Central heating

charley I haven't had it on since I moved in, plus, I pay a fixed amount monthly at the moment.

It is more efficient to have a multi fuel stove. You can start it off with smokeless coal 'eggs' and get a good bed of embers. Then add the logs for the burning effect. As the whole stove heats, it becomes rather like a very hot radiator in the room. Also, if you have an internal flue that warms the air through the house.

Lona I do hope that you do not get a nasty shock when the bill comes in unless you are with the likes of EDF who change the amount I pay almost monthly.

Only tested my heating for ten minutes in my new flat. It's electric radiators, so fairly instant heat and they seem really efficient.
I'm still having the balcony door open for 2 or 3 hours in the sunshine, it's barely autumnal here.

Timely post here. Thanks to grannylyn I found video of how to rd pressure my boiler. Good job too as it was well down in the red!:Had trouble getting the key in but acwuick Google suggesting coating it in Vaseline...and it worked. Feeling chuffed!

Our boiler is really old but we do have it serviced annually and the engineer says it is fine. I suppose a new combi boiler would be more efficient.
Our neighbours have installed a wood burner but I do wonder how much work they entail.
Your electric fire sounds like my friend's Jane10 - I was very impressed when I saw hers - although, come to think of it, hers could have been gas, so not like yours at all!

Interesting that some people light fires and woodburners before switching on central heating whereas others do it the other way round and only use the fire as 'extra' when it's really cold.

We don't have central heating any more now we've downsized and our 12Kw woodburner heats the whole place - we leave the bedroom door open in the evenings so the heat spreads into there as well.

DD only lights hers at weekends if it's really cold.

Agree about the amount of logs they get through

They're very impressive, Luckygirl. VERY expensive as well.

I now prefer contempary looking stoves to the quaint cottagey ones. So much easier to clean because you don't have all the nooks and crannies on the outside which collect dust and ash.

Just home from a fortnights visit to our son in Wiltshire where my husband wore shorts while outside painting the fence and I wore short sleeved tops. Now that we're home the long trousers are on again along with the jumpers and ch. I even have a warm cosy for the evenings cause I get really cold legs. Looking forward to the South of Tenerife where it's warm most of the day. If we didn't like the seasons here in Scotland we would move somewhere warm. Hey ho it's what it is.

It's hardly ever actually warm here and it's nearly always damp so, except for a few weeks in summer, our CH is set to come on for an hour each morning at the chilliest time. It helps take the edge off the damp too.

We've had in on for an hour or two in the evenings for a few weeks now.

We had a wood burner in the barn conversion in which we spent our last holiday. We loved it but couldn't believe how much wood it burnt each evening we lit it. Are they all heavy on fuel? We would have needed a huge shed to store enough for the winter and it only warmed one room. It was good though.

We have log fires over the Winter, have got loads stacked up ready in case we have a really freezing time of it, but really, the gas fired central heating is efficient, newly installed three years ago, so don't need a fire, but there is something comforting about one, on a cold day when you know you are in for the whole evening.

Austroflam!

DO IT! Luckygirl. I wouldn't be able to resist. Tall and bright red sounds very trendy. What make is it?

We lit ours this evening. Sooooo cosy.

My life is easier I don't have any central heating in my big old house

I can repressurise boiler myself now ! The Wonder Of Google

This is the 3rd evening I have had the central heating switched on and what a difference- my washing dries also so that is an added bonus.

Bright days, but cold nights! The CH has been on.

We're also alternating between the wood burner in the dining room and the novelty of the open fire in the sitting room. ( I haven't had one of those since I was a child).

We reckon if it snows we can justify having both fires on! Not that I want snow any time soon!

We are dying to light the woodburner in our new bungalow - it is very tall and bright red - honestly! We have stacks of logs in the wood store and are all set to go!

We had a spiffing new boiler installed on Thursday, so of course we just had to put the heating on to test that everything's okay. We thought long and hard about getting rid of the old combi, which may have been old and nowhere near as efficient as once it was but somehow managed to keep going (just like us really).

So far so good with the new kid on the block, and I can't see it being switched off again any time soon, now we've put the bodywarmers and bedsocks away

No heating on here yet. We're still wearing T-shirts indoors. Had to put a cardi on when going out on Thursday though.

CornerGran -- I spoke too soon, been ordered to put the heating on

Still mild here, shirt sleeve weather. Heating works.

Before it gets cold wobbly? Flipping freezing here!

Thanks for reminder, must test our system before it gets cold.