# Interest group forums > Energy and Resource Conservation Forum >  Titanium Geyser Element: Solution To Reduce Your Hot Water Consumption By 50%?

## Gregorydee

As an Energy Efficient Advisor, we have looked at the domestic market and found that 40 - 60% of the total electricity bills are in heating from geysers. We also targeted businesses such as Guesthouses, Backpackers and Hostels and realised that on average, hot water consumption was accountable for more than 60% of the total power bill!

After identifying the needs in both the domestic and business markets, our company developed a Titanium Element with patented technology to reduce hot water consumption by 50%. This new technology utilises Positive Temperature Co-efficient (PTC) ceramic chips as a heat source instead of the conventional resistance-wire heating, which currently is the only type of heating element used in the S.A market. In a nutshell, the Titanium Element will heat up the water in your geyser at the same rate as the resistance-wire element but using 50% less power, hence the 50% saving in costs. 

Benefits and Advantages of The Titanium Element (Eco-element):

*It will save you 50% on your monthly geyser consumption
*The titanium element is self-regulating and energy efficient
*Compact design for ease of installation
*Long lifetime expectancy 
*Reliable and durable
*5 year guarantee and factory warranty
*5 year maintenance free planWhen moving house, it can easily be removed and re-installed
*No need to ever switch your geyser off to reduce consumption
*Free geyser controller that will limit the amount of run time of your element yet ensuring 24hrs of    running hot water
*SANS (SABS) approved and accepted by all major geyser manufacturers

I am currently conducting free power audits on geysers in the Western Cape to residential units, guest houses, hostels, hotels, backpackers and any other businesses who are looking to reduce costs. The audit will show your actual costs vs the savings when installing the Eco-Titanium Element, taking into consideration the already approved 12.39% price increase from Eskom. Bearing in mind, that Municipalities will also place a surcharge when dispensing to consumers. The price hike could be in the region of 16% year on year for the next 5 years. 

If you would like to take advantage of the free audit for your home or business, please feel free to reply to this post or you may contact me on my mobile on 27 793202632.

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## AndyD

> As an Energy Efficient Advisor,


What's the name of your company please? From your Google+ account I'm assuming it's Thomo Plumbing and / or EcoDirect maybe????  




> our company developed a Titanium Element with patented technology


After Googling the phone number you've given I found your post on your Google+ account. It appears you've taken a product that wasn't, as you claim, developed by you and you've set up to missell it as an energy saving device. 

The problem you have is the laws of physics which categorically state (and they refuse to negotiate on this) that to raise a volume of water by a certain temperature requires a given amount of heat input which, in turn, requires a given amount of electrical energy to produce it. An normal element submersed into the water is 100% efficient at converting electrical energy into heat energy. Here's a high school physics explanation.  





> This new technology utilises Positive Temperature Co-efficient (PTC) ceramic chips as a heat source instead of the conventional resistance-wire heating,


Not new technology, it's been around and widely used fer decades. The heating efficiency of a PTC heater is identical to the efficiency of a normal element, the difference with PTC heaters is that they self-limit their temperature so they can be used without thermostats and safety limit devices in the correct applications and they're often use to heat temperature sensitive materials that would be damaged by the unregulated surface temperatures of a standard element. 




> In a nutshell, the Titanium Element will heat up the water in your geyser at the same rate as the resistance-wire element but using 50% less power, hence the 50% saving in costs.


 *Simply not true*, please show real evidence.

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## IanF

Would an induction geyser use less power? http://greenyourhome.co.za/saving-el...uction-geysers
Ok I trained as an accountant so could be wrong.

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## AndyD

Induction heating has some advantages, mainly that losses are lower especially in stoves because using induction to transfer the heat causes only the base of the pot to get hot and not the surrounding air whereas with a gas or normal electric hob a lot of heat is lost to the surrounding surfaces and air. 

With a geyser the element is submerged in the water it's heating so there's almost no transfer losses, all the heat produced within the element has nowhere else to go except into the surrounding water. In this case induction heating wouldn't have any advantages, in fact induction heaters would have slightly higher losses because the large coils that transmit the energy to the conductive material inside the geyser make a small amount of heat that doesn't end up heating the water. As with the PTC heaters discussed in this thread, it doesn't matter how you make the heat from the electrical energy being supplied, you're always going to get the same amount of heat from the same quantity of electricity.

