How much does an Oil-filled Radiator weigh?

How much does an oil-filled radiator weigh? The weight of an oil heater becomes important when you are moving it frequently. Especially when you get one heater to heat multiple rooms, it is important, that the heater is easy to carry around.

On the other side, when you have children or pets at home, having a heavy heater is an advantage. Heavy heaters stand their place and do not tip over as easily as lightweight space heaters.

In this article, we’re having a look at the weights of oil-filled radiators and what you can expect when you are buying a new oil-filled radiator.

Quick answer: An average oil-filled radiator weighs 18.9 pounds. The maximum weight is around 27 pounds. The lightest oil-filled radiator weighs around 8.6 pounds. But the light heater also outputs less heat and draws only 700W power, instead of the regular 1500W. Heavier heaters tend to have higher heat output.

As you see, the weight of oil-filled heaters varies quite a bit. And maybe the quick answer was a little too dense information. Let’s break all the info down. I’ll show you how I got all the numbers.

How I found the average weight of oil-filled radiators

My approach to finding the average weight of oil-filled radiators is simple and easy to reproduce. Instead of purchasing different models and putting all of them on a weight scale, I collected the weight values of 10 different random oil-filled radiators online.

Each of the heaters had their weight noted on their sales page. Then, I put all the data in an Excel spreadsheet and performed some math magic.

Here are the oil-filled radiator weight values that I have collected:

The last row of the table above already depicts the average weight of the oil-filled radiator samples.

One of the heaters is a smaller oil heater. It outputs just 700W of heat instead of 1500W. Since it is the only such heater on the list, I wonder what the average weight of a 1500W heater is.

To calculate this, I have redone the calculation above but left out the 700W heater. I came to the following conclusion:

The average 1500W oil-filled radiator weighs 20 pounds.

Why do oil heaters weigh so much?

Of all kinds of electric space heaters, oil-filled heaters are the heaviest. This is because they usually have this big metal body that is filled with oil. Both the metal and the oil weigh a lot.

Contrasting the heavy oil-filled radiators, infrared heaters tend to be very light. Infrared heaters rely on an infrared heating element. They do not contain any fluids to distribute the heat.

Infrared heating elements are very lightweight. But compared to oil-filled radiators they have one disadvantage. The heat they produced is very focused. Think of an infrared heater as a shining lamp. Everything in line of sight is heated, everything else stays cool. 

Oil-filled radiators, on the other hand, make use of their weight (through oil and metal bodies), which can distribute the heat evenly. The heavy heating body is a wide source of heat, not a narrow and focused one.

Oil-filled radiator heat retention

Due to their high weight, oil-filled radiators have a high heat capacity. This means that oil-filled radiators will retain their heat for some time after turning it off. This comes especially handy when you use the heater for bedroom heating but you don’t want to keep it turned on all night.

Infrared heaters are very light and do not retain any heat. Within a minute after turning off, they are usually cold. This, of course, also depends on the model. But the one I have at home turns cold almost instantly.

Yet, the same applies the other way around: Since oil-filled heaters weigh more, they also need more time to heat up, whereas lightweight heaters start producing heat almost instantly.

Oil-filled radiators need more time because the electric heating element that is encapsulated in the metal heating body first needs to heat the oil. This takes some time. Usually 5-10 minutes. But after that, oil-filled radiators are reliable, safe, and durable sources of heat.

The weight of an oil-filled radiator is a safety advantage

But not only the heat retention benefits from the increased weight of an oil-filled radiator. Oil-filled radiators also provide better safety since they are much harder to tip over than regular electric space heaters.

This is especially a concern when you have pets or children at home.

A space heater tipping over can damage the floor or hurt somebody. In the worst case, it can cause a fire.

Usually, the latter doesn’t happen, since most modern space heaters have tip-over protection. But you still don’t want to risk it.

Oil-filled radiators are heavy and need significant force to tip over. The force required to tip over an oil heater is big enough to ensure that it can’t happen by accident.

The infrared space heater I have at home is so lightweight, that when I pull the carpet it’s standing on just lightly, it falls over. Usually, you shouldn’t place infrared heaters on carpets. In this case, it was just for the experiment.

“The advantage (IMO) of non-oil-filled is that they are usually significantly lighter in weight, and they cannot leak oil.”

triffic from the vwt4forum

Weight and big surface protect from overheating

Another advantage of the high weight of an oil-filled radiator is the big weight and surface area. Since oil heaters are filled with oil (which is the main source of the weight) it is very hard for the electric heating element embedded in the oil-filled body to overheat.

Before an overheating can potentially occur, the heating element would have to produce enough heat to boil the entire body of oil. This is impossible with a regular wall outlet.

Oil-filled radiators are very hard to overheat. The oil absorbs all the heat from the heating element.

In comparison to lightweight infrared heaters, this is another advantage. Infrared heating elements heat up quickly. Because of these quick heat changes, the heating elements wear down much faster than those of oil-filled radiators.

Oil-filled radiators are durable. All thanks to their weight.

Weight is not too important

If you think about it, weight is not even that important. Even heavy oil-filled radiators are easy to move around. Everyone should be able to do it. Nearly all oil-filled radiators have wheels. Rolling them around the house is easy. As long as you don’t have to surpass steps, weight is not a factor you need to consider.

Only when you regularly change floors the weight of an oil-filled radiator becomes important.

It might also be a factor if you are young and move homes often. But once you are settled and your heater has a place, the weight is only an advantage.

Conclusion

An average oil-filled radiator weighs 18.9 pounds. The high weight ensures safety and durability. A check across 10 different oil-filled radiators resulted in a minimum weight of 8.64 pounds and a maximum weight of 26.6 pounds.

Due to their high weight, oil-filled radiators are more reliable but also harder to move around. As long as your heater has its place to heat and you don’t constantly need to carry it around, the weight shouldn’t be an issue for you.

If you want to learn more about oil-filled radiators and heaters in general, check out all the other articles here on heatertips.com!