Gas Dryers?

We just bought a house with only a gas(natural)line going to dryer area.Whats the deal on them?Do they cost more to buy or run?Do they work better or cheaper to run?Gas is real cheap now in New York,course that could always change in future.Also to run a 220 line from one side of basement to other would be real difficult,for me anyways,as the basement is really finished off,as in dryall cielings and the works.

I think natural gas dryers are much cheaper to run. An electric or propane would probably be a wash.

Gas is more efficient, thus cheaper to run. I would leave it gas.

Gas dryers used to be $50.00 more expensive to purchase than electric dryers, but traditionly cost 1/3 less to operate, depending on your KWH rates.
For some reason now, they run 80.00 to 100.00 more than electric, but since you have the gas line run and no 220, I think you have your answer.

HTH Chuck (Appliance Salesman)

I've had a propane dryer for nearly 15 years and other than replacing thre wear strips that carry the front of the drum twice over the years, and one of the coils on the solenoid valve last year, it has been very reliable. In other words if you open one up they are a very simply designed machine and because of that maintenance costs, at least on the older ones, aren't all that high. As far as operational costs, my gas pack is currently out of service due to holes in the heater tubes, so the only thing drawing off the tank is the dryer and the stove and oven. The wife and I both use the stove/oven pretty regularly, and with three of us in the house she washes and dryes several loads per week. I think they have added maybe 40-60 gallons to my tank over the past couple of years. I can't say how much goes to one appliance or the other but to operate both for as little as the cost of the gas used tells me it's not that expensive to operate. One good thing about the gas dryer is that even if power goes out during the winter, and your running on a generator, it draws such a small amount of power that you can dry your clothes if you should happen to get wet while outside in the snow, or whatever. If you've got kids that's a really good thing.

How much a kilowatt are you paying for electricity?

Our electricity here is only 4.5 cents a kilowatt (hydropower), and even at that, many folks in town who are on the gas line have gas driers and water heaters.

Virtually no natural gas available in the country here- but it is in town.

Your electricity would have be unbelievably cheap to make it better for heating water then natural gas.

When somebody cites electric prices - the price per KWH that shows on the bill means little. You have to add up all the other charges and then figure what you are REALLY paying.

Here in NY, the actual price of power is almost twice what the KWH price is by itself.

Here in New York and in northern Michigan -

One dollar buys:
Electricity - 28,333 BTUs of energy
Heating oil - 28,900 BTUs of energy
Natural Gas - 92,920 BTUs of energy.

That is a huge difference

Are you saying that your total bill for a month actually costs your only 4.5 cents per KWH - or is that JUST the charge for the power itself and only a portion of what you actually pay? Here in NY and in MI the actual bill is much more since there are so many other fees added - including the delivery charges that go up as usage goes up. Here - when the bill says electric is 7 cents per KWH the actual final charge is 13 cents per KWH. So, the 7 cents is nonsense and theoretical. What counts is what the bill is.

If you are really paying in total 4.5 cents then your actual KWH charge must be around 2 cents which does not seem possible anywhere in the USA.

I have always had a gas dryer. Changed my electric stove and fuel oil hot water heater to gas also as it is the cheapest energy (natural gas)
Now planning to change my fuel oil boiler to natural gas also (needs to be replaced soon as it is 43 years old)

look for a good used dryer on Craiglist. People who have gas service and move where they can't get it tend to sell cheap.

I've had both gas and electric dryers. One house had a 20 year old Maytag W&D set with a gas dryer. It worked well, I didn't notice much difference from useing it from an electric dryer. Gas cost less to operate than an electric, check your utility bills and convert the costs per BTU. An older gas dryer may still have a pilot light like a gas water heater.

Try a gas dryer, you won't notice much difference, and you can always change it out later if you don't like it. Used gas dryers sell cheap because 95% or more of homes are setup for electric dryers. Talk to a local appliance store, they often take in very good W&D sets as trade-ins when people upgrade.

We've had gas dryers for the last 44 years. This is the third dryer. It's 13 years old and never had a service call and it's natural gas.
We have a gas oven and a counter top gas range.
Hal

Gas, cook, heat, dry and anything else requiring lots of BTU's. Numbers posted in this thread don't lie.
Mark

Wow, you are lucky to have Natural Gas available to you!
The dryer will cost more initially, but look at LJD's price comparison and you can see you will be making up the cost in short order.
And......with the cost of wire nowadays, just running the electrical service to the dryer will be a big chunk o' change.

I did go through an analysis on a building that is presently unoccupied, so minimal electric usage- $28 "basic" fee, some more for security lights, and 4.9 cents a killowatt for usage. They charged 3 taxes as a percentage of the sum of the basic, plus security lites, plus usage, that amounted to about 12% of those items. Which is less than I thought it would be.

I still think you have to look at the "marginal" cost of each commodity, when making this decision. The original poster has both gas and electric service already, each with its own fees, taxes, basic charges, etc.- so the decision on how to power a dryer would only involve more electricity/ less gas, or vice versa. But your other post made it clear that there is such a big disparity in cost per BTU between gas and electric, that gas would always win.