I have a 1000 square foot 3 stall garage that I would like heated on the colder days. It is less then 2 years old, cemented, insulated well, but I forgot to inquire about heat when I built my house. Natural gas is available.

Please advise what I should do, and how much it might cost...Thanks.

 

I love wood heat, cheap install and if you don't use it all the time it is good route to go. Plus I like going out and cutting firewood. at my old place I heated a 40x50 with 16' walls shop with a wood stove. I installed some fans to keep the heat pushed down. man I miss that shop

 

Try www.lanair.com they build heating systems that burn waste oil for shops and such.........

 

I built a 26 X 28 X 10 high garage last fall and heat it with a 45,000 BTU, low profile, nat gas unit heater. The heater was $500, chimney $150, re-locating the gas meter $330, running a new gas line to the house $1450, and $200 for a gas fitter to hook up 4' of flex hose for the heater. I keep it at about 40F unless I'm working out there. The heater has no trouble keeping it warm during -35 or so weather.

Your garage is bigger. You might want to go with a 60,000 BTU heater. Depending how high your ceilings are, you could look into a radiant heater as well. Myself, I don't like standing under them. I've got a hot enough head already.

 

I have a good sized garage at about 800 sq feet. and went with an electric since its easy to put in and and easy to take with me when I move. If I was planning on staying here forever Id probably go gas/propane.

http://www.northerntool.com/webapp/w...t_6970_595_595

I bought this one and at $250 shipped it keeps my garage above 45 degrees unless I turn it up and it cycles itself automatically. Its been nice and the quality is good too. Plus its made in the US. For 1000 sq ft Id look at two of them though to keep a single heater from staying on all the time.

I thought Id add, my garage is all cement block and half into a hillside. Also, the ceiling is insulated.

Theres my .02

 

I heated my old 24X24 with a 45,000 BTU natural gas furnace. I kept it at 45 all the time and it took less than 5 min to roast you out when you wanted to. It was an 8" ceiling garage, and was insulated well. It didnt take 25 bucks a month to keep it warm I swear...... My new one is 40'X60'X12' ceiling, I am using a 125K BTU wood furnace. Not nearly as convienient, but a whole bunch cheaper than trying to use Propane.

If your garage is tight, and well insulated, I wouldnt see why you would need more than a 45K BTU hanging furnace.

You dont say how many times you are going to be opening the garage doors though, obviously recovery time would be slower with a 45K, and the cost higher if you were to be opening it all the time, truck in, truck out.

 

With the slab already poured, it is probably too late; but, most likely, by far the best heat is hot water lines in the floor.

These can be fed by an outdoor wood boiler with a waste-oil auxilliary burner.

That way, you can burn wood when you have wood and waste oil when you have it.

In a pinch, the waste-oil burner can burn diesel.

You can also pipe the heated water to a huge heater-core and force the air across it.

 

I use a double barrel wood burner to heat my 40x40 with 12 foot ceilings. Generally can get it 30 degrees warmer than outside temps.

 

My shop is 30X50, 10 foot walls, some insulation, but not the greatest. I use a 125K Kerosene torpedo that I bought from Lowe's on their end of season half price sale. Even with Tennessee's 9.25% sales tax, it was less than $200. Does a great job. Even has a thermometer that shows the temp. I also have a wood stove that my neighbor gave me. Haven't hooked it up yet as I want to use insulated pipe so I dont' have to put it 18" from the wall. Too cheap to pay the full price for double wall pipe. I burn diesel in the torpedo, so any left at the end of heating season gets poured in the Ram or Kubota. Wood heat is economical only if you can scrounge your own. If you have to buy it, likely not cheap. When I lived in Amarillo, Texas, I had a house with a fireplace. Wanted to use it for a party. A face cord of oak cost me $200!!! No trees in the Texas Panhandle. The wood I bought was shipped from Houston. Tennessee is covered with trees, so once I get my stove hooked up, I'll switch to wood heat.

 

Solid idea.

 

Try a Monitor stove or a Toyo stove. They burn #1 and are very efficient. Also they install into places after the fact easily.

 

Your in ILLINOIS right, so I would think about a corn/biomass stove. Its what we heat our 2.1K sq ft house with. A 56k btu stove kept our house at 71f when it was -5 with 20mph winds last month(feb). Will have a whole $600 +- in heat this winter (168 bushels of corn @ 3.60 bushel). Check local codes for any heating appliance in a garage, most require fire box to be so many inches off of the floor, so you might have to put a stove on cement blocks to keep Insurance co. happy. This is done because flamable fumes usually settle to the floor.

Duane W.

 

You have NG so why not just put in a 2-$300 wall mounted vent free heater 99.9% efficiant.
Joe

 

I have a Lennox 45k BTU hanging heater. Garage is 26x32 with 8' ceilings, R19 in the walls and R3 on the ceiling (not done yet). It will keep it whatever temp you want, and warms up from 45 to 65 in a couple hours even at 5 or 10 below 0. Not for sure what it actually costs be a month other than it's not much. We insulated the house and built the garage at the same time. Our heat billl was lower after insulating the house and building the garage, even though NG went up 30% or so.

 

I have a 1200 sq. ft. shop with 14ft walls and can easily heat it to 65 degrees when it was 35 weekend before last with a Dyna-Glo type heater that burns either Keronsene, Diesel or Propane. Less than $250 a couple of years ago at Lowes.