Using King Electric Heaters to Supplement a Ductless Mini-Split in Cold Weather
While high-efficiency VRF heat pumps and ductless mini-splits have grown in popularity among homeowners to keep their families warm during the heating season, a major limitation is their lack of performance in subfreezing temperatures.
Because Heat pump mini-splits transfer heat into your home from outside air, they don’t work well in temperatures below 30-45 degrees Fahrenheit. They can be easily overtasked when dealing with subfreezing temperatures, reducing the heat pumps’ efficiency, the very thing that makes them so desirable. This causes them to produce less heat than the room requires, affecting the comfort of the room.
Installing a King electric heater for supplemental heating is one of the best ways to address this dilemma. The result is a far more efficiency in terms of the overall system’s Heating Seasonal Performance Factor (HSPF).
Before purchasing a ductless mini-split system, always discuss with your HVAC specialist or installer to calculate the room’s Balance Point and recommend the appropriate sized heater to supplement the heat pump that is being recommended.
King Electric heaters are a great compliment to ductless heat pumps because they are far more economical, not to mention easier to install in auxiliary rooms, than additional ductless heat pumps.
A fan heater operates by using a fan to push cold air over a heating element to maximize the heat output as it pushes hot air out into the room. In 1984, King introduced the innovative Pic-A-Watt heating element, which offers multiple wattage options, which means most heaters can easily be tailored to the specific room’s heating requirement. Available in wall mount, ceiling mount or installed in the kick space of cabinets.
Cove heaters combine the quick comfort of radiant heat along with the sustained warmth of convection heat requiring a much lower temperature to achieve the same level of heat transfer. Installed high on the wall heating objects in much the same way as the sun heats the earth and the air outside. As objects in the room become warm, the surrounding air picks up heat by conduction and the entire room maintains consistently comfortable.
This is the most basic type of electric heater used in apartments and certainly the cheapest of all. Electric baseboard heaters work by drawing the cool air near the floor over heated metal fins and then the convection air current pushes the warm air back into the room. They are usually installed under the windows of each room but because of their large size take up valuable floor space which can affect furniture placement in the room.