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I know this is a bit of a “how long is a piece of string?” question but I’d be interested to hear from anyone with oil fired central heating as to what their approximate consumption is over a year.
Brother in Law(yes, him again – sorry) lives in medium sized three bed bungalow with oil fired central heating. We are concerned that he is not monitoring and managing his fuel consumption very well.
He had a delivery a few days before Christmas and, from what he tells us, he appears to have used over 500 litres in that time. Also he appears frightened to use any more until he gets a delivery, despite it being a 1000 litre tank.
I’d just like to get a few “sample” figures so that I can arrive at some sort of average to compare with his consumption.
Sorry again for mentioning him on here and thanks for any help
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@mo Thanks for that. Trouble is he panics when it gets down to 500L and then, when he orders it with the suppliers says “There’s no hurry” so of course it can be another two weeks before he gets any.
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Look at something like the watchman system, a smart meter you can connect to which will give you exact levels. Some, I believe, can actually trigger reorders remotely, from your supplier. Probably a good idea to speak to his supplier about these type of systems and what they could advise on. They take a lot of worry away, I don’t use one myself so can’t endorse one from experience, but I work for a lubricant company and have seen these systems in use.
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@kerry Thanks for the useful suggestion. I had been thinking along those lines. We would have as much problem persuading him to have a system such as that as we are having trying to get him to monitor and manage his fuel consumption anyway. It’s a bit of “if I don’t think about it the problem will go away”!
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I lived in a cottage in Derbyshire for six years and I topped up the oil tank (total capacity 2500 or 3000 litres) with about 1800 to 2000 litres about every 14 months. It was a very well insulated house, so I guess this would be quite a reasonable benchmark for an good (i.e. economical) consumption.
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I use between 2100 and 2400 litres over the year depending on whether it’s a cold year or not. That’s on a 3 storey well insulated detached house.
We have a village syndicate ordering around 40,000 litres every month so negotiate great savings. Miles cheaper than gas I reckon and oil prices are still lower than I was paying 10 years ago.
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3 bed single storey with not particularly well insulated walls. Using about 1300 to 1500 litres a year, but that’s supplemented by a wood burner. This winters been a fairly cold one. Had a delivery in September, will dip the tank this afternoon to see what we’ve used since then. Consumption over xmas and new year is always high.
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The watchman wireless monitor we got with the new tank a few years back has been great – plug the receiver in to a socket as close to the tank as possible and it is simple to monitor the level – it even pops up a small filling nozzle when it gets down to approx 1/8 tank left to remind you to refill. Looking online, it seems you can get a wireless version (Watchman anywhere) that comes with an app for remote monitoring – possibly a solution that would give you the ability to discretely monitor the levels?
It would also be worth checking the tank – if it is an older (>10yr) plastic or steel and un bunded, it may be worth investing in a new bunded tank, having had the fun job of syphoning off some 800 litres of oil from our 1900L tank after it split on a Sunday evening.
We run a Rayburn and CH boiler in an uninsulated farmhouse from our 1200 L tank and order when it gets to less than a quarter tank – even if the oil company take a week to come out there’s still plenty of capacity (so far!).
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