Shop/garage heating & cooling: what'd you go with?

[Chevy454]

Looking for ideas on how to heat & possibly cool our shop...what'd y'all go with? Any regrets, or pleasant surprises??

[427king]

Im doing the same thing. Checked around and the best is radiant heat with hot water tubes in the slab .Higher initial cost to instaLL but better overall heat and warm cement floors.Cheaper over the long haul. The down side is in a forced hot air system you can use the same ducts for the AC system if you want it,but i dont think ac is as important as heat[at least not where i am!]..Can always run the AC separate.

[Chevy454]

We've already missed the boat on that option, if ya get my drift! LOL!!

[k92]

I use a hotdawg forced air natural gas heater in my insulated 24x30 shop w/o any problems. I believe that it's 45,000 btu.I keep the shop at 60 degrees when I am not out there and can get it to 75 in about 15 to 20 minutes if I want.I used r-19 in the ceiling and r-13 in the walls and sheetrocked over it all so it's really pretty tight. Heater comes in many different sizes,mounts on the ceiling and cost me avout 450.00 with shipping.

[Postsedan]

I had a very similar set up in my old gargage...it`s a vertical wall unit at is only 17" wide and 5 feet tall...made to fit between the the standard wall studs...vents out the rear. 45,000 btu... worked great. I bought mine from Grainger Supply.

Dan.

[Belair62]

I put a home furnace in my barn and its only 24x25...one thing you must keep in mind rob....if you are going to be working with fuel in there in the winter...you must double vent that sucker...intake air has to come from outside or you can make a nice kaboom.

[DarrenX33]

[ QUOTE ]
I had a very similar set up in my old gargage...it`s a vertical wall unit at is only 17" wide and 5 feet tall...made to fit between the the standard wall studs...vents out the rear. 45,000 btu... worked great. I bought mine from Grainger Supply.

Dan.

[/ QUOTE ]

Pretty much the same setup in mine.. Works like a charm.

[mmcporter]

Rob,

I am building a garage as this is being written and I went with the 75,000 BTU Modine Hot Dawg unit running on Propane. Radiant was simply too complicated and expensive for my detached unit, and we don't plan to do AC, so this option made sense. Like many of the others who responded, we are putting in a ton of insultation and sheetrock to make sure it's a tight structure.

Good luck.

Morris

[budnate]

last advice..at least for out here, a guy wants to lay real heavy duty plastic on the ground prior to pouring the floor to hold back the moisture/cold from coming in that way..

[retengw31]

I have a 26 x 36 very well insulated garage built like a house (as contrasted to a pole barn) I have the 75k Modine Hot Dawg running on natural gas. Does a great job even here in Michigan. Keep T'stat at 50, bump to 60 when I work in there. Anything more and it gets too uncomfortable.

Had an old window unit air conditioner, so cut a hole in the wall and installed it up high ear the work bench. Didn't do too good until I put a fan on the workbench right under it aimed at the workshop area. THAT did the trick.

I rigged up a heavy cord that allows me to plug in my big generator in power outages in place of the air compressor and back feed power to my house. Just isolate it from the outside world and use only the critical circuits (beer fridge, well pump) Works quite well. No exhaust and noise problems in the house.

Neighbors around me have permanent backup systems that come on automatically when power goes off. Pretty slick, run on natural gas. Other than the noise, you'd never know the diff.