Heating options

skyhighZJ

skyhighZJ

Gov retirement < needs to live
Joined
May 31, 2012
Location
Aberdeen, NC.
The wife has a 10x20 greenhouse. She has been running electric ceramic heaters and it’s KILLING my wallet via the electric bill. I can get propane at cost from work. What are my best options for a LPG heater that will maintain a decent temp (with a built in thermostat) so I can ditch the electric. Is blue flame better? Radiant? I have a small fan to move the heat around as well.

Thanks!

Something like this?
Or this?
 
I bought a property earlier this year, and the only heat source that actually worked inside the house was the blue flame heater like what you posted. I’ve only been running it to keep the place warm enough for the pipes not to freeze on the cold nights. I warmed it from 45 to 66ish in about 1.5 hours last night. I’m sure it would work great in your smaller space. Thermostat seems to work good, it does what it’s supposed to do.

BTW - thread hijack - can anyone post the link to the discussion on the mini splits? I searched awhile back but couldn’t find the one I was looking for. Seems @RatLabGuy and @JSJJ388 both tried one and liked it.
 
Blue flame heaters are better at heating the actual air in room. Radiant heaters are more a line of sight/ surface heating heaters. That’s why you see them used on truck docks or restaurant patios.

Far as what Noel is talking about I used a line voltage thermostat to turn a turbo heater on and off. But these are loud and do not recommend leaving on if you are not out there so probably not best option for this.
 
FWIW, our 1900-ish sq/ft house has been heated solely by a single 30K BTU propane "blue flame" for the last 7 years (went with the 30K vs 10K/20K simply because the pricing was nominal)
While they don't have a typical "thermostat", the onboard controls (1-8) will allow plenty to dial it in... ours sits about at 2-2.5 unless in single digits
Most have a fan option pulls cooler air from behind and blows it thru the body above the flame area (using dryer duct, could pull said cooler air from the far end)
IMHO, go straight "blueflame" (heats the air in the space) over "infrared" (heats the objects in the space)...

Also, while they say it won't run a 20# grill bottle... that hasn't been my experience
 
Curtis_H said:
Blue flame heaters are better at heating the actual air in room. Radiant heaters are more a line of sight/ surface heating heaters. That’s why you see them used on truck docks or restaurant patios.

Far as what Noel is talking about I used a line voltage thermostat to turn a turbo heater on and off. But these are loud and do not recommend leaving on if you are not out there so probably not best option for this.
Click to expand...
We got a propane "salamander" (80k BTU) a few years back to heat the step-sons house during remodel...
Stoopid loud, but would heat the entire 2500 sq/ft house from 20* to 65* an hour (basement up) and ran it for weeks on a 20# grill bottle
 
wood pellet stove
its your only option if you truly want a break from the bills

propane is going to add a shit ton of moisture into the air (brings on other problems)
 
ckruzer said:
wood pellet stove
its your only option if you truly want a break from the bills

propane is going to add a shit ton of moisture into the air (brings on other problems)
Click to expand...
Being in a greenhouse I’m actually not worried about introduction of moisture especially with the colder months tending to be less humid.
 
skyhighZJ said:
Being in a greenhouse I’m actually not worried about introduction of moisture especially with the colder months tending to be less humid.
Click to expand...

it causes mold problems. algae problems. Problems that transfer to your plants. If the plants were rated for the Amazon zone....
Youre also going to have moments when the heat goes out (propane runs out). Youll get micro freezing on the moisture dripping everywhere. It will bust seals. Etc. The life of your greenhouse will cut down fast.
Your dripping moisture is also dripping alot of chemicals from the greenhouse and getting absorbed into the plants. Causing problems.
The propane is going to also release other "things" into the air - you can expect yellowing and browning leaves.
Its a common subject in the plant world

If you want the most superior option - if you got the space to do so, bury tile in the ground (couple hundred ft) past the freeze level - put fans on the ends and cycle the greenhouse air. It will maintain 50+ degrees all winter. Additionally, if you have the time, make your green house a step down. By having your greenhouse be 4ft into the ground, it takes barely any heat to stay at safe temperatures
 
ckruzer said:
it causes mold problems. algae problems. Problems that transfer to your plants. If the plants were rated for the Amazon zone....
Youre also going to have moments when the heat goes out (propane runs out). Youll get micro freezing on the moisture dripping everywhere. It will bust seals. Etc. The life of your greenhouse will cut down fast.
Your dripping moisture is also dripping alot of chemicals from the greenhouse and getting absorbed into the plants. Causing problems.
The propane is going to also release other "things" into the air - you can expect yellowing and browning leaves.
Its a common subject in the plant world

If you want the most superior option - if you got the space to do so, bury tile in the ground (couple hundred ft) past the freeze level - put fans on the ends and cycle the greenhouse air. It will maintain 50+ degrees all winter. Additionally, if you have the time, make your green house a step down. By having your greenhouse be 4ft into the ground, it takes barely any heat to stay at safe temperatures
Click to expand...
All of this is feasible in the future. Where it is just needs to get through this year. A new more permanent location is being worked for 2025. Gotta do some other infrastructure changes first.
 
Is a small mini-spli an option? You can get a 9k unit for only $400 and it will be way more than enough.
I've been reallu surprised how well the one I added to our sunroom works.
 
skyhighZJ said:
Trying to get away from electric is the problem.
Click to expand...
yup totally get it.