The old fashioned element type geyser is actually nearly 100% efficient at converting electricity into heat and putting that heat into the water. The only inefficiency it has is the heat losses to the surroundings through the insulation from the hot water it holds but these are storage losses, not conversion losses during the heating process.

If you want a cheaper way of heating water using just electricity then a heat-pump would be your weapon of choice. The big difference is that a heat pump relocates heat from the surroundings in one area to the surroundings in another area so it's not actually converting the electricity into heat as such, it's using the electrical energy to move heat that's already existing from one place to another where it's more useful.

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## Dave A

I took the liberty of moving part of a conversation in the moderators area into this thread as I believe it is helpful to the general public to know these things.

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## Justloadit

There is an inefficiency that creeps in over time with resistance heater elements in geysers. If you have water with a high calcium or mineral  content, the deposit of this material on the heater surface then creates an insulation between the heating element and the water, thus reducing the heat transfer. This means that it takes a longer time to heat your water, increasing the electricity bill. When the build up starts, then the deposit of more minerals on the heater is accelerated due to the insulation being created, and the heater fails, as invariably a hot spot occurs which causes the element at that point to increase in temperature as it is no longer transferred to the water.

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## Dave A

> There is an inefficiency that creeps in over time with resistance heater elements in geysers. If you have water with a high calcium or mineral  content, the deposit of this material on the heater surface then creates an insulation between the heating element and the water, thus reducing the heat transfer. This means that it takes a longer time to heat your water, increasing the electricity bill.


There is a fundamental law of physics in play though - so where is the "energy loss" going? Getting bound up in potential chemical energy?
(Which even then, I wouldn't have thought would add up to overly much, frankly).

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## AndyD

A coating of scale (calcium carbonate) would obstruct the transfer of heat to the water in varying degrees depending on it's thickness and structure and in doing so it would cause the tube of the element to become hotter. With a lot of calcium the outcome would be a shorter element lifespan and eventual catastrophic failure when the tube surface temperature becomes hot enough to rupture and expose the internal mica insulation to water ingress. The issue would be that if there was that much calcium in the water it would also block the pipes and taps etc so there would be little, if any mileage in just fitting a calcium resistant element. You'd need to treat the calcium with a softener or some other hard water treatment system.

Other effects of calcium build-up could be something I'll refer to as 'run-on' which is where there's heat contained in the element itself and in the surrounding calcium that hasn't yet been transferred to the water so when the thermostat switches off you might see the water temperature still continue to rise over the following minutes whilst the temperature gradient levels off even though the element isn't producing new heat at that time. With 150 or 200 litre volume of water, I wouldn't expect this run-on to be very pronounced unless there was a substantial quantity of calcium and I've never heard of it being a real-life issue with a geyser or even with any kind of industrial heating system.

Calcium build-up wouldn't decrease the efficiency of the geyser unless it was causing heat to be dissipated somewhere other than the water. If there was a substantial quantity, like enough to physically bridge between the element and the tank and this caused the tank itself to become hotter than the water than maybe it could cause marginally higher losses through the insulation. Firstly if there's that much scale in the system it's going to be an issue regardless of the type of heater or element being used and secondly I wouldn't imagine these extra losses, should they ever occur in real life, would be very significant and certainly nowhere even close to the efficiency improvements being touted in the sales bumf.

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## Justloadit

Talking about elements and geysers

I have just finished off developing a system, in which you do not have to remove the geyser element. Connecting PV panels directly to any type of load with out an intelligent controller is extremely inefficient. PV panels are what we call constant current supplies, in other words, irrespective of the load draw, the panel will supply a constant current value.

An example, if we take a 250W PV panel, which at midday can give you 30V at 8.4Amps totaling 252Watts effectively, and you connect this directly to a flat 12V car battery, then the panel will supply 12V at 8.4A only, totaling 101Watts. You are losing 149Watts. An electronic device, known as an MPPT controller, will match the load to the panel, in other words the controller if designed for a 12V load, will convert the panel power to 12V at 21Amps. Far more power than the conventional method.

Replacing the element in the geyser to 750W 24-48V element will work with an MPPT, however, the currents at 24V and 48V are very high, causing the use of expensive very thick battery cables to ensure that there is no loss in the cables during full load, and also to ensure that the cables do not heat up with the high current. This makes the installation difficult and costly.

