Heat a Two Car Garage -- Quartz Heaters

"W. Watson"

** Firstly - it is very dangerous to use a portable kerosene or propane heater in an enclosed space - but perfectly safe to use an electric one since it creates NO hydrocarbon fumes or CO2 gass.

Electric heaters all have inherently the same conversion efficiency =

100% - ie all the electrical energy is converted into heat. One with fans will spread the heat around better, ones that only radiate will warm what is in front of them better.

How much heat you need depends entirly on the size and construction of the garage, plus how well insulated it is. The fact that you can pretty much seal the place up tight with electric heaters inside means mush less heat is needed than with fuel heaters that require the space to have good ventilation.

Another issue is the amount of electric power available in the garage - it may not be enough for 2 large heaters unless additional circuits are installed.

....... Phil

Last time I looked the cost of electric energy far exceeded the cost of chemical energy.

Here the cost of heating a home with electricy is far higher than using piped gas. I'm fairly certain electric heating is also more expensive to run than bottled gas unless your transportation costs are unusually high. I can't be bothered to search for figures right now.

Bob

"Bob"

** Bollocks.

The domestic tariffs for gas supply and electric power, when based on heating effect in MJ or kWh, are very similar in most places. 1 MJ =

0.28 kWh.

** Go nothing to do with using a portable fuel heater in a garage - d*****ad. ** No you are not.

** Then shut up and f*ck off.

...... Phil

The big advantage of these radiators is that you can get warm without heating the air or the contents of the garage. Compare the cost of electricity with that of gas etc. but I suspect you will find that for an un-insulated garage the quartz radiators are more efficient and safer. We just had 2 boys die trying to refuel a generator in a garage - carbon monoxide got them.

Hi there!

I guess he have a car.

A fitting oven, burned by coal or better wood. Heats nice and the costs are the lowest. Can be fueled various... paper, wood, pellets, coal, koks etc...

If he likes it warm.

Best Regards,

Daniel Mandic

P.S.: can be outworked to a full pipe system... so he have something to do meanwhile, too. :) (To reduce to oven-dimensions even more!)

Perhaps a little Googling helps here.

From A Radiant Heater is the second type of technology where heat is emitted from infrared radiation. Radiant heaters encompass metal-rod and *quartz* units. The surface can range from a glowing panel of a gas heater, a concrete slab, a bar radiator, or an open fire. This heat directly warms people and objects in the room, rather than warming the air. Radiant heaters are not recommended for a large space. They are also ideal for basements and garages since they are good at spot heating.

[I guess they don't consider a garage a large space. Use of spot heating.]

Quartz Heaters use electric elements packed inside a quartz glass tube that radiates heat to warm people and objects. These are best used for spot heating. Sometimes they can be a fire hazard because they are fragile and easily broken.

And these .

They're best mounted up high. Useful for a church, say, used once a week for a few hours but very large and hard to heat.

Recently while replacing my air conditioning unit I opted not to buy a heat pump to augment my gas furnace. The salesman said that at temperatures above freezing it was cheaper to operate a heat pump than use gas. I asked him if that were true, why not just use heating elements instead of resorting to a heat pump. He said that heat pumps were actually more efficient than heating elements. Believing the same as your post that electrical heat was already 100% efficient, I didn't buy the salesman's explanation. Was I wrong or was he?

"Skeptic"

** Google and Wiki are your friends.

....... Phil

You were wrong. Under some circumstances you can get all the heat expected from the power used plus twice as much again. You won't achieve this with a whole house unit, but it is a very effective solution down to a certain temperature. After that you need an alternative source of heat UNLESS you have a geothermal heat pump ("Direct Exchange" or "DX" system) which will work at any outside temperature but is hard to retrofit to an existing house.

If you don't have ducts in your house a Ductless Split System Air Conditioner is very good and can be had in heat pump models.

Thanks to both Phil and Homer. I guess I should have posted here before I replaced the unit.

Skeptic.

heat pumps steal heat from outside and release it inside, this is how they exceed the heating efficiency of 100% efficient resistive heating.

Bye. Jasen

First off, you must be in the UK, as that wattage would be prohibitive on a

115V/15A North American residential circuit. Even at 120V you'd still pull 15.6A.

