How to heat a 2-car garage shop

[Joseph Durnya]

Radiant gas heat... Love it

[Chris Friesen]

Radiant gas heat... Love it

Have you run into any problems? I had read some horror stories about panels warping due to the radiant heat reducing humidity levels on one side while the other side was higher humidity.

[Clint Olver]

Chris,

I have the exact same situation (2 car attached, 1 external wall + double wide door, room over garage...) My door is factory-insulated door. Double-walled steel with polyurethane foam in between. I heat my garage with a $15 space heater from HD. Today is supposed to get up to 19 degrees F, and the heater barely runs to keep the shop around 67 F. Even when it drops to -15 F it doesn't run all that much. I keep the shop around 57 F when I'm not in it for a few days. To heat it up quicker, I just open the door to the house an hour before I go in. Insulation is the way to go for sure. It doesn't hurt to put in flooring to raise everything off the concrete slab, and the more "stuff" you have in there, the more heat it will hold.

(Heater is on the bench top)

C

[Mark Blatter]

Do you get much moisture out of these heaters or are they vented outside?

[Justin Jump]

I second (or third) the minisplit idea.....

You can, with enough knowledge install it yourself, though hire out the final purge/charge refrigerant hook up. Most unit come pre-charged, and can be up and running fairly quickly.

A link to my minisplt install below...



http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthre...y!!&highlight=

[Jeremy Killingbeck]

I insulated my garage door at my old house with ridged foam sheets from Menards. I bought the white 4x8" sheets, cut them to size & put them into the pannel area on the garage door (I had a lip so I did not have to use any glue). Adding the insulation to the door kept the garage around 10-15° warmer in the winter. The cost of the 4x8 sheets were about 1/2 of the garage door insulation kit & they were also thicker, so they insulated better.

As for heating I used a 5KW electric heater for my 20x20 garage. It is not the most efficient way of heating, but you don't have to vent anything. I think the total cost for the heater & installation was around $300 vs $700 for installing a gas heater. The heater took about 30min to warm the shop from 40° to 60°. With only weekend work & a couple nights a week I think it raised my electric bill by by around $15-20/month.

That being said in my new shop (30x25' very well insulated) I have a 45K BTU natural gas heater & I love it. I keep my shop heated at 55° all the time & I have not noticed much of an increase in my gas bill. Gas will also warm the shop up a lot quicker if you don't plan to keep it on all the time.

If I had the money & was starting from scratch I would probably look at a split unit so I could cool the shop in the summer.

[Jason White]

When I lived in Boston, I insulated the ceiling and walls and used a pellet stove controlled by a wall thermostat. Worked great! The only thing cold was the concrete floor.

Hi,

My shop is in an attached, 2-car garage, about 20'x20', with a single double wide overhead door, and 1 entrance to my house.The ceilings are 8' in most places, and 9' near the door.I am a bit of a tool/wood hoarder so space is at a premium. The garage is not really heated, and it's getting pretty cold. Right now, I am using small electric heaters, or occasionally, a propane heater, neither of these are great long term solutions.

How are you guys heating your shops? Anything you would do differently? what would you recommend?

Thanks!
Chris

[Joseph Durnya]

Have you run into any problems? I had read some horror stories about panels warping due to the radiant heat reducing humidity levels on one side while the other side was higher humidity.

sorry I haven't been on .. no ..no warping... I wont bring the temp up fast... as the unit seems to heat everything in the garage quickly... if I know I will be out there I will turn the heater on ( at the lowest temp) when I get home from work... then by the time I have dinner and get out there move it up to 70 or so... its a 3 car garage.. insulated with insulated overhead doors

HTH Joe

[Drew Pavlak]

I am in the process of building a pole barn shop, Working on insulating and drywall. This is a joint effort with my brother-in-law. We decided to go with a Radiant tube heater that hangs from the ceiling. Natural Gas fired. Mfg - SpaceRay (SunStar is also made by the same company, they offer all kinds of options). I would definitely recommend Radiant of some kind. My father-in-law had a auto shop for 40 years and this is what he had heating his shop. Heats objects not he air. When you open you garage door, you are going to lose some heat no matter what you are using, difference is that the objects will help heat the room, so it will come back to Temp a lot quicker and the heater will not have to work as hard or run as long to get back up to temp.

Currently my heaters are not installed, but looking at them I am not disappointed that I went with SpaceRay. unit is well built. looking forward to getting them installed, it's been a little cold in Michigan lately.