Here with my brochure.
Attachment 6113

It may not be cheaper than the vacuum tubes or direct solar heating systems at first glance, but installation of this unit is a couple of hours, and only requires the connection of a few electrical wires, as compared to the direct solar water heaters, which require modification of pipe work and additional plumbing, modification to roof, requirement of a heat exchanger with a specially designed geyser for the application, circulating pumps and controllers, and the additional weight on the roof of the circulating water and reservoir tank.

Ideally suited in the addition of alternative energy to an already built home using an electrical geyser.

Feel free to request distributors price list

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Dave A (19-May-16)

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## SilverNodashi

> Talking about elements and geysers
> 
> I have just finished off developing a system, in which you do not have to remove the geyser element. Connecting PV panels directly to any type of load with out an intelligent controller is extremely inefficient. PV panels are what we call constant current supplies, in other words, irrespective of the load draw, the panel will supply a constant current value.
> 
> An example, if we take a 250W PV panel, which at midday can give you 30V at 8.4Amps totaling 252Watts effectively, and you connect this directly to a flat 12V car battery, then the panel will supply 12V at 8.4A only, totaling 101Watts. You are losing 149Watts. An electronic device, known as an MPPT controller, will match the load to the panel, in other words the controller if designed for a 12V load, will convert the panel power to 12V at 21Amps. Far more power than the conventional method.
> 
> Replacing the element in the geyser to 750W 24-48V element will work with an MPPT, however, the currents at 24V and 48V are very high, causing the use of expensive very thick battery cables to ensure that there is no loss in the cables during full load, and also to ensure that the cables do not heat up with the high current. This makes the installation difficult and costly.
> 
> Here with my brochure.
> ...


I am / was interested in your equipment, but there's no prices on your website?

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## Justloadit

> I am / was interested in your equipment, but there's no prices on your website?


Send me your email address and I will get it to you.

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## Dave888

Please let me have some pricing. Thanks.

dave@solarex.co.za

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## richardpickering

I know this is old, but thought that it was worth replying. We have an element that we are about to launch that works specifically with horizontal Kwikot geysers. It delivers 20-45% savings on a standard coil. The inventors of this have done many labs tests. We have done field tests measuring water and power use on the geyser and confirmed results. I know this sound untrue, but the figures speak for themselves. 
The issue with the argument about a specific amount of power heating a specific amount of water is that it does not take into account: standing losses and heating inefficiencies inherent in the current element structure. 
In 2 test cases we did, both 150 liter geysers, one a house of 2 people using 140l average per day, one a house of 4 people using 245l. The 2 person house used an average of 44 watts per liter, the bigger house used 36, with the standard coil. With the new coil this changed to 35 for the small house and 24 for the larger house. Savings of 20% and 33% respectively. 
We are continuing field tests for the rest of this year to ensure that we can be confident of the savings in different situations. What has become very clear is that how you use the water (the draw off profile) and the amount used relative to the size of the geyser does have a significant impact. I am not an engineer. I am surrounded by them and none would believe a word of this. The evidence is clear and they are now gently baffled, but gaining belief. 
We will launch early in 2017. We will have many customer testimonials with measured results. Northface will not sell a product that is not tested by us and proven effective.

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## AndyD

Hi Richard, welcome to the forum.



> .....The issue with the argument about a specific amount of power heating a specific amount of water is that it does not take into account: standing losses and heating inefficiencies inherent in the current element structure.


It was already covered previously in this thread why a standard geyser element is already very close to being 100% efficient at converting electrical energy into heat energy and putting that heat energy into the water in a geyser. There are no 'heating inefficiencies inherrent in the current element structure'. 

Standing losses are, as their name suggests, heat losses through the insulation over time as the hot water is standing. Standing losses of an insulated cylinder/geyser will be identical regardless of the type of element that initially heated the water.

You could, in theory, reduce standing losses by either heating the water to a lower final temperature or even by heating the water slower so the standing temperature is lower for longer but either way that's not about the 'type' of element, it's only about the power of the element being lower. The flip side of reducing the power of the element is that the water takes longer to heat so you're more likely to suffer with cold water during times of high demand.  





> In 2 test cases we did, both 150 liter geysers, one a house of 2 people using 140l average per day, one a house of 4 people using 245l. The 2 person house used an average of 44 watts per liter, the bigger house used 36, with the standard coil. With the new coil this changed to 35 for the small house and 24 for the larger house. Savings of 20% and 33% respectively.


