New shop needs heat

[DoyleH]

I just built a 22 x 36 garage, as big as the city would allow. I live in MN so heat is essential. I am looking at the best way to heat the shop. I have a 15' Wolverine and a couple of wooden kayaks that need varnish so I would prefer not to have a standard forced air unit. I plumbed the garage for natural gas and am leaning towards a ceiling mounted radiant heater.

Any thoughts?

2nd question. I keep two cars in the garage as well. I am debating wether I should wall of part of the shop or work on some sort of movable walls to get boats in and out. If I leave the space open and have varnish curing, will the doors opening and closing have an effect on the varnish?

Thanks for your help.

[raycon]

If the floor is not poured yet radiant floor heat.

[Ken Hutchins]

Plan your work and play, go play in the snow and ice when it's cold ;) . Paint and varnish on the warm days. smile.gif

[Keith Wilson]

Paint and varnish on the warm days. Right. Around here, that means you can only count on working from May to September. Actually this year, maybe from June to August - they're talking about frost tonight. :rolleyes:

Anyway, I also have an unheated garage attached to the house, and any recommendations would be helpful. There's no natural gas plumbing in the garage now, although that could be remedied. I'm not much of a perfectionist with the varnish, so I don't mind forced air. There's so much sawdust on the rafters already that there's no hope. Ah well, nonskid varnish, right?

[ 08-20-2004, 02:10 PM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[Bob Perkins]

I'll second the radiant floor heat - (if it is not too late).

I have it in my shop - it was worth every penny. It is very efficient heating. I never have the problem of poping out to the shop for 20 minutes and not wanting to turn on a heater.

All of the tools are warm - I don't get cold feet - no condensation - all the glues and liquids are usable - humidity is constant. The list goes on and on.

If there was only one downside (a very small one..) is the floor is hard. I have floor padding in all of the common work areas..

Bob

[almeyer]

Move your shop down here (Houston, Texas area). Heat is not a problem. :D

[Nicholas Carey]

There's also ceiling-mounted radiant panels, usually electric. They have the salutory effect of warming you and your tools and materials rather than heating the air/building mass.

Here's a web site with some information:

http://www.toolbase.org/tertiaryT.asp?DocumentID=2101&CategoryID=1435

And a DoE wrote Impact Sheet (well, brochure, really) No. 34, Direct Source to Object Radiant Heating Panels (http://www.eere.energy.gov/inventions/pdfs/sshc.pdf).

This company — http://www.sshcinc.com/ — makes a line of radiant panels (Enerjoy) in sizes for 2' x 2' (250 watts) up to 2' x 8' (1 kW). They market their cosmetic seconds specifically for woodshop use (25% discount from normal retail).

The Radiant Panel Association figures energy savings for shop can be as high as 60% over more conventional heating systems, so you save money even though you're using expensive electric heat.

[imported_Steven Bauer]

My shop is 20 x 25 and I love the radient heat I put in the slab. It cost about $1500 for all the parts - I installed it myself. I use a high efficiency gas hot water heater and there are 3 200' loops of HEPEX tubing buried in the floor. I can keep the thermostat set for 55 degrees(f) but it's comfortable because the floor is about 65 degrees. You just can't wear thick socks or your feet get too hot! :D Wool is right out. :D

Ceiling mounted heat will leave you with cold feet.

Steven

[Nicholas Carey]

Originally posted by Steven Bauer:
Ceiling mounted heat will leave you with cold feet.Not if you put in a wood floor (easier on the feet, the knees, the back and your tools)

[TimH]

I have a small wood stove in my shop. A wood stove for a wood shop :D

[Bruce Hooke]

A key decision you need to make is how warm will you keep the shop when you are not in it. Keeping it warm all the time is nice for a number of reasons:

1. It's warm and ready to go whenever you are. You will use the shop a lot more in the winter if you don't have to go out an hour or more before and fire up the heat.

2. Your tools will be happier if the do not go through big temperature changes all the time. Among other things, large temperature changes can cause condensation, which, of course, leads to rust. However, plenty of shops are allowed to get cold at night so it's not an impossible situation.