As far as heating ability goes, I've owned several kerosene heaters, they tend to be rated 20-25,000 BTU. 1875 watts works out to about 6400 btu's, so two of your electrics would put out ~13,000 or just over half of what a kerosene heater puts out. Where I live (Canada) kerosene is pretty darn cheap compared to electricity.

Let's face it, folks: kerosene heaters are designed to operate INDOORS. Do you think that these things designed for pumping 25,000 btu's per hour into the atmosphere outside? It's a HEATER, of course you're going to use it inside. I'd venture that the OP's "elderly neighbor" does NOT have an airtight garage which could pose a ventilation/asphyxiation problem. I have used my kerosene heater in my home and in my garage thousands of times. I will qualify that by saying I've always lived in older homes with too much ventilation in the winter (read "drafty") BUT there is NOTHING inherently wrong with using a kerosene heater indoors.

Three rules for kerosene:

1. Never fuel the heater when it's hot
2. Never fuel the heater indoors
3. Always buy type 1-K fuel (most pure).

Personally, I might add a fourth rule:

1. Light the heater outside. They smoke like a b#st#rd when you first light them for the first minute or so.

Dave

Your fourth rule may or may not be in conflict with my first rule:

1. Never move the heater when it is burning.

Don Young

I wish !

Electricity is ~ 3-4 x times the price per kWh of natural gas here ( UK ).

Graham

Choose your poison.

It's not hot when you first light it so you're not going to burn yourself. All modern heaters are equipped with tip-over shut-offs in case you should, I don't know, trip down a flight of stairs with it.

Dave wrote:

. Two comments on this.

1) If the garage is only in use for a few hours a week the cost of the fuel, whether it be kerosene, propane or electricity, may not be a major factor or concern. For example a difference, for the colder months, of maybe five quid/ ten bucks a week maybe incidental. Perhaps a difference for a whole season of 50 to 150 dollars? Electricity is convenient and relatively safe; no lighting or pilots, no fumes or exhaust (CO) etc. Also in this day and age some stricter environmental rules about spilled fuel and/or leaking tanks, oil barrels and or fuel lines! Most insurance policies don't cover! Electric heaters can be fixed baseboard, or fan directed towards work area, or portable with tip-over switches or quartz 'radiant heat'. An exhaustive discussion about the relative cost of fuel for something that is in use on average for a couple of hours a day ( 30 to 60 hours per month?) maybe only academic? We have used up to a 4800 watt 230 volt blower heater in attached garage and in our boat on cradle next to garage. Calculating that whenever we have it on it will cost no more than 50 cents (Canadian) per hour; which is usually a rather minor incidental cost compared to the repair we are doing and the saving by working on our own vehicle/boat! Usually too, except in the coldest weather the heater may not run continuously anyway. So if we are out there working on something for a couple of winter evenings, say 8 to 10 hours total we are talking maybe $4 to $5!

2) We do have an emergency kerosene heater filled and ready to run in the hall closet. However our highly reliable electricity has not failed for long enough in recent 3 to 5 years to ever use it. It is the type that has to be taken outside to refill. We gave our previous one to a daughter whose husband often works off shore and may therefore not be home, because that one had a removable tank that could lifted out and refilled outside. If/when we use our emergency kerosene heater it is placed on a noncombustible steel panel near the fireplace, the flue is opened and fire extinguisher nearby. Also we never sleep with it burning. Been too many CO accidents due to misuse of non vented fuel burning appliances inside! Including one elderly couple who apparently took their propane barbecue inside their house, used up all the oxygen and killed themselves!

Before I'd jump in like that, I'd take a really close look at what either one actually costs to run - I've read somewhere that resistance heating is the least efficient use of electricity that anybody has yet come up with.

As long as the ventilation is good so he doesn't get asphyxiated, I'd suggest staying with the propane, and get it in bigger tanks; barring that, I'd go for a heat pump.

I've lived in a travel trailer, and, although it was California, we still needed heat during the rainy season, but it'd take me well over a month to go through 5 gallons of propane; but propane was about a buck a gallon at the time, but on the other hand I used it to cook and heat water too.

Good Luck! Rich

A heat pump works like a fridge, but inside-out. ;-)

Cheers! Rich