and put a thick Winter Duvet on your bed + possibly get an Electric Blanket for overnight heating. I would also get a time switch to switch on the radiator in the bedroom for 60 – 90 minutes before you normally awake, so the room is warm when you get up.
Unless you have a real need to warm the other rooms in the flat constantly, then I wouldn’t bother trying to achieve this using one central heater, you are just wasting energy even if its cheaper energy and needlessly working the heater harder than you need too. Putting the heater in front of a door which is just slightly ajar should be enough for ventilation rather than leaving the door wide open. I used to move my heaters around, to where I needed to be at the time, including just putting the heater at the door of the bathroom and blasting it at full power for 5 minutes warmed the bathroom for long enough to have a shower etc.
I can’t help much with your other consumption reduction, other than to try and shower during the Off Peak period. I would also boil a kettle to do the washing up, as it will probably be cheaper than using the Propane.
Thanks for the help with calculating the running costs. Thats really helpful, and the advise regarding electric blankets is brilliant, it never even entered my head to buy one. Is there any particular brand I should go for?
Actually, your idea of making the bed warm rather heating the who room, reminds me of sleeping in my old van and camper van. The van had not been insulated or even boarded out properly, so the cold metal used to throw the cold down on my head to an extent where sometimes it hurt. In my attempts to reduce this I discovered why people had Four Poster Beds in the day, if they could afford them, so I created a tent around me inside the van. It was much better. It would be very easy to hang fabrics around my bed, then my body heat wouldn’t be wasted. Coupled with an electric blanket, it should be super cozy. I don’t like breathing in cold air when sleeping. A bit extreme? :D
Back to Inverter heaters… Even with my cruddy maths, even if I invest £300 on a 4kw heater, by switching of my gas heating and buying an electric blanket, my investment could be paid off by the end of this winter? So come next autumn, the investment will be history and I’ll hopefully have a whole winter season of cheap coziness.
I’ve been looking at the heaters for sale and DiO have a deal on a 3.2kw heater called Inverter 5006. I called them up and they told me its a Corona, but I couldn’t see any badge or markings to say it was one. Do Coronas have Corona badges?
I know I should be looking at 4kw heaters but the prices seem all over the place. Some less powerful models going for higher prices than more powerful ones and some being sold with free goodies. I really detest shopping for a costly item, only to find out I bought it from the wrong place or payed too much, or it ends up be unsuitable. Its nearly as bad as being cold.
DiO have a 4.6kw beauty for £345, but that works out at an extra £85 more than the 3.2kw. I have looked at the Brico eu eBay site and they have a 4.6kw SRE4600 for £285. http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Inverter-Liquid-Fuel-Heater-Indoor-Electronic-Portable-Heating-4600W-SRE4600-/272282504442?hash=item3f654d4cfa
Can’t seem to find a cheaper 4kw.
I understand you have one of the SRE models and rate them. So as long as Brico bravo can ship it to me cheap enough, then maybe I’ve found one? Has anyone had any experience with one these SRE4600’s??
I hope its not over the top.
Thanks again for the great advice and awesome website.