I don't notice my bill going up with one truck plugged in, but when I had a friend living in my spare room he plugged his truck in and I saw a very small power increase.


but I usually leave mine plugged in all the time, this year I think I will get a timer for it.

seems like somebody did the math on it and posted it last year, but I cant remember.

 

i would really like to know exactly how much it used per hour??

wonder if it would outweigh the cost of the timer

 

I'm pretty sure the block heater only draws 600 watts, which isn't too bad. But you have have to do the math to figure out how much it'll cost you to leave plugged in ALL the time.

 

I'd keep checking Ebay. A guy on another list mentioned he was going to sell his there so I kept checking and got it for 1/2 of what dealers want. The Dodge cover is nice, but there are others. Hopefully someone on here will chime in on good aftermarket covers, or you could do a search. The Dodge cover is one of the more expensive ones.

 

A quick search and I found this thread.....


https://www.dieseltruckresource.com/...k+heater+watts

 

You can pick up a $10 timer. Set it to come on a couple hours before you get up for work and shut off an hour after you would leave, in caser it's your day off. If you leave it on over night, it won't hurt the truck at all, I actually left mine plugged in around the clock a couple years ago while I pulled the transmission (outdoors). I left the tools laying on the engine to keep them thawed out and made it a bit more bareable to be under there when the wind wasn't blowing.

 

I ended up with an extra timer from one of the christmas light installs a few years ago, works great. I set it for two hours before I leave in the morning and typically am 120-130 degrees when I start.
I have always been a one who allows my truck to get close to operating temp before I drive it so a little bit of electricity for me is the difference between a 5 minute warm up and a 30 minute warm up. I have allready plugged my truck in a few times when temps have dropped to around 45-50* at night plugged in gives me 135* at start up vs unplugged equals 70* at start up.

T398

 

Well, I'll take a shot at rough guessing the math...

Assuming the block heater is around 750 watts, and you left it on 12 hours a day, that would be 9,000 watt hours. If you did that for 30 days in the month, that would come to 270,000 watt hours, or 270 kilowatt hours.

My rate here I believe is $7 flat charge per month plus $.059, so running the block heater like that would add $15.93 to my monthly bill...

Assuming I did that right, it looks like running the block heater all the time isn't going to break the bank, but it isn't free either.

 

You're making my head hurt... . I think I'll stay in the South and just concern myself with the cost to run A/C most of the year. No electric cords for me.

 

LOL

I got lucky and my truck came with the cord already installed. I also live in the dessert southwest and will probaly not NEED to ever plug it in. I will try it a few times just to see what the difference is in how much faster the cab will heat up. We do drop down to the low 30's and sometimes high 20's for a week or two!! Then back to lows in the 40's

 

I think The only ones that already have a cord are the ones with a snow plow package.
Joe

 

Mine has a cord already but no snow plow package.

 

No plow package here either. I was supprised to see the cord sitting there. I am trying to find the window sticker to see if it is on there.

 

Mine came with a cord as well, but then again I live and bought my truck in eastern Montana. BBBBRRRRR!!!!

 

I bought mine in North Iowa 39 miles south of the MN border and mine didn't come with one. It's up to the dealer to order it with this $10.00 option and not all of them do so. Brrrr is right as the wind chill has been below and or near 20 degrees all day long.