I'm needing to get some paint work done on some sprint car bodies and am tired of waiting for it to warm up and almost out of time. I have a booth with no heat and the exhaust exits out the north wall of my shop which isn't heated either. Right now it is in the low 50's inside and was wondering how I can heat my booth up some so I can paint these parts. Any help appreciated. Travis
Kill two birds with one stone. Go to Menards and get a dozen of halogen shop lights. Lights the booth up and they put out enough heat, both radiant and generated to make it toasty quick.
when i first went to work in a body shop we used a torpedo heater placed in front of the doors , thats where the intake filters were back then , the torpedo heater heated the air nicely and didnt cost that much to run , just a gallon or so of kerosene
Believe it or not, just like bdynpnt said above; I saw a guy with a spraybooth that had a Kerosene (Jet engine type) of heater blowing into a plenum that was on the face of his spray booth !!!! Holy explosion Batman !!! He claims that he has never had any problem with fish eyes, etc...!!! I guess if your heater is burning clean, it'd work. He'd even use this heater to "bake" the paint on after the vehicle, parts, etc... were painted. He said that it'd get the booth up to 120 degrees in order to bake the Urethane bc/cc.
I have and use a propane torpedo heater on the intake side of my paint booth. It does a good job warming up the intake air without the smell of kerosene. If I want a warmer mix I insert the snout into the oversized intake plenum a little deeper, if I need it a little cooler just back out the snout a little further and it draws more ambiant air. The only drawback is it doesn't work too well on windy days. Dan Stevens dba, Steelsmith
So how bad of an idea is a oil fired forced air furnace? Ive had mine kick on in the garage while I was painting and I cringe thinking about an explosion. Could it happen? jeff
jcs64, I run an old oil-fired forced air heater in my shop too! I use a propane torpedo heater aimed into a plenum attached to the front doors of my paint booth. The booth has a retractable wall seperating it from the rest of the shop when it's in use. I also have an explosion proof exhaust fan on the opposite end of the booth from the doors/torpedo heater. It just makes it a slow motion wind tunnel. If the oil fired heater that generally keeps the shop warm does come on, it really doesn't matter except for the small amount of dust it might kick into the air. If you are painting in a shop without an exhaust fan, and your heater does kick on you run the risk of an explosion. The more explosive chemicals that build up while you paint the greater the chance of something triggering that mix. The best thing you can do if you are going on the cheap is to use box fans on both the intake and exhaust sides of your booth. There is still some measure of risk using a box fan as the exhaust for a paint room/booth. The fan itself is the ignition source because of the brushes/sparks they create. Pushing fresh air in as well as exhausting the air in the booth can keep the air from reaching that critical explosive mixture as quickly. Explosion proof exhaust fans/tube axial fans, use a fan in a tunnel with an electric motor outside the tunnel. There is a belt to drive the fan which is in a seperate tunnel connected to the motor and allows outside air to circulate along with the belt. That way there is no ignition source. If you are just painting in a garage, every light, outlet and motor in the shop are potential ignition sources. It's not as likely to happen with an exhaust fan system. You again adjust the odds in your favor when you use a fresh air intake. No outlets in the booth, again helps the odds in your favor. Lights that are sealed behind safety-glass again the odds improve. A wall that seperates the booth from the rest of the shop, again better odds. It's all about how much risk you are comfortable with. Of course, your home owners insurance will say you're on your own, given the least opportunity to escape paying a claim, so keep that in mind! Just my experience, Dan Stevens dba, Steelsmith
Here's a trick if you have Hot water heat in your shop. Put a Truck rad or a commercal rad in each side of your air inlet ducts (2) and hook it up to the Hot water lines. The rad will heat up the air coming into the booth and give you good heat. And there no chance of you blowing yourself into Tomorrowland. The Old Tinbasher
ive been a painter for 20years and have used turpedo heaters in the booth while i sprayed and im still here.now i have a downdraft thats heated..it not the over spray that will blow up it the dryed paintfilter you have to worry about. warm the room and car up . then turn fan on and start painting.....
Torpedo heater in a spray booth? In 75' at the bullet proof age of 19 I was spraying the 4 coat of lacquer in my mom's one car garage. No mask or gloves, just beer, bones and Allman brothers on the 8 track. The good old days so to speak. The door closed to keep the dust out and BOOM! When the compressor kicked on or somebody lite the bong the air blew. Knocked out the windows No body hurt 2 bad just scared the hell out of us. We laugh about that today but that could have gone either way. Now in 2010 when we are supposed to be smart and know better is it wise to have an open flame in a booth? I know the paint is supposed to be less explosive or environmentally better or some BS, but I wear a mask,gloves and one of those white suits just for the little crap I shot today. I even turn in the left over paint and thinner instead of dumping down the sewer. Safety must come first. Please be careful and use your head when you choose your heat source. You can't enjoy that hot rod or your family from the hospital. ps, the paint job came out ok. [ 70' nova 396 ]wish I had a camera back then.
There seems to be some misunderstanding. I NEVER said anything about having a torpedo heater IN the paint booth. Mine is outside the front doors of the booth. There is a plenum attached to the doors over the fresh-air intake 'window's'. The snout of the torpedo is inserted into the plenum duct, more or less to adjust the temperature of the air coming into the booth. No flame in the booth! I hope the 'picture' is a bit clearer now! Dan Stevens dba, Steelsmith
Just a side note on the box fans, Most of them are using a brushless motor design. So there should be no sparks if it's operating properly. However, the switches or any other breakers/fuses in them are not protected at all from sparking. If you must use one you may want to think about bypassing the that stuff and running power directly to the motor.
I used to paint heavy equipment in a huge tent....heated with a 350,000 BTU Master space heater (the kind runnin' off #2 Diesel)....painted WHILE the heater was going (tent wasn't insulated), it was thermostatically controlled, so it'd kick on and off, sometimes shooting a blip of fire out.......did this for YEARS without ever "blowing up", sometimes shooting 5 gallons of URETHANE per machine ....
The Jalopy Journal
