How are you heating your garage this Winter?

[RayL]

I have an unheated 2-car garage that is too cold to work in now (~35F). The space is 20ft by 20ft with an 11ft ceiling.

I'm thinking about buying a portable 8KW Diesel Air Heater to get the temperature up to where I can feel my fingers again.

YouTuber Project Farm recently did a review of a few of these cheap Diesel heaters. They seem to be a good fit. Anyone using one of these or have a better solution to portable heat in a garage space?

Thanks,
Ray

[71GranCoupe]

Interesting.

[Brads70]

I enjoy watching this guy and he had a episode on those diesel heaters. I have no need for one as I don't use my garage much in the winter but when I do I heat my house with a woodstove located in the basement and have a bathroom exhaust fan that suck warm air from the basement into the garage with a flick of a switch. Works ok for all I need it.

[RayL]

@Brads70 - there are a lot of videos about these diesel heaters out there now - all new to me! I've learned a few good do's and don'ts from watching them. One thing that I've seen over and over is that the actual burner unit is the same for every one of them. So look for the cheapest unit with the best controls / configuration for your use case and you are good to go.

[jimynick]

Natural gas tube heater in a 36X24 garage. My son Nick hooked it up with a thermostat that maintains it at about 50f and if you turn on the second bank of lights, it fires up and runs until it's about 68f..You can also set it by hand to run and keep running until you say stop. Good heat and doesn't seem to cost a fortune to run. Just my 

[torredcuda]

My first garage which was just barn board with no insulation I started with a torpedo heater, then a small wood stove, then an old mobile home furnace I bought for $100 off Craigs List. I hooked it up to a barrel tank and wired a plug and thermostat in so when I wanted to work out there I could go out, plug it in, set he thermostat and go back in the house to finish my coffee while it warmed up. Second garage was insulated and had permanent oil furnace heat, third and current garage use Hot Dawg propane heaters mounted on the ceiling. As I tell everyone who asks about garage heat - make sure you check your fire regulations so you are covered in case anything happens, my state requires any flame source in a garage be at least 3' off the floor due to gasoline fumes causing potential igniting/explosion.

[mtull]

Natural gas tube heater

Sounds interesting.  Are you referring to the straight tube heaters like this: Natural Gas Infrared Straight Tube Heater, 10'

[7E-Bodies]

My shop is a 40x60 with 10' ceilings, nicely insulated, yet it's a metal pole barn so its a cold magnet. I heat it easily with my salamander heater bringing it up to temp in 20 minutes, then shutting off that noisy thing and letting my wood stove take over. I'm very happy with this. I'm in central IL and it get's butt-cold here.

[Dakota]

A couple of months ago, I put in a "Mr Coolit" mini-split heat pump.   It is mostly intended for cooling during the Texas summers, but we are in an "Arctic cold snap" right now (20F - Fall weather for a Buffalo boy) so I've been running it in "heat" mode.  It'll warm up the garage by 10 degrees in an hour or so.  It doesn't appear to put a huge electrical load on the house based on what I can tell, so I'm pretty happy with it so far. 

[PLUM72]

I am working out of a fairly standard 2-car garage.  Ceiling is insulated, the walls are not.  I am not out there all the time so, the temp is what it is.  When I am out there, I have a 240 volt plug in electric heater.  Its a Dr. Heater $125.00 Amazon purchase.  I wired my air compressor with a NEMA 6-30 plug.  I pull the plug on the compressor and plug in the heater.  While its not great, I work with a sweatshirt and light jacket and it is tolerable.  The garage temp largely depends on how cold it is in the Chicago area.  I can normally get the garage temp up into the 50's, if it is 20-30 degrees F outside.

Depending on what I am working on, sometimes I can move to a small workshop I have in the basement of our house.  If I were out in the garage more, I would run a small natural gas furnace hanging from the ceiling. 

[70_440-6Cuda]

Well, I am in SoCal and it is currently 68 degrees so I open the garage door

Fires and wind are crazy right now..... scary stuff but not near me thankfully.........yet

[mtull]

Well, I am in SoCal and it is currently 68 degrees so I open the garage doo

Everyone likes a little a** but no one likes a smart a**.  Just kidding about that but very happy your far away from the fires, hopefully their contained soon.  We've warmed up to the mid twenties here in Northern VA.

[usraptor]

I have a two car insulated garage/workshop with vaulted ceilings and a 2 post lift.  When I had the shop constructed I had two of these radiant heaters mounted on opposite walls as I live in snow country on the side of a mountain in Utah.  I normally keep the thermostats at 35 degrees.  However, when I go out to work in the shop/cars I turn them up to approx 60 and within 20 minutes I'm stripping off my insulated work shirt and down to working in a t-shirt.  One of my best decisions having these installed.   

[70_440-6Cuda]

Well, I am in SoCal and it is currently 68 degrees so I open the garage doo

Everyone likes a little a** but no one likes a smart a**.  Just kidding about that but very happy your far away from the fires, hopefully their contained soon.  We've warmed up to the mid twenties here in Northern VA.

Dang!  My sister is in NY and it has been in the 30s...  My buddy uses one of those cannon style propane heaters in his shop in the winter

[jimynick]

Natural gas tube heater

Sounds interesting.  Are you referring to the straight tube heaters like this: Natural Gas Infrared Straight Tube Heater, 10'

Yup and that's not a bad price for a new unit. I bought mine at the Barrie swapmeet for $150 non-running and $50 later it did. Gives good radiant heat and if you rig it, it makes a good painted parts dryer too.