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Heater for the Garage

D

Desert Pete

Joined
Apr 11, 2007
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It has been an unusually long, cold Winter for Oregon. The garage has stayed cold most of the Winter which means the lathe has been idle.

What do the folks from the really cold part of the country do for garage heat?
 
HEat

I live in North Eastern Ohio, and we also have had a cold winter....MY shop is my garage, although we don't put a car in it, but I use propane heat, I did a little insulating, and put a plywood sheet overhead to keep the heat down...I tried to use Kerosene, but the smell was bad, propane has worked for me for about 5 years now, I was given the force air blower and purchased a 60lb tank, I am not in there 8 hours a day or anything, maybe 2-3 hours, 2-3 days a week, and it last me about a month or so, I usually fill it once a winter, I run it until I can see my breath then turn it back on......if I had a gas line I would put in a permanent heater, but I am a little scared of the wood, dust and flame, so I only run it when I am in there working....Dennis
 
I have a well insulated 800 ft shop, and an electric oil radiator keeps it comfy. Not warm, but comfortable.
robo hippy
 
Greetings from a bit north of you and Robo (but still in the PNW)

The first thing I did was insulated the walls and ceiling, then drywalled them.

Then I installed a 220V@30 amp heater.

I do regret not insulating under the floor, if I had it to do over again....

TTFN
Ralph
 
Walls and crawl space are insulated. Cement slab floor.

Things get pretty cold here in Montana during the winter time. I've always heated my shop with a small ceramic heater that runs 24/7 in the winter months. I don't even have it on the highest setting......just enough to keep the shop above +40oF during the cold months. When I go out to the shop, I turn that one up, and switch on another electric heater at full throttle! There is a third ceramic heater that I don't always use.....usually for around +10oF, or less outside. From the usual +40oF, it usually takes about a half hour before things get above +50oF, and since I have "winter" shop clothes, this is a temperature that is comfortable for me to work for many hours in. In winter, it usually doesn't get above +60oF while I'm out there, but I'm very comfortable at that temperature.

Note that I have the auxiliary heaters on a timer........just in case I forget when I close up the shop!

OOC
 
Don't heat the garage, just the part you need warmed. If you do even simple things like drape curtains around your lathe area - with a proper top - you can get to comfort with a couple of 100-watt incandescent bulbs.

Seems a good deal, because you need the light anyway, they are not likely to give you ignition problems like heating coils, and you also contain the mess in close.

Been keeping my well pump warm and getting the tractor's blood flowing with light bulbs under blankets for years. Takes a couple hours to warm the tractor after a 12-hour -20F cold soak, though! Remember that you don't start work with your moisture-exhaling body right away, you wait until the metal is warmed above the dewpoint. You can do this with a regular electric, then extinguish after you start working.

Take care of your feet and legs by getting them some insulation and cushion.
 
I use a torpedo heater with a portable wall thermostat and, like MM says, reducing the area it has to heat makes it much more effective. I looked into the clothes drier idea but abandoned it when I considered the amount of humidity that thing puts into the air and realizing that my tools would rust BIG TIME with that additional moisture hanging about. A simple frame in the shop (garage) made from inexpensive PVC reduces the area to be heated and make it more comfortable to stand along side my little lathe.
 
Just for reference, a clothes dryer does NOT put out humidity, unless of course it has wet clothes in it. When venting the clothes dryer into the shop area for heating purposes I suggest NOT putting wet clothes into it. Just run it. When drying clothes, close the vent into the shop and open the vent to the outdoors.

This works particularly well when heating a small area as MM suggested.
 
A zillion ways to skin a cat. I live in SE Michigan, and have a well insulated 18x24 shop attached to my barn. I keep a small 1500W electric heater going throughout the winter to keep it from freezing. Normally it keeps things around 40-45 on the coldest days (this winter has been down to 15 below). Then, when I want to work in it, I fire up my kerosene heater (yeah, it does sometimes smell) and a small propane heater. Within 30 mins, the place is toasty and I turn off the propane heater. I also bundle up, and start shedding jackets and sweatshirts as it warms.

Two issues that are still a pain. The first is finishes. To really cure properly, most finishes want to be above 50. So during winter, I try to apply them while temps are rising, and I have several hours of higher temps. The second is open flames. Both the kerosene and propane heaters use open flames. So any time I plan to use flammable finishes, I have to kill the open flame heaters.
 
My uninsulated (and drafty) shop has a wood stove and I installed a propane Hot Dawg heater to take the edge off. I corralled the lathe area with some plastic tacked to the overhead, so I'm only heating the workspace where I'm standing.

