Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Sapa]

I have read in a few different posts recently where in one thread everyone was saying ondol was cheaper and in the other it was cheaper to use an electrical heater. So which one is it? I guess it depends on the size of your place and which rooms you want to heat? I have 3 big rooms and a long hallway that all get heated up by the ondol. So it's probably cheaper just to have an electric heater in whatever room I'm in, right? right?
How much is it for an electric heater?

[Jeff's Cigarettes]

ELECTRIC HEATERS ARE DANGEROUS. And, electricity once it get's to a certain point is very expensive.

[bassexpander]

You don't have to heat all of your rooms with ondol all of the time. There is a pipe with butterfly valve controls on it that allows you to turn different areas/rooms on and off to save money.

We don't pay utilities at our current place (my school does) but if we were paying our own, we'd probably keep our ondol set at 22 degrees when home, and 20 when not. We don't put it lower than 20, because it takes more energy to raise the heat (and hours) to bring it back up.

Using an electric blanket or electric mat for your bed instead of the Ondol is probably more expensive, in my opinion, unless you're a total miser. Of course, this depends where you live and how much electricity you use. Electricity costs are not the same for everyone -- did you know that? Officetels and apartments pay much higher utility rates than older-style villa places do.

Personally, I think people are better off running the Ondol as I've mentioned. By the way, my Kiturami Ondol (it's only a year old) has a vacation setting. If I go on vacation, this setting keeps the water in the pipes just warm enough that it doesn't freeze. If you decide not to run your ondol, you'd want to leave it on a setting like that, because if your ondol pipes burst, you're in for a lot of expense!

[Sapa]

my ondol control has a lowest number of 40 and a high of 80. So should I just keep it at 40? I presume these numbers aren't for celsius?

BTW, I just went into my kitchen and there is about 3 inches of ice in the rice cooker pot, ice in the sink and no water is coming out of the tap! My kitchen can only be described as a kind of conservatory/greenhouse that rings around the outside of the building seven storeys up. It's bizarre, I have no idea how I'm supposed to do anything out there in the winter, or how anyone lives like this. There's no heating system out there. It can be nice and toasty with the ondol in the house, you slide back the door to the kitchen and it's like stepping into a freezer.

[saw6436]

^^Sounds like the balcony of your building was converted into a living space.

[MrRogers]

Regarding OP and the cost of ondol versus the electric heater, where I live it depends on which gas company your apartment uses.

The gas is very expensive here so I just turn the ondol on low for a couple of hours to heat up and take the dampness out and then turn it off...sleep with it off. Leave it off during the day when I am at the schools.

I also use a very small electric heater (because the dumpy "apartment" (NOT) the school district gave me is small) to warm up the air so I don't have to turn the ondol on again. Then turn off the electric when it is sufficiently warm. Sleep with it off.

[Sapa]

so now I cannot do any washing probably all weekend until the temperature gets above freezing.
I obviously going to have to remember to keep the tap running next time we have this weather.

[Join Me]

I have heated my apartment both ways. I found the cost to be about the same. Now I keep the ondal on low and use a space heater that has a thermostat built in. I find that is a better way to keep the apartment heated at a more consistent temp and I can just toss the space heater in the bathroom (not heated) ten minutes before I go in for a shower in the morning to warm it up.

[eamo]

If you have a fairly modern and compact apartment, ondol will be much better. Just leave it on minimum when you got out to prevent your pipes from freezing.

If you turn off your ondol completely you not only run the risk of having your pipes freeze, but you'll also need a lot of gas to get that concrete floor warm again.

Most Koreans turn on their ondol sometime in early Winter and then leave it on 24/7 until early spring.

If you live in a big old draughty 'villa' apartment, then ondol might be wasteful. You might try to insulate one room well, get a space heater, and just hunker down in that room until Spring..........

..........but I've heard horror stories of people using space heaters and getting 300,000/per month power bills.

[brento1138]

Here's a tip. Koreans sleep on the floor for a good reason... because being directly on the warm floor keeps you very nicely warm. You don't have to be using too much ondol for that. What I did was put a matress on the floor, and sleep on that. Even if the ondol is on the lowest setting possible, you can be toasty warm. Also, it pays to live on a higher floor in an apartment building, since heat rises...

[saw6436]

Your Ondol thermostat may also have a timer setting. We generally keep ours on 10/50 (meaning the boiler is running for 10 minutes and off for 50 minutes) or on 20/40. We also keep the temp set on 45. I am on city gas (which is cheaper). Our 34 pyung, 3 bdr, 2 bth apartment costs about W60,000 per month in winter. Roughly W5,000 in other seasons.

We have one small side balcony that I have appropriated as an office space (1 1/2 meters by 2 1/2 meters). I keep an electric space heater in there but have not noticed any real change in our electric bill.

[bassexpander]

I'm really curious what those 40 or 80 markings mean.

[prairiemaker]

We are on the thirteenth floor in a three bedroom apartment. It is supposed to be one of the better apartments in Wonju, if there is such a thing. However, it is really put together loose. The sliding doors on two sides were letting in a lot of cold. My wife from the Philippines, last year was averaging three to four hundred dollars a month bills, during the winter, which made me want to cry. Even with these huge monthly bills she was always cold though because the apartment was always drafty.

We went to E-mart this year and spent forty dollars on that grey window foam and then duck taped over that. After this we put plastic up over the balcony windows in the bedroom we use as a closet. Now we are toasty. I cannot believe what a difference it has made. We turned our heat on for the first time last night. There have been a couple of mornings it was down to 21 but I turned on the stove and put a fan by it for about thirty minutes and it warmed right up. Normally during the day it reaches 23 and then drops back down to 21 -22 at night. The heat seems to rise up and with no drafts my wife is no longer cold. The forty dollars we spent to stop the drafts, and the six hours of labor, has been the best move we have made.

I would like to take credit for the incredible genius behind the idea to insulate, but an earlier poster mentioned this and said it hade made a difference. I am glad we did it and would urge you to do the same.

[victorology]

The 40-80 indicates the temperature you want to heat the water to. In the months where you only use hot water for the shower, you may not need the water to be so hot. In the winter, you'll want the water to be heated to a higher temperature so you can change it.

[Sapa]