Natural Gas Garage Heaters - The Heater Shop

[Bob G]

Another question that just popped into my head while reading these posts on shop heating...

My sons installed a natural gas furnace ( converted to propane) and a central a/c unit in my shop the summer before last and this summer I had the a/c unit set at 80 or so all summer long 24/7

I could cool the place off when I really needed to...and the Electric bill really did not suffer ...

NOW that winter is here what do I do....?

Last winter I had it turned off ... when I went out I fired up the furnace and also a 30,000 btu Kero heater to take off the chill (Kero ran for 20 or so minutes) then the furnace ran by itself...

Shop is insulated, but not really insulated well, I was thinking of leaving the furnace on and set the thermostat to something in the low 50s' or maybe even high 40s'

Cost is a factor but I sure did not mind the cost of the A/C... Figure 20 degree difference in Temp from Max or Min outside Temp...

How do you guyts do this.... I am retired and I do use the shop almost daily...

Bob Griffiths

[Charlie Self]

Bob G asks:

I forget where you're located, Bob, but what I do is keep the shop just warm enough to prevent glue and finish deterioration from cold...above freezing, but far from warm, no more than 50 or so. About as low as my cheap thermostat will go and not shut things off. Actually, this winter it's off all the way (I'm not back yet), and the garage here has only a catalytic propane heater that won't quite do all I would like, but is a little better than nothing. This garage is so leaky I don't even open the door. Forget the windows: they were shut in '15 and probably haven't moved since...I moved something in front of the back wall one day, and one of the old iron weights came tumbling out at me.

Shops don't need to be really warm (never mind, Bobby W. You're a special case, one of two people I know who prefer it in the 80s when they work, summer and winter). I like mine at 55-60, unless I'm gluing or finishing. Helps soothe the cheapskate in me (nothing like being at least a major part Scot), but also, I tend to sweat very easily, so it reduces the dripping on projects and tools.

Charlie Self

"Say what you will about the ten commandments, you must always come back to the pleasant fact that there are only ten of them." H. L. Mencken

[BRuce]

yep, I leave mine all the way down and it stays about 50. When I go out to work in the shop, I crank it up to about 65, that's warm enough for me. Even if I could run it down lower, I would not due to the condensation problem that can arise when rapidly changing temps and metal tools.

I'm in central NC, and use less than 300 gallons of propane a year (have to pay the rental fee on the tank because I don't use more!). that covers the "garden shed" and the shop. the garden shed probably uses more than half of that because of the large window area.

BRuce

Bob G wrote:

[Edwin Pawlowski]

It would keep some heat in the heavy cast iron. Overall, it would have to improve things like material dimensions, condensation control, drying of adhesive and finishes, not to mention your comfort.

Find out what the cost per 1000 Btu is for you propane and you can figure the cost of running the furnace for an hour. Of course the difficult part is to know how many hours the furnace will run over night. Propane has

91,000 Btu per gallon. About three hours of run time per gallon.

You may also want to look at improving the insulation. Ed [e-mail]

[Lawrence A. Ramsey]

Ok Charlie, what part is Scottish? And the Scottish KNOW that they are Scottish- SCOTCH is a damn drink. But I hear over and over how "they" are Scotch. Glad you said Scot.

[Greg O]

Charlie, did you missd the part where I said I did HVAC work for a living? I have checked them out, my opinion stands! Any heater, that right in the instructions requires an open window or door for fresh air is not going to be recomended by me, or anyone that I know that does this for a living either! We had a customer that wanted one installed. We would not do it, headed him in the direction of a vented heater.

You can find vented heaters that cost within a few dollars of the unvented heaters, very simular units, they just have a air intake, and exhaust that goes through the wall. Greg

[Greg O]

If you are out there daily I would let it run. Turn the stat down to 45-50 degrees when you leave. My heat runs at 45 degrees unless I plan on beijng out here the next day. Then I leave it at 65, but then my shop is fairly tight, so it is pretty easy to heat.

I have AC in my shop too. You gatta love it when the temps and humidity start creeping up to 100! Greg

[Charlie Self]

Lawrence Ramsey asks:

My wallet.

Charlie Self

"Say what you will about the ten commandments, you must always come back to the pleasant fact that there are only ten of them." H. L. Mencken

[Robert Bonomi]

The amount of water in the air, giving relative humidity of 88% at 75 degree F,

*IF* you could keep it all in the air at 40F, it would be a relative humidity of THREE HUNDRED FOURTEEN percent. *snort*

A relative humidity of 28.1% at 75 deg F, when cooled to 40 deg F gives a relative humidity of 100%.

21% humidity at 75 deg F will give 100% humidity at freezing. 15% humidity at 75 deg F will give 100% humidity at about 25 deg F.

[Bob G]

Thanks guys.... The Tank has been delivered & is full......now I have to trench & run a gas line down to the shop..(200 foot)....until then I am swapping out 100 Pound tanks of propane like I did last year...

$1.90 a gallon with the large tank...$2.40 a gal with the

100 pound tanks... Price was not the big deal last year BUT with 3 foot of snow..on the ground I could not swap the 100 pound tanks, they were frozen in place...

.Once everything is up and running I think I will just set the Thermostat at 50 or so and leave it that way...

Bob Griffiths

[Silvan]

CO more likely. Carbon monoxide, not carbon dioxide. Mine hasn't either, incidentally. I'm beginning to wonder if the damn thing even works. Maybe these carbon monoxide detectors are just a circuit to make 0.0 appear on the LED display. :)

[BRuce]

[Silvan]

Yeah, seriously. Maybe 00.00 even.