I am thinking of purchasing a clothes dryer as we have a newborn baby and it is getting hard to get his clothes dry. I did a little bit of shopping around and I have to buy either a Condensor or Heat pump model. Vented model is not an option due to the inability of venting. There's a huge price difference between both Condensor model and heat pump model. I understand that the heat pump model uses very less electricity compared to condenser model. I read reviews about both models, some are quite happy but some were complaining about that these dryers were not drying clothes enough. Does anyone have a heat pump clothes dryer and what do you think? Does it really worth extra money? Any advice would be highly appreciated. Thanks.
Heat Pump Clothes Dryers advise
LDaniel on 28/05/2020 - 01:34
Comments
How much electricity would be saved by buying a heatpump/condensor dryer compared to the old fashioned tumble dryer? Probably not that much?
The cheapiest option would be buying a normal tumble dryer and running it during the free hour of power with Electric Kiwi, which is what I do personally.
OP has mentioned that they need a condenser or heatpump model due to the inability to vent, so old school options are not an option.
I was under the impression that he was talking about external venting. I just open a window.
I believe tumble dryers and condenser dryers use roughly the same amount of power.
A condenser does collect the water for you, so you do not have to vent out to the exterior of the house.
Tumble dryers and condensers use roughly $1.50 - $2 per cycle, while Heat Pump dryer use about $0.60.
So depending on how often you think you might use the dryer, you might be better off buying one over the other.
I have a Panasonic heat pump dryer, and my experience with it is that it does not completely dry the clothes in 1 cycle, even putting in the "extra dry" setting.
I often run the clothes through a 2nd cycle of drying (which is significantly quicker)
Also would like to point out that I do not separate the clothes, i.e just stick it all in there after the wash, so will be a mix of fabrics and thicknesses.
If cost is an important factor, i would consider looking for a used machine from TM or Facebook. Because during normal use only clean stuff should go into the dryer.Clothes wont be hot and dry with condensor/heatpump models. But dry enough.
Most people wont save much since a heatpump model as may cost 4 or 5 times as much anyway than your classic dryer.Someone gave us the best advise on dryers. Buy a Miele, and I am very impressed. Owned it for more than 6 years, and it still is amazing. You can't go wrong with a Miele. Will last for Decade
Heat Pump?
If conventional, not worth the price ?
Consumer did a write up on heat pump dryers. You had to use the dryer a lot to make the cost worthwhile. Sorry I can't remember the frequency you had to use the dryer but it was a lot!
Condenser dryers use slightly more power than vented dryers but the difference was small. I prefer condenser dryer because you retain the heat in the house from the dryer rather than vented it out and the other advantage is no need to vent.
I replaced my condenser dryer with a vented dryer however because we remodeled the laundry and wanted to wall hung a dryer above a bench and condenser dryers are too heavy to hang on a wall and also they don't support having the controls below the dryer (vented dryers can be installed in the wall upside down and you flip the control pad).
If you cannot afford a Miele then get the condenser. Heat pump dryers are difficult to fix.
In my experience and research it will come down to how much you literally will use them and your expected lifetime. I went through a similar exercise with the different types of hot water cylinders; at the time (this may have changed) the extra you paid for the more energy efficient models consumed all the expected savings over the (expected) lifetime of that unit, so in that case there was no actual incentive to getting to the more efficient models.
I would say the same may apply in this case. Work out the expected lifetime, how often you (realistically) will be using it, factor in your electricity rate, and see how long it takes to offset that initial cost burden with the savings from the more efficient unit.