Is it for money or other reasons? As mentioned propane isn't a good long term solution. 1 winter maybe.
If its for cost reasons, its a math problem whether the juice for the mini split costs more than the 'pane.
 
Water baseboard heat with a simple thermo siphon loop to a $100 cheap wood stove in the yard doubles as an outdoor feature. An old cast iron radiator may hold heat overnight when it is needed.
 
Right now I'm heating my garage w/ a couple small resistance heat units but been thinking about getting a propane unit or just biting the bullet and putting in a mini split (which I know to be the correct answer).
After doing some math I thought of this thread and thought I'd pass it along given @skyhighZJ 's point about wanting to ditch electric but the potential issues with propane.

Heres's some math to consider:
After taxes etc we pay $0.237 / kwh for electricity. (this is also a reminder to me its time to re-look at distibutor & plan options).
A typical 1500w resistance heat unit provides 5100 BTU. That means 2 of them running together to get 10.2k BTU for 1 hour costs me $0.71.
Meanwhile the 9k BTU mini split I put in the sunroom is reliably pulling a little under 400ww when running full bore (measured via current monitor). If I were to move up to say a 12k unit for the garage and it uses 33% more juice that would cost me $0.126 per hour (full bore). 5.5x cheaper!

Around here a typical 20 lb propane tank (that is actually 15 lbs) costs $23, or $1.53 per pound.
A pound of propane is 21548 BTUs.
That means if you set the regulator to say half, at 10k BTU, to get in the same range as above, it would use $0.711 worth of propane in an hour.

Soooo.... cost per BTU, propane is saving nothing over good old electric resistance heat. Plus it comes with the moisture problem (over a pound of water per pound of prpane used) added to the atmosphere. AND you have to keep switching the damn thing. The only thing it buys you is convenience of doing it anywhere or getting a crap ton of BTUs all at once. Or maybe you're buying prpane in a larger quantity at a better per-lb price.

I'll also be the first to say this is ideal math and I'm probably missing something. But in the meantime I'm now finding myself guestimating math on how many hours a year it would run to make up the difference in cost. at a difference of $0.58 per hour for 2 ceramic heaters vs mini split, even 100 hours run time a year at full bore is only 58 bucks. But it also provides A/C. I have a 12k window A/C unit now so thats covered but I'd wager its 1/3rd the efficiency too....
 
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EDIT - I just saw @skyhighZJ can get propane at cost. Curious what that rate is if you don't mind, purely for the math exercise.
If it were half cost, $0.36 per 10k BTU/hr then you;re saving 36 cents an hours. At 24 hrs a day thats $7.44 saved. But its hard to imagine a need to run that kind of thermal load constantly!
 
So I’m not sure how to break down all the math but last month we used 4,081 kWh @ $413.33 plus tax, fuel factor & “facility charge”. We don’t have an option of who we use. See pic
image.jpg

Whereas our previous months bill ran us 2027kWh
image.jpg

Now, I understand things have been colder and our heating has been on more but it is a primary LPG heat gas pack but other than adding the 2 1,500 watt electric heater for her greenhouse, nothing has changed.

I can fill 20 lb (bbq tanks) at work for $8 and a 100lb tank is $40 and I fill them to max. Not the exchange tanks 80% (or close enough). So the propane to me is a better option and throughout the day I can vent off extra moisture as needed with the windows in the greenhouse. Guess I’m thinking a LPG heater is a more economical solution.
 
shawn said:
:eek::eek::eek:
Click to expand...
Yeah it wasn't until today I realized how bad it is.
MD is deregulated, you can choose your producer, but still have to go through BGE for the delivery. Its been a few years since we last shopped around and it looks like there are a bunch of changes... with many providers going to 6 or 12 month payment plans, discounts for allowing cutbacks during high demand etc.

One notable thing too is that 25% of my bill isn't the charge from the supplier, its the delivery and a stupid "MD EmPower surcharge. They implimentated this program "to incentivise efficiency" where you can get discounts for allowing cutoffs during peak demand, installing certain appliances, and other shit. To offset it they just added a % fee to everyone's bill and said "for the averge person its only a few dollars a month" yet for me its averaging way more than that. On top of thats there's taxes and fees, a flat $9.50 "customer charge", delivery charge etc.
So they state the rate is $0.17 per kwh but the REAL price is way more.
 
ckruzer said:
it causes mold problems. algae problems. Problems that transfer to your plants. If the plants were rated for the Amazon zone....
Youre also going to have moments when the heat goes out (propane runs out). Youll get micro freezing on the moisture dripping everywhere. It will bust seals. Etc. The life of your greenhouse will cut down fast.
Your dripping moisture is also dripping alot of chemicals from the greenhouse and getting absorbed into the plants. Causing problems.
The propane is going to also release other "things" into the air - you can expect yellowing and browning leaves.
Its a common subject in the plant world

If you want the most superior option - if you got the space to do so, bury tile in the ground (couple hundred ft) past the freeze level - put fans on the ends and cycle the greenhouse air. It will maintain 50+ degrees all winter. Additionally, if you have the time, make your green house a step down. By having your greenhouse be 4ft into the ground, it takes barely any heat to stay at safe temperatures
Click to expand...
Diameter of tile? And I'm assuming type of material buried helps with thermal conductivity?

The whole buried concept intrigues me but all I read is a below grade mud puddle. Gonna have too research that too.
 
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