Heating your shop/garage

[Old Money]

i use a construction Lp heater with 20 inch box fan behind it set on low. hang two box fans horizontaly 9 feet high set on low wired to a switch. get some shipping cardboard 1/2 inch thick to use on floor instead of creeper.

[macstaples]

Originally Posted by burnin oil

For the radiant heat guys. What do you spend to run the water heater per year? I am about to build a shop myself and want radiant heat. Ultimately a wood boiler setup but that part would be a couple years down the road.

My shop is 1000 ft^2 with 10' ceilings and with all four walls exterior. In the winter I keep it at 57 degrees (to me the radiant heat feels about 10 degrees warmer than what it's set to).I have an off-peak electric boiler and pay $0.045/kWh. My biggest bill was in February of 2019 and I paid $90 for heat when the average temp was 6F. For an entire winter, December-March it averages about $70/month.

[Jrainman]

Originally Posted by burnin oil

For the radiant heat guys. What do you spend to run the water heater per year? I am about to build a shop myself and want radiant heat. Ultimately a wood boiler setup but that part would be a couple years down the road.

I see on average about a 16 dollar per month increase in the heating season, wood boiler is the way to go ,my friend has a wood boiler set up he does radiant in his 6000 sq ft house and 60 x 40 pole barn off same wood boiler. The major cost when doing radiant is the insulation board you need to put down under the pad before you pour ... it is quite expensive .

[burnin oil]

Thanks for the info. I started clearing for the shop this week but still have alot of trees to come down. I also have alot more backfill requirements than originally thought thanks to living on a mountain. I may have to push back building until next year to gaurentee the soil compaction. I will be pulling fill from next to the house so it's actually two large projects rolled into one. Clear and fill the shop area while making more yard. Atleast diesel prices are dropping.

[Longhorn 69]

burnin oil, I have a 80' x 60' pole barn with the front half 40' x 60' finished off and has in floor heat with a 14' ceiling. I have a central boiler wood stove that I have used for the last 15 years to heat the floor, and a 40 gal water heater for domestic water in the shop, and I also heat my house and a 40 gal water heater in the house. I cut approx 20 to 22 cord of wood per year, and will use most of it depending on the northern Illinois winters. I maybe burned about 18 cord this year and still burning it. I'm sure you are aware of the work it takes to heat this way. If you want to burn wood to heat a shop and house with a wood boiler you need to have a good source of wood. You need to have the time to cut and split the wood, and you have to treat it like a herd of milk cows, someone has to be there to milk them every day. Some one needs to fill the stove once or twice a day. I have a 500 gal propane tank and it gets topped of once a year. We use a gas stove, and water heater in the house, and same in the shop. It is pretty cheap to heat this way, but it is sure labor intense. I am thinking of converting to a gas boiler to heat the shop in the near future. I have enjoyed my set up for a long time and it works great. I'm just getting a little wore out. Ha

[burnin oil]

Thanks for the input and I know the feeling. I started heating with wood this year. Our weather has been somewhat mild this year. We have burnt around 5 chords since October. Luckily the coldest part of the day has been around 7am so it warms back up quick. When I get around to making the switch I will probably do some kind of water storage setup so that you can let the boiler die back. I have about half the land cleared now for the shop so hopefully in a couple of weeks so I can begin the grading which will be extensive. The shop is going to be huge and have an open pole barn area for parking vehicles and equipment. Burning the old stumps is slow going.

[Chevys4life]

Man.........you have a very nice garage set-up!!!

[Pitpig]

Have a 30 by 30 separate garage, insulated, with 14 ft ceiling at the peak. Tried kerosene, too stinky and ice cold floor. Had electric heater (15000?) that was only good to about 40. I Installed a house gas furnace with an 8 inch duct along 1 wall and 4 outlets. Works great! Plus I can hook an ac to it later. Go natural gas and never look back