Shop heater? Standalone (no power)

[The Heretic]

I have a feeling that he doesn't have propane piped to his shop and probably doesn't have a huge tank out in the back. Otherwise he would have said something about that.

I currently don't. I have the 5 gal/20# tank currently. I will be getting at least one 100# tank for the heater. Vacillating whether to have it inside or outside the shop. I could afford a large permanent tank, but I don't anticipate that I would need it, and I intend to sell and move in about 40 months, at which time the house I will be building would have a large permanent propane tank as a backup fuel source.

My shop is about 100 yards from my house and has no heat source, so even though the walls are insulated, it is generally about the same temp as current outside temps.

 

[The Heretic]

View attachment 340561
Why not a cheap stove kit ?

Illegal in Oregon. A wood stove has to be EPA certified.

 

[KeepnitReel]

Couldnt you just buy a used one of craigslist? I think wood stove would be the cheapest route. I have about the same size shop and my 220v heater does well on the temp, and my monthly electric bill!!!!!!! A cord of wood at $200 bucks, and $200 dollar used stove, pays for itself in one winter if your out there all the time.

Illegal in Oregon. A wood stove has to be EPA certified.

 

[CHLChris]

A plus for wood: Playing with fire is FUN!!

 

[GUNARCHER]

I tried a small propane heater that mounts on the propane bottle with two burners.
I hung a shop towel near the burner to dry it off and it started dripping water!!

Water condensed on my motorcycles and other metal surfaces. Not the effect I wanted. Now use a wood stove. still get some condensation until the metal warms up but not as bad. Actually gets so hot I have to open a window. It's only a two car garage and not insulated and no inside paneling.

 

[The Heretic]

Couldnt you just buy a used one of craigslist? I think wood stove would be the cheapest route. I have about the same size shop and my 220v heater does well on the temp, and my monthly electric bill!!!!!!! A cord of wood at $200 bucks, and $200 dollar used stove, pays for itself in one winter if your out there all the time.

Used or new, it would be illegal if not certified. It has to be certified for the date when it is installed, so anything I buy today, must be certified for 2017. It is unlikely that a $200 used stove on CL would be certified for 2017 - more likely it would cost at least $2K.

As for wood, I have 20 acres of forest - not a problem, except it is a LOT of work to cut, split and stack wood. I do it for my house, but only as a backup.

Buying a $100 propane heater and using the existing 20# tank I have will be sufficient. I won't be out there all the time, but there are times I want to be out there for a few hours on the weekend.

 

[The Heretic]

I tried a small propane heater that mounts on the propane bottle with two burners.
I hung a shop towel near the burner to dry it off and it started dripping water!!

Water condensed on my motorcycles and other metal surfaces. Not the effect I wanted. Now use a wood stove. still get some condensation until the metal warms up but not as bad. Actually gets so hot I have to open a window. It's only a two car garage and not insulated and no inside paneling.

A small confined area - especially one attached to a house, is going to be a lot different from a detached 2K SF shop.

 

[The Heretic]

I went ahead and ordered the heater.

Thanks for the feedback.

FWIW - my next place, which I will build to my specs after I retire, will start off with an earth bermed shop with small living quarters. The shop and the house to follow, will have hydrothermal floor heating, mostly heated by solar and geothermal, with a wood furnace backup.

FYI - Oregon will not certify wood furnaces. They don't want them to become popular, so they won't certify them, even though they have less emissions than a wood stove. They probably figure that wood stoves are only used by us yokels, but if they allowed wood furnaces then a lot more people would want them and cause more pollution.

I can't have a house that passes inspection with a wood furnace as the heat source in any way, but I can have a place in the shop where one can be installed and plumbed into the hydrothermal system. The furnace will be installed after the shop/house is build and passes inspection.

 

[tashworth1]

Illegal in Oregon. A wood stove has to be EPA certified.

you never said you wanted to play by the rules

 

[The Heretic]

you never said you wanted to play by the rules

For this place, I need to play by the rules since I am going to sell it. Any place in Oregon that has a wood stove, the wood stove has to be certified or removed and disposed of when the property is sold. No sense in going to the expense and effort if I just have to remove it later.

Besides, I am a believer in the reasoning behind the law - to a point.

 

[CoastRange57]

Any loss from an improperly installed, uninspected and unpermitted wood stove would likely result in a denial of coverage by an insurance company.

 

[Jamie6.5]

Actually the laws governing uncertified woodstoves are restricted to homes and dwellings.

But whatever floats yer boat.

 

[CoastRange57]

Actually the laws governing uncertified woodstoves are restricted to homes and dwellings.

But whatever floats yer boat.

If you have an insured building like a shop on your policy and it burns down and the cause is found to be an unpermitted wood stove by code, an uninspected a non permit installation, and anything else against code you can be damn sure your insurance will deny coverage.

You obviously have not dealt with an insurance company on a major loss before.

 

[Jamie6.5]

If you have an insured building like a shop on your policy and it burns down and the cause is found to be an unpermitted wood stove by code, an uninspected a non permit installation, and anything else against code you can be damn sure your insurance will deny coverage.

You obviously have not dealt with an insurance company on a major loss before.

Insurance company rules are not laws, and I didn't say anything about installations, unpermitted or otherwise.
Stove certifications deal with air quality and flue emissions, and they only apply to stoves and inserts in homes and dwellings.

Thanks for playing.

 

[Alexx1401]

15,000 BTU Tank Top Propane Heater[/URL]

 

[Alexx1401]

For some reason that did not all come through. I use tank top one I bought at Harbor Freight. Single or double burners work great. You can point the heat at you.

 

[The Heretic]

For some reason that did not all come through. I use tank top one I bought at Harbor Freight. Single or double burners work great. You can point the heat at you.

Yes - but 15K BTU won't heat the shop - I would need at least 75K BTU

I thought about a radiant heater, and I might also get one of those, but when you have a truck that is over 20 feet long, then you will probably wind up moving the radiant heater around a lot to stay warm if that is all you have.

 

[Alexx1401]

Twin is 30k and covers quite a large area. Try 2 of them 60 k is a lot of heat.

 

[Papa]

I like my kerosene heater. More BTU's than propain, no electricty required.
Now, finding low priced fuel is a little tricky.

 

[mjbskwim]

Well I'm in the rocket stove camp. But I just had an epiphany,a gravity fed pellet rocket stove. Only real problem with rocket stoves is they need to be fed kindle wood to make them efficient.
That's too much splitting for me. So then the pellets are next.
There are many vids out there of these. Not hard to make at all.
If you do what's called the 'mass heater' the shop will keep warm for a day with a decent fire in the AM.
Then the idea of sectioning off the part you are using. You don't have to build walls to keep the area you are using warm. Maybe just some deviders?
And I do like the idea of starting out with a small space heater while the wood stove is warming up,but you could just go out prior and start the fire to get it warm no?
The rocket stove I made was from a couple propane tanks. Burn chamber was a oxygen bottle. It was inside a 5 gal tank with peralite?(or vermiculite) around it to keep all the heat in to gasify the wood faster. Then lava rock around that inside a 30" home sized tank cut down to 3' tall.
I would get 600* on the 1/2" plate on top I put there to cook.