I use a propane radiant heating system. It heats good but we have had problems with it blackening the outside of the building slighty. I'm told that this should ne be a problem with propane but it is. The unit has been taken apart and serviced several times and the problem was never totally cured. The install vented the system to the unheated rear section of my building where 8 cars and 13 cycles are stored and I think this is the problem. If you ask me it should be vented to the outside, probably through the metal off. The installer said "not necessary," but I still think that is how it should have been done. The problem is not real bad anymore after a few tweaks, but I still think the install was done sloppily. I did post an album with shots of the place, as well as other gasrages I visit. Gunner
know what you mean about the price of kero, i started mixing mine with diesel 50/50 worked fine and this year found a 175000 btu that runs on diesel 2.50 gallon. Found it on craiglist
My garage was originally a house! So I have a gas furnace. Turn the thermostat to 60 or so and go back in the house for 10 minutes and all is ready to go.
24x24 garage thats well insulated. I use a 75,000 torpedo heater drinking diesel with a thermostat set for 70. But the floor still stays super cold. Can always see my breath when i get on the creeper. I wish I had heated floors.Still need to insluate the doors tho to help a bit more.
Somehow I knew when I clicked on this that it would be a hot topic Oil fired furnace that was in the shop when I bought the place 17 years ago. 900 sq ft shop, insulated so-so. Biggest heat leak is the roll up door. I leave it at around 50 degrees to save the lathe and Bridgeprt and when I go out there I just crank it up and it's tolerable in about 20 minutes. Only thing for sure is that a cold shop = not much work getting done! Too old to work in the cold now...ha!
Permanent individual electric space heaters, built into walls. Heaters have fans and thermostats. No sparks. Turn on heaters an hour before I want to work. No fuss, no mess, and least expensive form of heat in our area. Jon.
propane radiant heater 90000 btu sits on the floor and cranks out lots of heat, 100lb tank lasts most of a winter in WI, lots and lots on insulation and a ceiling fan helps to
our shop is 6500 square feet with aircraft hanger style ceilings that leak and no insulation. Heating it with the wood stove is hopeless. Especially now that the temps are down to 0 degrees and lower.
I no longer have my shop, but I used to use a dual fuel torpedo that would heat 850 sq./ft. I don't remember what the BTU's were off hand. Said shop was a detached 2-car garage.
I have thought about mixing diesel with the kero, would help some with the price. I would love to have a used oil heater as I have lots of used oil but they are pretty expensive.
I use a wood stove. Works great-I have 6" of fiberglas all around, but it takes a while to warm up so I have to plan ahead to work out in the shop and I have to be even more careful than usual with flammable stuff. I'd love to add a set up to drip in and burn waste oil-anybody have a good,home-built set-up?
My two car garage is on the smallish side (22 x24) and it has a six foot deep grease pit. Walls and ceiling are well insulated. Doors are supposed to be insulated but still leak a lot of heat. When I'm out there working, I use a small, ceiling mounted radiant heater that takes the chill off but never really warms the place up if it's below freezing outside. If it's really cold I will turn it on several hours before I want to go out. Also use a oil-filled radiator to just keep the garage from freezing when I'm not in it. Don't have any space for anything on the floor like a real stove or furnace. Obviously the pit is always cold, no matter what's on.
By 8 am its warm enough to take off the flannell. Kinda mind warping that in 4 months the temp will go up another 30/40 degrees. Its 72 now according to the weather channel.
My A/C guy was talking about this type of unit. He said it more expensive but cheaper to run. And since it heats ups ojects in the shop the heat does not rush out when the doors open. Is that true?
I use kerosene salamander/torpedo type heaters to heat a three car unattached garage. It will keep it nice and toasty even down to single digit temps. Good clear kerosene is right at $5.00 a gallon. You can use fuel oil or diesel in it also which is a lot cheaper but.... It gets awfully fumy with diesel . The good kerosene is worth the money no fumes at all.
I use a infra red radient heater 30' tube propane. I have had ALL OF THE ABOVE at one time or another. Now at age 60 it's finally my reward. NO fumes, NO air blowing around NO maintinence, NO splitting, stacking or carrying wood. It warms up everything it touches to the temp its set at. My building is 2400 sq.ft. w/14' eaves steel bldg. insulated and I keep it at 42 degrees when I am not in it and turn it up to 60 when I am. I go through about 300 gals per year. It may be a little expensive but in the long run no more than the other devises. Plus if you save money and die the next day do you take it with you. Pat
Fifteen years ago, we just used two giant jet engine looking space heaters. Big bastards, ran on diesel, but they'd run you out with fumes if you weren't careful. When diesel went above a dollar a gallon, we started using them less and looking for something else. Then about ten years ago, we put in a bigass forced air propane heater that hangs from the ceiling. I want to say it's like 1.5M BTU, but that could be wrong. I know it would empty a thousand gallon tank in less than a month if you ran it every day (with the T-Stat set around 65 degs F). When propane finally went above a dollar fifty a gallon four or five years ago, we started looking for a cheaper solution again. We saved parts and scrounged and finally, two or three years ago, we put in a commercial air handler with two (2) 25 kW heating elements in it. With electricity at around $0.11 kW Hr, it's a lot cheaper to use electric than propane. We've got a pretty big shop, 3,750 sq ft, with 16 ft eaves, so there's a lot of air in there to heat. It's got good insulation though, so that helps, but the one wall has two 16' x 14' roll up doors in it, and they leak air and heat like a sieve. It's ~4 degs F outside right now, and the t-stat is set for 57 degs F. The heater kicks on every fifteen or twenty minutes and runs for ten or fifteen minutes. I hope that the rest of Jan and Feb aren't this damned cold. Global Warming my hairy white buttocks!
My son and I built a new 28X48 garage last fall; buried 1000 " of pex tubing in the concrete. Use a 50 gallon hot water heater and circulating pump connected to a thermostat. The floor stays 67 degrees. And so does the garage.
dress is several layers-pick up some good military long johns.etc. put the cold out of your mind-once your into your project the love of the craft will override the cold. caution to all using open flame heat-what the fumes, ventalition wash your old oil soaked clothes. trust me - you can good poof!
same here. just put on the layers and a couple 500 watt halogen lamps. once i get working, i dont think about the cold.
High Effeciency Radiant Heat on Natural Gas. Absorbs 90+ BTU's generated. Looks like a long tube that extends the length of your shop. Looks just like the one in the picture on the post above of 51LedSled. Very energy effecient. I've had all kinds of forced air heat units and these radiant heaters use less than half the gas the forced air units do and don't blow dust and dirt all over everything. I'm in Okla and the temp is in 20's......
Prist isn't the healthiest stuff to breathe.I have used Jet A before and had better results with K1.I thought K1 burned hotter and cleaner than Jet A. The difference was pretty noticeable.Read the MSDS sheet on Prist and decide for yourself if you want to use it.
When I built my garage,I put in a ton of insulation,then drywall. I had a rooftop furnace/air unit placed next to the garage. It draws the air in from the garage heats/cools it in a air handler and blows it back into the building.This way there is no open flame to cause an explotion from gas,paint or other chemicals.Ductwork all goes thur the attic. Love it !!!
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