shop is cold!

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ToddMR

ToddMR

Member
Joined
May 3, 2010
Messages
1,715
Location
Columbus, OH
So I have been getting by with a small utility heater. Now with windchills below 0, I need something better. Looking to buy either something electric based or kerosene in two weeks. I will have about $200 to spend. I do want to be in the shop this weekend, but somehow I don't think firing up the propane grill in the shop is the best idea lol.
 
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They make a non-vent propane heater that works great. I have the natural gas version in my shop/garage and keep it on all winter set to low, and the shop is 65-70 degrees. It is well insulated though. I got mine at Hartville Lumber. They are on line. A propane tank for your grill will fuel it for a long time.
 
Todd my first questions are going to be what kind of shop are we talking about? Is it a free standing building or is it a section of the garage ect. Free standing I cannot give you advise on but I can help if it is an attached garage. First you need to make sure it is insulated. We are fortunate in that our garage has only one exterior wall plus the garage door. It also has a second story over the garage as well. Once we insulated the exterior wall we also did an insulation package on the door. We run two oil filled electric heaters and also leave the door into the house open. This morning the outside temp was 14 and the inside of the shop/garage was 75. Yes my electric shoots up during the winter but we spend so much time out there, it is well worth it. My father-in-law uses a wall mounted gas heater that seems pretty nice.
 
I use a Mr Heater Hero as I only have one power circuit in my garage. Got it on sale at Northern Tools. It uses a 20lbs propane tank and spits out about 35000 btu of forced heat.
 
Thanks guys. Yeah its a detached, cinder block , 1 1/2 car garage that is 100% dedicated shop. We had an insulated door put on last year. Many of the units I have looked at have oxygen sensors built in.
 
Shop heater

Todd,

For many a year I have been burning my Kero Sun "Omni 105" model
( tubular, vertical) in my shop. All day on one filling of fuel, about 2 gallons, much of the time there is a good bit left in tank perhaps 1/3 rd) Have never changed the wick in well over 10 years. After it gets going, and the dampness is reduced, I cut the flame back to lowest. Still gets the shop in the mid 70's. Only means of circulation is a little "muffin" fan. Pets like the heat too. My cat curls up on the closest corner of the floor mat nearest the heater he can find. If I'm not scrollsawing then he sometimes gets in my "bank teller chair" and sleeps as close as possible to the heat source.

Charlie
 
Wow I went through this problem when I built my shop. I have a 220v unit that I hung from the ceiling, a Kero sun heater that I do not use because of the cost of fuel. My daughter was getting a new furnace so that she could have central air and I luckily got her old one and installed it in my shop and am able to keep my shop at 68*. If you were closer I would give you the Kero heater and fuel that I have left over, it is just collecting dust and taking up garage storage space. Good luck.
 
The pellet stove looks like a promising solution. Today is the first day we got above freezing in a few weeks now and my shop has been dropping down to around 54 degrees overnight and the three wall mounted radiant heaters are doing just fine IF you're underneath them or pretty close by. I think a visit to the local stove shop is in order tomorrow.
 
paintspill said:
if you are mainly turning and in one spot a radiant heat unit works great, as long as you are in front of it. but if you love woodworking like i do. you may have to bite the bullet. this is what i did. and i don't regret it for a second.
shop heat.wmv - YouTube
Click to expand...

Yeah, that would be great, but an 8" hole through 30 year old cinder block would be a chore lol. I might look into it though. Trying to keep my options open.
 