3. Water based finishes, and wet water stones, will be destroyed by freezing. Epoxy doesn't really like being frozen but you can restore it if it does start to crystalize, or so I have read. Oil based finishes and epoxy will handle better if they are allowed to get to "room temperature" before use, which can take some time if they are starting at sub-freezing temps.

Of course, keeping the shop warm all the time costs a lot more money than just heating it when you plan to use it, especially in a cold place like Minnesota. A compromise position is, of course, to keep the shop somewhat above freezing all the time but only really heat it up when you plan to use it. If you want to do this you may find it hard to get a thermostat that will go low enough. Many stop at 50 degrees.

In addition there are some hidden implications of the decision about when to heat it, such as:

Some heat sources are much better at providing quick heat than others are. In my experience, any water based system (such as radiant floor systems) will be very slow to respond to a thermostat change. Oversizing the system can of course compensate for this to some degree. As a worst case example, my apartment has a hot water heating system and if I turn down the heat by 15 degrees or so on really cold nights it takes all day the next day to catch up. This is, of course, because the (ancient) system is just barely (or maybe even not quite) large enough for the space it's heating. However, my parents have a radiant floor system in their relatively new house and they also find that it is very slow to respond to themostat changes. At the least, if you go with a radiant floor system make sure the person who designs it knows what sort of response time you want from it.

On the other end of the spectrum wood stoves tend to be very good at cranking out a lot of heat in a hurry. My father has a wood stove in his shop in Maine and in fairly short order the shop can be warm and comfortable, even when it's quite cold out. There is NO heat in the shop when the wood stove is not going. The trade of, of course, is that there is no heat in the shop when you get there!

If you plan to run the heat all the time then, of course, it also makes much more sense to focus on getting a highly efficient system. Electric heat is, of course, notoriously horrific on this count. Since you've got gas in the shop I certainly would start by looking at gas fired celing hung unit, but I do not have enough experience with those units to be able to offer a lot of advice.

[Bruce Hooke]

P.S. For those of you who are from warmer places (meaning almost any other non-mountain location in the lower 48! :D ) it is maybe worth noting that Doyle may well be having to deal with outdoor air temperatures in the MINUS 20 degree F range. I grew up there...I know! :D

[paladin]

a word of caution about floor radient heat....when Sweet Thing and I built the new apartment I intended to go with the radient floor heat but she said NO!. It seems studies in Ukraine showed that the floor mounted heat contributed a very large and real amount of PAIN eventually to those people prone to arthritus in the ankles, feet and lower legs...don't ask me why..
The rest of the apartment had it installed..kitchen/dining room...and bedrooms, but not in very high traffic areas that I frequented. Over the years I have had both legs broken above and below the knee, left ankle shattered into 5 pieces, foot bones and toe bones broken (all in Southeast Asia) and as a result I have "Advanced Rhuemetoid arthritus caused by massive shock trauma" or something like that... I was told the hard floor and radient heat would make it worse.......by several specialists..
The heat lamps should work great...80 percent light and 20 percent heat....and I like it.....

[Donn]

"..temperatures in the MINUS 20 degree F range..." Ugh! Never again!

[Bruce Hooke]

Originally posted by Donn:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />"..temperatures in the MINUS 20 degree F range..." Ugh! Never again!</font>[/QUOTE]Ah, heck, it's not that bad...and when you step outside in that sort of weather you really know that you're alive! tongue.gif :D Of course I was on the cross-country skiing team in high school...

[Peter Malcolm Jardine]

I bought two 220 volt construction heaters and hung them from the ceiling. They're cheap, they work great, and have thermostats. I keep the shop at about 50 F and I can bump it 10 degrees in less than an hour. The shop is 24 X 32 and it gets cold as hell up here in January. Fair to mention there is an apartment over top and the whole building is framed 2x6 and insulated and drywalled.

[Ex-Oceangoddess]

Any time I would vote for underfloor radiant heat. We had a few weeks of -30 degrees here in Montana and the shop was toasty all the time. Even when we had to open the big doors and lost hot air, since the floor, building and contents were warm it only took a minute or so for the cold to dissipate once the door was closed. And once the slab and surrounding area was warmed up the cost of keeping it warm is minimal. Best thing we ever did.

The only way to go in our opinion.....