 If you're electrical energy consumption was reduced then either less volume of hot water was produced or the same volume was produced but it was at a lower temperature.




> What has become very clear is that how you use the water (the draw off profile) and the amount used relative to the size of the geyser does have a significant impact.


 Erm yes, if the 'draw off profile' has an effect on how much hot water is being consumed then yes it would have a significant impact on power consumption but I don't see the link between the 'draw off profile' and the element.




> We will launch early in 2017. We will have many customer testimonials with measured results. Northface will not sell a product that is not tested by us and proven effective.


 After a quick Google it appears Northface already have it for sale on their website;



> Econocoil - efficient water heating
> 
> 
> 
> Save 20-40% of your water heating bill simply by changing to this element. Applies only to Kwikot 150l horizontal geysers.
> 
> Read more
> 
>     The Econocoil minimises the heat losses and maximises the heating efficiency of the geyser. It does this by moving the heated part of the element further from the edge of the geyser and using convection to move the hot water to the more insulated part of the geyser.
> ...


A couple of things confusing me here, firstly the claimed savings on the website go as high as 40%. Secondly the way it's claimed it saves energy is _by moving the heated part of the element further from the edge of the geyser and using convection to move the hot water to the more insulated part of the geyser_ 

So, by the element being a different shape it's possible to reduce electrical consumption by 40%...??? Bold claims indeed, call me a sceptic but I'd like to see the proof.

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## Justloadit

I am with Andy on this one. An element is actually a resistor, which currently is the most efficient load/heat transfer for electricity, unlike inductive loads causing higher currents to get the amount of energy from the supply to the load.
So moving the element (resistor) around in a metal enclosure with water is not going to make the amount of energy less or more required to heat a litre of water from a specific temperature to another specific temperature.
There are 3 parts, which will change the amount of energy required to heat up a litre of water
1. The amount of heat loss into the environment
2. The change in temperature from x and to y
3. How quickly you want to heat the water from x to y

The higher the final temperature, the more energy required, because the heat loss starts creeping into the system.
The quicker you want to heat the water, the higher the instantaneous energy is required.

At the end, the amount of energy((KWH) in both the cases, higher temperature and time, will translate to the same in kilowatt hours, provided the insulation on the geyser is good. The difference is the size of the electrical wire to carry the current for the higher instant energy applied.

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## richardpickering

Thanks for the Welcome Andy D. I am not an expert as many of you on this forum clearly are. I am only an accountant and software guy, 12 months into the renewable space. 
Obviously the Econocoil claims are bold. I have yet to meet anybody, myself included, who is not massively skeptical. Hence the fact that we are measuring performance in peoples homes. We only listed the product once we had the field results in. Lab results are consistent, but only lab results. 

Every engineer I know has said it is not possible, or it is possible, but not to such a degree. We will be collecting more measured information as we install more units. 
We are using water and power loggers on the geysers to ensure that data is available. If there is anybody on this forum who has a 150 or 200 l horizontal Kwikot I would love to offer you a free trial (with full metering) so we can get your views. We operate in Cape Town.

I will post additional results here as I get them. I would value anybody's input. Essentially I have evidence to date that it works. I need more as we will only sell something to our customers that does what it claims. 
Essentially the point i think that is not being discussed sufficiently is that there is a big metal plate on the Kwikot. This loses far more hear than any other part of the geyser. Moving the heating process as well as the hot water from this point has a significant impact. 
You are right to be skeptical. Who wants to test it out?!  :Smile:  Free.

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## SilverNodashi

I agree with Andy on this, these claims are probably just "fancy sales pitch". The 40% savings is far too much in my opinion. In fact, I don't see how this can save any money at all, regardless of the fact that it's a bit further away from the metal plate. Doesn't make any sense at all. I would have been happy to run a trail, but I guess the best way to run a proper trail, would have been to have two identical geysers, with identical plumbing, and then take out say 100L of both at a time, and then record the energy used and time needed to heatup to the same temperature, say 60 degrees Celcius.

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## richardpickering

Folks, there is not a single engineer who believed the claims. We have converted many, who remain a bit baffled. I only care about the numbers, I have no engineering skills to throw at the problem. 
I can only assure you that we will not deliver a sales line that is not backed up by measured proof. We are in the process of field testing. We will install metering equipment (power and water) with the next 10 customer installations. 
The claims are crazy. We had the same reaction. I am happy to share the lab test results and the results from the field. These follow the tests that you have outlined above. In our tests we tested different draw off profiles, but all over a 24 hour period, even if there was only 1 draw. We also measured the exit temperature of the water from the tank at the end and adjusted for temperature differential. 

