Mr Heater Propane heater?

Status
Not open for further replies.
The_Jeff

The_Jeff

Joined
Jun 15, 2003
Messages
43,808
Location
ME
Looking for additional heat for my garage, with winter on its way.

I have 220V/ 40 Amps out there for welding so I could get a giant space heater, baseboard, etc.

But the Mr Heater buddy series caught my eye. like this guy and I'd get the 20 lb adapter too. Gets great reviews. I'm worried about condensation and CO/ CO2 production. I like working in my garage like the next guy but if I'm light-headed that cuts into the fun rather seriously.

What say ye? Propane and Propane accessories, or stick to electric?

I don't want it 68' in my 450 sq ft garage, but I want to bring it up to 35 inside if it's 0 outside.
 
Electric heat is $$$; depends upon how much youre using it...

A CO detector or three is very cheap. Time to run the calcs of runtime on a tank vs the electric cost.
 
One pound of propane has 21k BTU. 1 kWh has 3400 BTU. I pay 55 cents/ lb of propane and 18 c/ kWh.

So for a buck I get 38k BTU from propane or 19k from electricity. Hmm.
 
My Parents had a neighbor (40 yo / married, 1 child) who died of CO poisoning in his garage.
He had a natural gas heater and I believe the venting was defective.
He must have felt light-headed.
His body was found outside by a neighbor.

So, what ever you do, make sure it's SAFE and get (more than one) CO Detectors.
 
I have a Mr. Heater in my shed and I fire it up when I'm going to spend some time in there working on things likes my season equipment etc. and it works great. I just keep the door to the shed cracked and that is more than enough fresh air to keep the area safe and not enough to allow all the heat to escape. I would just get a detector and plug that in as a secondary but really with a door/window cracked a little bit it's more than enough. They burn really clean. I've spent 1/2 a day working in the shed with it on.
 
Last edited:
Originally Posted by eljefino
One pound of propane has 21k BTU. 1 kWh has 3400 BTU. I pay 55 cents/ lb of propane and 18 c/ kWh.

So for a buck I get 38k BTU from propane or 19k from electricity. Hmm.


Well electricity is about 100 efficient, but a propane heater is probably just in the 75-80% range. But yeah, propane is still cheaper.
 
I use the "Dura Heat" and have for many years without incident in my garage. I just turn it on for 20 minutes before going out and it suits me well.
 
Have you thought about possibly a kero/diesel heater? Something similar to this. I borrowed a 125K unit when I was doing the heater core in my S10 last Christmas. I have a small 2 car garage and even though it was 15* outside it brought it to 60* in a hurry and was surprisingly fuel efficient. It was a little overkill, but I'm probably going to get a unit similar to the link. There was a small odor, but I never felt light headed or dizzy. I know it might not be what your looking/asking for but we've used those propane heaters before and have been less than impressed, not to mention it used alot of fuel. This was 15+ years ago though.
 
It's ok, looking for all options. I thought the kero ones stunk. "Everyone" has one up here and we all hate them, LOL.
 
Originally Posted by eljefino
It's ok, looking for all options. I thought the kero ones stunk. "Everyone" has one up here and we all hate them, LOL.


I think it might be more the quality of fuel than anything. That and the new ones have definitely improved over the years. Although I did loose alot of my sense of smell from a chlorine plume when I had our pool years back. But I never felt any strange effects from using it in an enclosed space, but my garage is old, un-insulated, and full of cracks, so there's plenty of ventilation.
 
Last edited:
Originally Posted by Delta
Originally Posted by eljefino
It's ok, looking for all options. I thought the kero ones stunk. "Everyone" has one up here and we all hate them, LOL.


I think it might be more the quality of fuel than anything. That and the new ones have definitely improved over the years. Although I did loose alot of my sense of smell from a chlorine plume when I had our pool years back. But I never felt any strange effects from using it in an enclosed space, but my garage is old, un-insulated, and full of cracks, so there's plenty of ventilation.
You'll go broke heating something that is not insulated, even to a low temperature.
 
Originally Posted by Wolf359
Originally Posted by eljefino
One pound of propane has 21k BTU. 1 kWh has 3400 BTU. I pay 55 cents/ lb of propane and 18 c/ kWh.

So for a buck I get 38k BTU from propane or 19k from electricity. Hmm.


Well electricity is about 100 efficient, but a propane heater is probably just in the 75-80% range. But yeah, propane is still cheaper.


If youre talking about a heater vented outdoors, yes. But if it is vented indoors, it is also 100% efficient.
 
You don't need to heat the entire area to 70F. If you can direct the heat toward you, you'll be comfortable, even if the space is 50F or so. Therefore, the argument of heating an un-insulated area is mitigated. Much less delta-T and heat loss at 50F than 70F+.