[mower]

My vote goes for what seems to be the heat of choice for Canadian shops...radiant ceiling heat, not electric, but the natural gas type. Doyle already said he had natural gas connected, it would be easy to do. They are very efficient and they do a very good job of keeping the shop comfortable. Bruce points out what seems to be the biggest problem with floor heat. they don't respond to requests for more heat quickly. Most of us keep our shops slightly above freezing unless we are in them. With cieling heat, you are comfortable as soon as you turn the unit on. Natural gas ceiling heaters are a bit pricey but I have never had more convenient, more efficient, and more comfortable heat in a shop. Give it some thought, thousands of Canadians can't be wrong!

[Captain Pre-Capsize]

Here is some help for those hard concrete floors. When I built my skiff over the winter I went to Home Depot and bought carpet underlayment used for basement floors. It is black on the underside and green on the topside. It trapped the cold clammy air underneath and gave me something cushioned to walk around on all winter.

Oh, the heat source? Well, it is an attached two car garage so I just kept the door to the house open. And yes the children and wife, uh, bundled up that winter. :D True story and a whole lot cheaper than purchasing and installing a gas heater in the garage for a one time project. Of course, now it is apparent to all that this is not a one time project but rather a new way of life for ol' dad here. Soooo, I should have bought the heater after all and the family would have been more comfy. But hey, they will never forget it! :D

[imported_Steven Bauer]

Here is the secret weapon against hard floors:

http://us.st5.yimg.com/store1.yimg.com/I/allheart_1805_75704145

Tha advertising copy says:

Incredibly light and comfortable clog
Ergonomic fit forms to feet
Top and side ventilation helps keep feet cool and dry
Waterproof, U.V. proof and chemical resistant
Tractioned outsole
Mildly massaging insole grip
Fade and crack resistant for long life
Made of rebound(TM) closed cell foam
Pliable yielding material still firm enough for support
So light no need for toe curling to keep them on!
Popular European design, made in Canada

What they don't say is that they float, too! These shoes are so comfortable it's hard to wear any other kind of shoe. And they take all the pain out of standing on concrete all day. Hamilton Marine has them with straps on the back of them. A little better for boating. :D

Steven

[KimWard]

I'll second mower's comment, the thermostst keeps the shop just above freezing all winter. When it's time to work, turn it up and in 10 minutes it's ready. Pretty efficient too. The only thing I'd add to my shop, and still may is a wood floor. Harder to sweep but better feeling and sounding. Kim

[John Hastie]

One thing not mentioned is a "closed combustion furnace".

I built a 12'x42' enclosed (and insulated)workshop in my 40'x40' shed (pole barn).

I use an outside LP Gas (250 gallon) tank and the above mentioned ceiling furnace to heat my shop in the winter.

I also use a de-humdifier (on auto).

This combo reduces condensation and heats up quickly when I go out to the shop.

Remember, an open flame heat can be explosive in a dusty environment.

[Dan Lindberg]

Doyle,

No matter what heat to decide on, if you plan on any amount of "good" varnish work, plan on building a clean room.

I often do the final varnishing in the garage, and unless I shelter it from falling dust, it's full of stuff.

Also, before deciding on the heat type, you need to think about how much time you plan to spend working and how long each time.

I work in the basement at night and it's often for only an hour or so each night.

BTW, I felt just having gas was a huge improvement and plan to hang a forced air in the ceiling.

Dan
also on MPLS

[Captain Pre-Capsize]

Steve:

So where does one get those clogs. I wouldn't want to be seen in public but speaking as someone whose feet need to breathe, I'd be interested in a pair. Give us a website!

[imported_Steven Bauer]

Spring for the ones with the strap from Hamilton Marine. Thirty bucks. And you can flip the strap forward if you don't want to use it. The ones without the strap I got from Maine Mountain Works. They caught on bigtime with A-trail hikers as camp shoes and stream crossers. These guys care about every once they carry and that's about what these shoes weigh! :D
I think they were originally marketed towards doctors and nurses. Put 'rebound clogs' into google - you'll find them. Or just order them from Hamiltons. Or here: http://www.allheart.com/fpac.html

Steven

[JimConlin]

Steve-
I'm not sure about those holes on the top. The way I work, I could get a lot of gooey stuff on my socks. Maybe duct tape is the fix. ;)

Jim