This suggestion is not for everyone. Probably not for most. But this is a wood fired heater that you can build for well under your $200 budget. Problem is you are not going to go get it tomorrow morning and you are going to work your hiney off making it. But they do work. I have a small one setting in my back yard that is a test. We have been building it and tearing it down to rebuild it in order to tweek how well it works. We finally bought the book and have a new list of ideas of how to improve it.
You could build it so the burn box is outside and only the heat mass is inside the shop. No open flame to catch wood dust etc on fire but it also woudl not have more flame than a propane or kerosene heater. They use wood not much larger than pen blanks. I burn mine with splinters that come off pallets at work. Dry branches and twigs from trees work also. Also for heating the air in a shop you woudl want more barrel than mass so you get more radiant heat from the system. There are ways you can tweak how much radiant heat you get as apposed to stored heat. Leave duct work exposed rather than cover it for example. But it does work and the barrel will get warm enough you do not want not touch it in just a few minutes of burning. A one hour burn will warm a mass enough to stay warm for 2 days. Btu you don't get nearly as much radiant heat from the mass. Okay enough selling here is a link to the Rocket Mass. Heater.
rocket stove mass heater

you can google it and come up with more sites and videos.
 
I can sympathize with anyone having a cold shop... while it's not terribly cold here, it's colder than I like to be... my shop is a tin building, stand alone out under the trees behind the house. It's not insulated, raised off the ground about 18" at one end, maybe 4 or 5" at the back end, pretty full of stuff, without much room for a heater, but I have one of those oil radiator heaters that I can plug in and roll over close to where I'm standing that helps some. I have the walls covered with masonite, solid at the bottom half, peg board at the top half, but because the siding and roof is corrugated metal, places where the metals meets the headers and corner joists, you can see light (i.e., cold wind can blow through)... I've thought about a propane heater, or a kerosene since there wouldn't be much of a ventilation problem, but for now I'll stick with the radiator heater... I just work until my feet get too cold to feel my toes and then call it a day.

Summer I need a couple of fans to stir the air, but the heat isn't bad at all for me... it can reach 100+ degrees inside the shop, but as long as the air stirs, I'm fine. I do have to watch and not let the sweat drip onto my finish...
 
I have a non-vented propane heater in my out door shop. For those of you that are considering this, it puts A LOT of moisture into the air. Also, then, if you shop cools at night, that moisture condenses on the cold iron/steel of your tools. The result is rust.

I use it very little, if I have to be in the shop and usually not when I am doing turning. I also spray my lathe bed (ways) and other exposed metal parts with a rust retardant whenever I finish a turning session.

There, is of course, the oxygen depletion issue as well.

IMHO, if at all possible, a vented heater is a much better solution.
 
Yeah just when I thought I was good to go, I find out I need a 100 lb tank at least. So now the cost keeps going up and up. I am not sure what to do at this point really. Then I have to worry if a place will come fill my tank etc etc. Researching stoves etc now
 
I use a 100k propane torpedo in a 20x22 open rafters @ about 30 degrees takes about 10 minutes on low to about 60. I normally shut it off then and it lasts for easily over an hour. If I had a ceiling it would heat up much faster and last longer. I'm not insulated at all and walls are open, no drywall.

Few years ago I had a 175K propane torpedo and that was much better. 10 minutes with that bad boy on and it was 80 degrees. I had kerosene before the propane but had to give that up as it gave me severe headaches.
 
Think warm thoughts:biggrin:...Seriously, I keep my shop at 60 degrees and wear a sweatshirt to stay warm, when it gets really cold I tend to turn on a heat gun and warm up my fingers on that. I could turn the heater up some but I am a cheap bastard when it comes to my own comfort, I've been through worse than a little chill in the air.
 
Spend the bulk of your $$ on insulation - walls, ceiling, and floor if it is elevated. That will make a world of difference in the effectiveness of the heater. Then, tough it out for another month or so and you will find heaters for about 1/2 price on clearance.
 
mrcook4570 said:
Spend the bulk of your $$ on insulation - walls, ceiling, and floor if it is elevated. That will make a world of difference in the effectiveness of the heater. Then, tough it out for another month or so and you will find heaters for about 1/2 price on clearance.
Click to expand...

Thanks Stan. Yeah I know I need to insulate for sure. I think Winter is going to last much longer since it is just getting started here. I think I pretty much made up my mind on getting a 240 volt electric heater. The rafters will be the first to insulate. Then replace my plexiglass windows with some sliders. The main door was replaced last year. My floor is concrete and the walls are cinder block.
 
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