In the field we have measured a week of use with standard coil and then our one. This is obviously the test than counts and we need to see how the savings compare in different use-cases. 
We are continuing with these tests and will publish them all on the website. We will only officially launch the product in Jan 2017, assuming that the results from our field tests continue to verify what we have found in the lab. 
If anybody on this thread is in Cape Town and would like to be included in the tests then I am happy to do this. If you are converted you can buy your Econocoil.  :Smile:  If not we will remove all the equipment, return your original element and publish your results with the rest of the ones that we collect.

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## SilverNodashi

> Folks, there is not a single engineer who believed the claims. We have converted many, who remain a bit baffled. I only care about the numbers, I have no engineering skills to throw at the problem. 
> I can only assure you that we will not deliver a sales line that is not backed up by measured proof. We are in the process of field testing. We will install metering equipment (power and water) with the next 10 customer installations. 
> The claims are crazy. We had the same reaction. I am happy to share the lab test results and the results from the field. These follow the tests that you have outlined above. In our tests we tested different draw off profiles, but all over a 24 hour period, even if there was only 1 draw. We also measured the exit temperature of the water from the tank at the end and adjusted for temperature differential. 
> 
> In the field we have measured a week of use with standard coil and then our one. This is obviously the test than counts and we need to see how the savings compare in different use-cases. 
> We are continuing with these tests and will publish them all on the website. We will only officially launch the product in Jan 2017, assuming that the results from our field tests continue to verify what we have found in the lab. 
> If anybody on this thread is in Cape Town and would like to be included in the tests then I am happy to do this. If you are converted you can buy your Econocoil.  If not we will remove all the equipment, return your original element and publish your results with the rest of the ones that we collect.


So, please explain to me, how exactly do you get more efficiency out of an element? 40% in your case? Crunching the numbers, it means a 1Kw element only need 600W to heat up the same amount of water, over the same time period to the same temperature, or 1200W on a 2KW, or 1800W on a 3KW element!

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## Justloadit

Their is a finite amount of energy required to heat up a litre of water, irrespective of the method used. In some instances the cost of energy due to the type of energy may cost more or less. In this case we are referring to a resistive element used to transfer the heat generated by the element to the water. This is called specific heat




> Specific heat is a physical property of materials. It is used to describe heat transfer. The specific heat of a material is an intensive property that is independent of the amount of a substance. It is defined as the amount of energy needed to heat one gram of the substance by 1 degree Celsius. The mathematical expression is    Specific heat =   calories  /  grams oC
> 
> Specific heat is essential when designing engine cooling systems, constructing electronic circuits so they do not overheat, designing refrigeration equipment and everything that involves heat transfer.
> 
> The amount of heat needed to increase the temperature of any object can be figured using this relationship.
> Heat in calories = mass in gram x temperature change oC  x specific heat [ cal / gram oC]
> The formula has four terms in it. You can calculate any of them if you have the other three.


So how can a resistive element be more efficient than another resistive element when fed with the same amount of energy?

What may not be disclosed here, is that an intelligent device is connected to the geyser, which then uses an algorithm to calculate when power is applied to the element. This then will give you the types of electrical savings as claimed, but simply changing an element of the same value to another of the same value WILL NOT SAVE YOU ENERGY. Adding a geyser blanket and cladding pipe work is another means of reducing standing losses.

I think that the whole story is not being published.

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## SilverNodashi

> Their is a finite amount of energy required to heat up a litre of water, irrespective of the method used. In some instances the cost of energy due to the type of energy may cost more or less. In this case we are referring to a resistive element used to transfer the heat generated by the element to the water. This is called specific heat
> 
> 
> So how can a resistive element be more efficient than another resistive element when fed with the same amount of energy?
> 
> What may not be disclosed here, is that an intelligent device is connected to the geyser, which then uses an algorithm to calculate when power is applied to the element. This then will give you the types of electrical savings as claimed, but simply changing an element of the same value to another of the same value WILL NOT SAVE YOU ENERGY. Adding a geyser blanket and cladding pipe work is another means of reducing standing losses.
> 
> I think that the whole story is not being published.