That is, unless the OP is going there to drink a few cold ones away from his family while he "works on stuff"...Might want to be a little more comfortable for that kind of use.

//

My experience with Mr. Heater:

We lost power at the end of last winter. I unpacked our brand-new 3 year-old Mr Heater and had to set it up, since our new place has electric heat.

As a precaution (and test), I staged the Mr. Heater in our master bedroom (where we would be sleeping all night), with the hose run outside the room to a propane tank that was well ventilated. I also leak-tested all joints.

I placed two relatively new CO detectors in the room and ran the Mr. Heater on full for a couple of hrs (it had already gotten really cold i the house by the time I set it up, but luckily temps didn't go below freezing anywhere in the house). Only one of the CO detectors had a digital read-out of CO level, which I placed nearest the bed, a few feet from the Mr. Heater.

Periodically, I would peak my head in (holding my breath lol) and check the CO detector read-out. No alarms and the one that had a read-out remained at zero the whole time.

I then entered the room and hung out for a bit before turning the Mr. Heater off, with my wife nearby to open the door and windows, if need be.

//

I still did not feel comfortable running the Mr. Heater while we slept, so I broke it down and moved everything back outside while we slept. We then slept in our 75F+ room (I don't remember the exact temp on our little thermometer, but it was pretty toasty in there), and let the temp drift all night (it was something like 50F by morning time), which remained well above what it started out as and definitely what outside ambient was. Very nice!
 
I was going to respond with something similar to what gathermewool said. It probably greatly depends on what you'll be doing in the garage and how long you want to be in there. If it's anything like a normal garage that may not be that well insulated, your best bet might be to use electric, possibly one of those reflector dish type radiant heaters, that you can point right at you from a couple angles.

If you want to be doing other kind of work in the garage where you have to be moving around a bunch, that might not work. In that case I'd just do the fuel cost calculations and pick a heater.

One more thing that I've found from cold weather motorcycling, I use the little lighter fluid powered Zippo/Jon-E catalyst hand warmers and stick them in an inside pocket to help keep the core warm. Probably worth doing either way. Great for snow blowing, or other winter outdoor activities.
 
Originally Posted by EdwardC
I use the little lighter fluid powered Zippo/Jon-E catalyst hand warmers and stick them in an inside pocket to help keep the core warm. Probably worth doing either way. Great for snow blowing, or other winter outdoor activities.


I have half a dozen of these things. They were finicky...until I figured out how to actually use them! I usually run hot, but my hands get cold quickly and turn into useless blocks of ice after being in freezing weather for too long. Having one of these Zippo heaters in each pocket (or tucked into my glove - trust me, they fit in big mittens) is freaking amazing. The only issue is moisture. My hands stay warm, but get a bit moist pretty quickly, relative to no zippo heater.

I can't wait for battery tech to become good enough (and heat tolerant enough) to allow for sufficient heating in a compact, battery-powered hand-held device. THAT would be perfect! Maybe in the next decade...
 
I want enough heat that the fasteners and electrical connectors aren't brittle and my tools don't freeze to my hands. 35 degrees while working is sweatshirt weather. Thinking that if something needs emergent repair, I'd get it in the garage, run the heat for an hour, then go in there and get cracking.

It's uninsulated and the roof is trussed without ceilings. But the concrete pad will keep it positive 20 in there when it's -15 outside... for a while.

I am all business out there. No beers. No interference, either.
laugh.gif
 
Sounds like a Mr. Heater will work out well. If you're close enough to the main house to run an extension cord, maybe even a small 1500W ceramic heater could work. It will definitely take longer to heat the place up, though.
 
Electric is 100 percent efficient, ONCE IT GETS TO YOUR LOCATION. The problem is that the power plant is not 100 percent efficient, and the grid transmission system including transformers, line loss, and power-factor (current being slightly out of phase with voltage due to inductive loads such as furnace motors) causes about half the electric power to be lost before it reaches your property. This has a lot to do with why resistive electric heating (not a heat pump) cost more than running a Mr. Heater propane heater.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Similar threads

A
Waste Oil Heater vs Propane Heater for Garage?
2
Replies
22
Views
6K
DemoFly
G
Propane Water Heater Acting Weird
Replies
10
Views
517
Gebo
W
Garage heat options
2
Replies
20
Views
2K
WA1DH
bigjohn
Oil for Generator on Propane???
Replies
12
Views
1K
JavierH19
Mainia
I just picked up new Westinghouse Tri Fuel 11000tfci Inverter generator
Replies
4
Views
2K
Ride_Red
Back
Top Bottom