how do you heat your garage/ workshop

[diesel lover]

Just as the title says. I would like to see how you are heating your workshops. Its been -14 ｰF here. I would like to comfortably in my own garage. I'm about to buy a house.

In my parents 2 car deep garage we used a wood fireplace and a propane air forced heater/ salamander to "JumpStart" the temperatures to a comfortable level. After the high btu heater for a little while straight firewood heat maintains it for not much cost.

How do you guys heat? Thanks

 

[deerseeker001]

I do the same turn on the LP salamander face where i am working and then build fire in wood furnace.

 

[Western]

I got kinda lucky, I was at a guys place that had "junk" everywhere. I noticed an large propane heater, similar to the kind I have seen in orchards, he sold it to me for $25!!.

The best I have had was infrared ceiling mounted gas heaters. Ran them with a thermostat and supplied by 250 gallon LP tank. They sure aren't cheap though.

 

[kenmac]

I have a 4 ton NG forced air furnace that blows through duct work. I keep the thermostat set at 35-40 degrees just to keep water and anything else that can freeze even when I'm not working in there

 

[George2615]

I installed a used mobile home oil furnace in my garage. I use kerosene for fuel. Bought it cheap from a guy who services furnaces. Also have a salamander if needed but it's quite noisy when running.

 

[dave1949]

Be careful with wood burners in garages. Insurance companies may frown on that set-up, and it wouldn't be smart to hide the fact from them either.

My passive solar garage is heated with sunshine. It has a full earth berm on the north side and about 2/3 bermed on the west end. Eight big windows on the south side and an overhead door on the east end.

Even this winter with the cloudy and cold weather we've had, it stays above freezing (~40*F) overnight and gets up to 50-55 degrees on a sunny day. That's plenty warm for working in a pair of coveralls. I do have a ceiling-mounted 17K btu 230V electric heater if I would need more warmth. Pretty expensive to run that. Being retired, I just skip the cloudy days if it is too cold for comfort.

If you plan on doing finishing with paint, urethanes or varnish for example, you would want to keep the temperature above 55*F overnight most likely.

 

[Code54]

I have a ceiling mounted LP forced air unit (sort of like what a warehouse would have. I think it is 120000 btu's and have it hook to a thermostat. I mostly walk over when I get home, run it up to about 70, and in about an hour the 40x30 shop is mostly in the 60's (if its about 20 or more out). Works great - propane is not super cheap but it really

 

[timster2]

I have a 24 x 36 detached three car garage. Currently it is being heated with a wall mounted infra red propane heater. This is the second year and so far it has been working better than I expected. I have the heat set at about 42 and it has maintained the heat all winter. Temps here have dipped to -10 and no problems. I had plans of putting a larger heater, however, this is working out so the larger heater will wait until after I expand the garage.

 

[Rustyiron]

You can't beat radiant in slab heat! (Well Dave's passive solar might) My last shop was a ceiling hung Modine LP. With 16' ceilings all the heat went up to the ceiling and running the ceiling fans to push it down felt more like a cold draft. Opening one of the big garage doors would let all the heat out and recovery took for ever no matter how fast you opened & closed the doors. It is not complicated or very much more to install than a more conventional heating aproach to things and very comforable. There are considerations like the additonal cost, and they do not have a fast "response" time. That is you just need to set it and forget it for the heating season. It will not heat up Sat. morning for a weekend job.

 

[Toyboy]

Hydronic in concrete garage floor and baseboard upstairs on 2nd floor. Garage/shop has it's own boiler.