Unless current geyser element are really very inefficient, and this version has improved on the design?

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## Justloadit

An element which is a meter long and 2KWatt, or 300mm long and 2Kwatt, will still produce the same amount of heating energy, the only difference, is that the temperature along the longer element may be less at the surface area than the shorter element, BUT this does not mean that the shorter element is more efficient in heating the water than the longer element, what it would do, if you were using it to heat barley or some other organic material, is to burn on the surface of the shorter element any organic material. Water is not organic, and therefor makes no difference at what temperature is on the surface of the element, the heat will be absorbed by the water, and will pass on to the cooler parts of the geyser, thereby equalizing the total temperature through out the vessel. If there are temperature differences, then this would be due to lost heat to the environment at the points where the temperature is lower.

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## AndyD

> ......Essentially the point i think that is not being discussed sufficiently is that there is a big metal plate on the Kwikot. This loses far more hear than any other part of the geyser. Moving the heating process as well as the hot water from this point has a significant impact......


I'm not an expert on Kwikot 150 litre geysers but I will be in the next few days because I have an old one in my workshop that was left in the roof space by the bone idle lazy plumbers who replaced it under warranty last year and the first time I get a chance it will be disected on my workbench.

Reading between the lines here I'm guessing the big metal plate you're referring to may be an internal baffle inside the cylinder perhaps.

Any components inside the cylinder, including any metal plates, will have heat losses but those losses are determined by two things, the temperature difference between the internal cylinder and the surrounding environment and the quality of the insulation that surrounds the cylinder.

If there is an internal baffle plate then altering the length of the element could have a profound effect on the circulation of the water inside the geyser whilst it's being heated. It could have an effect on the temperature gradient between water at the bottom of the cylinder and water at the top. It could even result in a large percentage of the water in the cylinder remaining cold or cool due to lack of circulation during heating.

Regardless of the numerous possibilities one thing is certain, if the geyser is consuming less electricity with the new element arrangement then it's producing less hot water. Yes, the water that comes out when a tap is turned on may be at the same temperature that it was with the old element but there will be less of it available so during high demand times the geyser water will become cold sooner. You're effectively taking a 150litre geyser and turning it into one that only produces 120 litres or maybe 100 litres of hot water. Could it produce electricity savings? Maybe it could but I still doubt it would be even remotely close to the 40% claims and if its a family of four or five people there's a good chance a couple of them will be taking cold showers. 

However you wiggle and jiggle the element in a geyser, any savings will be at a cost, you'll always end up robbing Peter to pay Paul.

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## richardpickering

Thank you all for the active feedback. I am not yet certain of the savings and we are doing field tests. Once complete I will share the results either way. Signing off until I have more information back from the field. We will not be selling this to a soul if the evidence in the field does not continue to back up the numbers from the lab. 
WRT to the last point about less hot water, the lab tests include emptying the geyser and measuring the the average water temperature to add back/subtract from the other power measurements for remaining energy in the geyser. I will bug you all no more until I have more numbers.

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## SilverNodashi

It would be worthwhile to log all data, i.e. ambient and internal water temperature, energy used / consumed, and water disposed / re-filled during the test periods.

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## richardpickering

Hi Again

We have just launched this product to market. Please see www.econocoilsa.co.za for the test reports and video. I know there are many skeptics borne of many unfulfilled promises of efficiency. 
I would value your expert feedback on our information. 

Our field tests delivered an average of 33% saving. This was in 5 separate homes. We measured water flow through the geyser and power using an effergy meter on the element line. The tests were done for 2-4 weeks with the standard element & Econocoil. 

I look forward to taking heat from you again!

Cheers
Rich

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## AndyD

None of the links on the website to the Skeg full 20 page report work, I tried Firefox and Opera so I'm guessing it's a website technical issue.

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## richardpickering

Thanks Andy. Dumb error on website. Thank you for picking it up. It is now fixed.

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## Dave888

I still don't understand how this element can save this much electricity. As many posts have mentioned, Q=mCp(T1-T2), so heating m litres of water by y degrees will require a defined amount of energy. The only variable will be the heat losses.

The website states that the energy saving is achieved by mixing the water inside the geyser more efficiently, dropping the temperature in the top section by say 20 deg, which then leads to lower heat transfer. I agree, and a quick calculation will show that the reduced heat flow of an insulated section at 60 deg vs 80 deg is about 28%. But then the temperature of the whole geyser is higher, and losses will be higher over the entire surface of the cylinder, not just the top section. So I suspect savings are not very significant.