I've learned one thing -- when I buy my own place and build a shop, it'll be well insulated. 🙂

-jon-
 
I live in Alaska , heat in the shop is a must all year long, Sometimes 25 below zero for weeks at a time . I use a Toyostove as do many folks up here for homes as well as garages . My shop is 20 x 20 , I use around 3 to five gallons of fuel oil a week to keep it at 60 . You can install the stove yourself an only need a 6 inch hole in the wall as the intake and exhaust use the same hole. I used propane heat for a while and found there is a lot of moisture in it and it will rust your tools . What ever you deiced stay warm , it's got to be scary holding a skew chisel while shaking from the cold.

Regards
Dennis
 
Shop Heat

I, too, live in the PNW, however I live on the dry side, colder in the winter and warmer in the summer. No moss growing between my toes. My shop is a large 3 car garage, which my wife gladly lets me use, as long as I let her park her car inside. I insulated the walls and ceiling and installed a flameless propane heater with thermostat. I do not run the heater unless I am working out there but generally does not freeze inside in the winter.

I checked with my propane guys and made sure that I could use this in an environment that had some flammable fluids. I do not spray in the winter due to temperatures that retard curing.

side note: I installed an attic access and if I leave it open in the summer, the warm air rises and flows out through the access creating a slow cooling breeze that makes it very comfortable to work in the summer. When it hits triple digits, who want to be covered with sawdust and shavings anyway.
 
When I purchased the property I have now - there was an old, uninsulatated house on it with no good heat source. I had to live in the old house for two winters. So I investigated gas heaters. I wanted something that I could use in the house for a couple of years and then move to the shop when I had it built. I ended up with a gas free standing heater - attached to the natural gas line. The flame is contained in a chamber that is not exposed to the air in the shop. Therefore no problem with open flame and wooddust or flamables. There is a heat exchanger with a fan. Air for combustion comes from outside the shop and the exhaust is vented through the outside wall - 4 inch hole.

I live in a moderate climate area and only have to use it on really cold days and then only for awhile to heat up the cold space. The shop is totally insulated. Very comfortable. The cat likes it a bunch too.
Hugh
 
My new "winter" workshop is an 18x24 foot area adjoining my garage. After working for years in a drafty old building, I decided to insulate the walls, ceiling, and the concrete floor (foam) of the new workshop and to heat it with a wood stove. On days I know I'll be working out there, I'll go out before breakfast and start a fire. By the time I've had breakfast, coffee, done the soduku, and returned to the shop, it's toasty.

Having said that, it's been about three weeks since I've been out there for any length of time. I'm getting over back surgury, and my surgeon doesn't want me lifting too much.
 
Several have made an excellent point, that some of the first money would be well spent on insulation. My previous shop had 6" of ordinary fiberglass insulation in the walls and about a foot in the ceiling, and once warmed, the lights plus my body (working furiously of course) would hold it at 70 when it was 35 outside.
 
Cold Winter..

Western New York Winters can be very cold, this year especially!
I have a 24' x 40' shop with 10' ceilings, when I built it in April 1999
insulating (r19 walls & r39 ceiling) it well was the first priority.
I heat it with a 60,000btu ceiling mounted propane furnace. I keep the thermostat at 60+ degrees 24hrs. a day.

The past few years the cost of this fuel has increased many
times. I thought about many other heating sources; wood burning stove,electric,etc.

I'm fearful of the amount of dust created by turnings and cabinetry work during the Winter months when I can't open the garage door and totally remove all the dust. I do have a large dust collection system installed in the shop and my turning room has its own.

I heard radiant heat works very well, anyone here have experience with this type of heat?
 
Mark,

Radiant heat is effective for increasing the comfort level of personnel working in a large building, but does little to increase the air temperature. The radiated heat passes through the air and only warms opaque objects in its path. Thus it would improve your comfort level (assuming that one of the heaters was aimed at you), but might be inadequate for an area where finish work was done. My specific experience refers to use of multiple large (2 ft. x 4 ft.) radiators mounted overhead and aimed toward the floor where personnel worked. The building was metal, uninsulated, and maybe 80' x 250'. The people reported some improvement but still felt too cold much of the time. In a much smaller space such as your shop, and depending upon the energy density of your installation, the results could be much better. One possible concern would be that the radiators might be an ignition source.
 
Bit of common terminology conflict, of course. Hot water systems featuring floor tubes are commonly referred to as radiant heat, and any distribution device is commonly referred to as a radiator.

It its pure form, it's what Richard says - IR - which excites the molecules of pizzas on the self-serve line or the humans on the assembly line. http://www.michigan.gov/documents/CIS_EO_Energy_Observer_06-04_93953_7.pdf for an overview. Not really such a good idea, unless you're warming the lathe too. All you need is a cold condensing piece of iron in a room with a moisture emitter at 98.6.
 
Thanks for the clarification MM. I forgot that water tubes in the floor, which are conductive and convective heating, are incorectly called "radiant" heating. I was indeed referring to IR heaters.
 
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