I hate going out to my garage to work on boards or anything when the temp gets below 50 deg. Besides… epoxy takes forever to set!
I have a small wood burning stove but I have to go out and collect wood, let it dry, get it started, wait for it to warm up enough, etc.
So what do you use to heat your shop when you want to work and it’s cold out?
Les
http://www.grainger.com/Grainger/wwg/catalogPDF.shtml
Go to page 4097.
They hook up to the same propane tanks that you use for your BBQ.
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This will get your shop nice and toasty in minutes.
A wood pellet burner? Cant find a picture of a general one, but its convinient cos you can get pellets in 10kg bags for 2-3 euro i think (kitty liter would be the more pricey version :). I think its fairly efficient as well.
I had one of those gas heaters,I returned it after it emptied a 20$ tank of propane in about an hour.Your wood furnace sounds like the chit.Hit up construction dumpsters for scraps if you can,just don’t burn pressure treated wood of course.You could probably score old pallets and stuff to burn,an old chair on the side of the road…you get the idea.
Must get really cold in St Augustine. Rarely ever need to re-fill the tank more that twice in the winter here in San Clemente. Run the thing for 10 to 15 minutes to get shop nice and hot in the morning and turn it off. Helps if you keep the doors and windows closed. Sometimes I’ll use it as a giant blow dryer to dry my sprays on rainy days.
Atomized: Great low cost recommendation.
Hook it up to a termostat and maintain 80 in the heart of winter.
Thanks for all the suggestions guys! I’m thinking on it… I’ll be set to continue thru the next winter!
Any one have some more? I do have natural gas that I could plumb into the garage… wallheater?
Just thought of that one after reading about the thermostat.
Les
Hi Les,
Having just sprung for a new boiler here, I've done the research recently. If you've got natural gas, that's your cheapest BTU for the dollar. Wall heaters work okay for 'one big room' type places, like some shops. If it's big enough, one of those ceiling-hung fan heaters works too. http://www.northerntool.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_6970_200307959_200307959 for instance
If price was no object, radiant floor heating is really good stuff, but you'd wind up redoing the garage slab for it.
Also, you might want to go a little nuts with the insulation. That Home Depot foam is good stuff, cut to fit between studs in the wall and most definitely the overhead areas.There's also spray-in foams that are even better. Used to be that you could only get it from one or two installers in a region but the price has gone down and a lot of the smaller insulation companies/installers do it now.
hope that's of use
doc...
I use this also. Works great. I preheat my room with the propane heater. Then switch to the dayton electric 19,000 btu heater. Its probably not a good idea to have a open flame going on when glassing! Another thing i do is i pre heat my resin also. I use my other electric heater for it. If you don’t your resin will be like syrup, good luck with a lite lamination. When you preheat, it wets the cloth out super easy. Just make sure it dosn’t get to hot as the resin will want to drain becase its viscosity thins. Also you might have to adjust your catylst cc’s also as it might need a little less or a little more. Sorry for rambling just typing off the top of my head-josh
Hey Doc! Good suggestions. I’d already decided that the garage is WAY TOO crowded with junk. I keep accumulating stuff or I don’t put it back. Come spring I’ll tear everything out and INSULATE then add the heater!
Les
Jesus - I know! The wood heater is the cheapest. I just need to collect the free wood and get the fire started ahead of getting out there to work but I think I’m getting lazy in my… as I’m getting older! Ha!
hi Les,
and it works great. i've had it for a couple years and it's still kicking. we use it A LOT!
i think 1 or 2 of these in your shop would work great... you can set the temp to wherever you want it and it will kick on and off to keep
the temp there. it's not going to put out as much heat as say a propane heater or wood stove but, it should be enough... you could go out, set
the heater(s), go back in and make some coffee and when you come back, the shop should be toasty.
The price is right. Nice to have on in my shaping bay.
That’s a good price! I’m going to check into a nat.gas heater and see how much. Maybe I can get a used one cheep.
ThanksChris
Les
Y'know, it occurs to me that I'm an idiot:
You see, if you were to find one of those cute little natural gas 'looks like a woodstove' deals, and Craigslist has plenty of 'em, you can just hook up one of those to your existing woodstove chimney and have at it. And they have thermostats they work off of that mount on the wall just like a regular heating system.
Or, again, one of those ceiling mounted deals like I mentioned before, which can also run off a thermostat, but possibly a programmable thermostat set to start an hour before you want to start work, y'know?. But looking closer, those too need some sort of vent/chimney or what have you, they won't vent into your existing chimney. Figure at least another $100 plus some work to do that.
In the meantime, while there's lots of ventless small heaters like http://www.northerntool.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_6970_200332737_200332737 which a buddy of mine uses to take the chill off his workshop running on propane, I note that they are 'not sold in California' .
Hope that's of use
doc...
I'd be very careful using any heater that makes a flame anywhere near your work area. With all the chemicals, fumes and dust in the surfboard building process you might blow yourself up.
Put any flame driven heater outside your glassing area and protect it from the elements.
"Y'know, it occurs to me that I'm an idiot"
HA! that happens to me every day!
The new insulated roll up garage door helps quit a bit........Using tarps to make my two car garage into a 12 x 12 foot cube helps too....I don't like working in small spaces but I really ,really hate being cold.....$79 electric space heater from Home Depot. Custom made cord for lots of amps/volts/current....I move the heater all around....We need to heat the room, not the surfboard.....Unplug unit when I'm not there , fire extingusher near by.....think about what can catch on fire...like dust......
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