Heat loss depends totally on the insulation of the geyser tank and the temperature of the surrounding air. Geysers manufactured to SABS standards are controlled in terms of their standing heat loss and the insulation requirements are regulated by SANS 151. The maximum allowable heat loss for a 150lt capacity geyser (most common geyser size) is 2.6kW per 24 hours at a stored water temperature setting at 65 degrees C and no water is drawn off during the 24 hour period. This translates to a temperature loss of between 10 to 12 degrees C over the 24 hour period. If 150litres uses 8,7kWh to heat from 20 to 65 deg, standing losses are less than 30% (in my opinion, still much too high).

You would get a 31% saving in heat losses simply by doubling the thickness of the insulation.

The maximum saving by dropping the temperature in the top section by 20 degrees may be (optimistically) around 0,5kWh per day. Say 15kWh per month (= R30 to R40 pm). The average house uses 30kWh per day, so the total saving will only be about 1,5% of the total bill.

BTW, an Xtreme non-ferrous geyser (which is very well insulated) has a temperature drop of about 1 deg/24hrs, so is a lot better than a conventional steel geyser.


Secondly, stratification in a geyser is actually a good thing - it allows the use of the hot water from the top of the tank, while fresh cold water flows into the bottom, and is not allowed to mix with the hot water. This is why many geysers have baffles - specifically to prevent mixing of hot and cold.

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AndyD (13-Feb-17)

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## Justloadit

OK downloaded the report.
I noted an error on table 3, 2nd line, Volume - 30L standard element temperature shows 30, I suspect that this should be 60 Degrees.

I also noted that Under Apparatus it shows that the Econocoil is 3.0KW and the standard element is 3.0KW, however in 5.1 Appendix 1: Heat Distribution Test it shows the Econocoil as 2.0KW and standard element as 3.0KW

I will need time to study the report, just do not have the time right now. 
Depending on the Econocoil rating, it may have an influence on the how one interprets the results.
I think I understand what the position of the econocoil is doing, by it's position, improving the distribution of the heat of the water in the geyser due to natural convection movement of heated water, as opposed to the element in the centre.

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## Solar Advice

Actually uses 15% less energy only. The "close to 50%"only comes with the addition of the thermal controller and assumes that your geyser thermostat is turned up to a temperature higher than 55 degrees.

It definitely saves no doubt, just not as boldly stated.

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## Houses4Rent

I think the main problem is the Kwilkot geyser. Why does it only work on Kwikot? I renamed them Kwikcrap as they frequently burst before the 3y warranty is up (no, not 5y anymore). So what good is a different element to save electricity if the geyser fails far too early. I manage 130 properties and have been through many geyser replacements in the last 10 years. If I have a choice I chose anything, but never Kwikcrap. They tried to cheat me twice so I have a passionate aversion against them.   
I happily spend a small fortune and installed a 10y warranty solar geyser last year. As my electricity consumption was quite low already before the installation it will never pay itself off. But I am very happy that my element only kicks in 0-5h a month in last 4 months and that I doing my share of being environmentally friendly. Its very pleasing to shower with hot water and not having paid Eskom for it. Now we have a water problem in the Cape, but that is a different topic.

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## AbrieD

Hi Andy, 

I am doing plumbing for many years, and and energy efficient system still have to be developed. 
This solar hype that started several years ago turned out to be just a new money making scheme. 

Every solar heated system needs Escom backup, and the solar company advertising the BIG savings, 
also require that a timer switch be installed and set to 2 hours morning and 2 hours afternoon heating. 
So the real saving is the timer of R 300.00, and not so much the solar of R 20,000.00+

A company with the name Nu Inc ( http://nu-inc.co.za/nuthermo/titanium-elements/ ) then claim that their titanium 
element, using PTC heating elements (ceramic chips), is the answer, saving up to 50%. With an additional benefit: lime does 
not stick to titanium. 
This area has heavy lime deposits, causing regular element failures, up to 5 times per year. I saw elements, that lasted more than a year, 
with such heavy lime deposits, that the element could not be recognized as an element anymore. 

As said before on this forum, the form of heating will not make a difference to the energy used.
Please take a look at this element, and tell me if you agree to what is claimed??

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