Curious what others are using
I don't have a heated shop or garage
I am looking to get a portable heater just to get the chill out of the garage when i want to be in it. Really starts in November cutting deer in the garage sometimes its pretty chilly to now when its down right cold. I had a kerosene salamander quite a while ago it was pretty loud and smelly.
I am thinking about either a radiant kerosene heater or a propane salamander type. What are you guys using and how does it work?

Thanks Hank

Seems that there was a thread here about the new portable diesel heaters recently.
Someone[KFWA?] was looking at them for this purpose maybe?

Never heard of a salamander heater.

Looked em up....we call them torpedo heaters.


Anyway...when shopping for a propane salamander....get the smallest one out there.


A common size seems to be 150 to 185,000 BTU.


That size will quickly freeze up a 100 pound propane bottle.

Propane forced air heater, works great till you hit -20 and the propane is too cold to get any flow pressure. In other words no heat. 😀

Seriously looking into having garage sevice upgraded and put in a 220 electric.

What I use now

yea a few weeks ago I bought an 8K diesel heater for the garage.

it runs all day for about $5 worth of diesel.

The Vevor brand is the most popular (cheap) version at about $130. It has Bluetooth and a phone app to start it remotely.

Last week we had temps around 15 degrees. I started it at 7am and by noon it had the garage in the high 50's. By 2 or so it was around 60 degrees. It was a 2 car garage.

So its not a quick solution but it is cost effective and its portable. I ran the exhaust out under the gap in my garage door. You could program the app to kick it off around 5am while you're still asleep.

I'm not sure its a daily usage solution although there is no shortage of people that do that. For me, on just the occasional use on the weekend, its a great option. Since it exhausts outside, there is no smell.

It does require a 12V power source. most people use a battery since the entire rig is portable - I bought a dedicated power supply for mine.

I have the Dyna-Glo propane topedo heater for my 30x60 attached insulated garage. I think it is 65K BTU to 85K BTU. It runs off of a 20# bottle. It is forced air and quiet to the point you can have a conversation next to it. I love it and would never go back to kerosene or diesel. Assuming it is above freezing outside, which means it is >40f inside, I can run it for 30-40min to bring the temp inside up to a point it is comfortable to work in jeans and a sweatshirt.

I’ve got one of those.

Works well as far as heating. But LOUD if that matters to you.

Reasonable.

It runs all day on just a gallon? Even with red diesel, that's less than 6 quarts.

I have Blue Flame 30,000 BTU propane heater I bought from Northern Tool years ago. Too many fumes from diesel or kerosene

Val6, infrared, very quiet !

well at least 9 hours with diesel left in the tank. I've yet to run it empty from full. I have a 1.3g tank


this is what the manufacturer says

consumes less than 1 gallon per night and reduces fuel consumption to the 0.15 L-0.65 L（0.04gal-0.17gal）/h range. Diesel air heater with large 5 L/1.3 gal tank provides continuous heat for up to 24-30 hours,Our 5-8 kW diesel heater is suitable for altitudes below 9800ft/3000 m and operates smoothly in an ambient temperature range of -104 °F to 122 °F/-40 °C ~50 °C.

What's the brand and model, if you don't mind, KFWA?

the most popular is Vevor, there are cheaper models out there , you can go as low as about $100 on Amazon, but if you watch a few videos, you'll see Vevor in many of them.

Mine is actually a GoVee brand that is 8KW. I don't think they really go by model designation, just KW rating. Mine does not have the Bluetooth option which I regret not getting now.


note: actually I just read up on mine and it is programmable to have a start/stop time, so I guess you don't need bluetooth

Thanks!

I bought this one recently from Home Depot. I use it in my un-insulated garage (1200 sq ft) when I'm skinning deer and it works like a champ. I love it!

I've had a couple of freestanding kerosene heaters over the years. This one, on its lowest setting, puts them to shame.

https://www.lowes.com/pd/Mr-Heater-...dProductFound=false&idExtracted=true

I bought a Dewalt lp heater that will run off a battery if needed. If I remember correctly it puts out 68000 btus. I figured it would be handy to thaw something out even if there was no electricity available.

I need to train my pickup to run that efficiently.

Oil heaters are good. They're portable and pretty efficient.

I have a regular wall mounted propane heater with thermostat on top

Mini split

Vevor propane forge.

I have a 26’x26’ garage with 10’ ceiling……I have a free-standing, ventless, 30K BTU propane stove that I hook up to an RV propane tank! iI also have a 22” box fan angled downward mounted near the ceiling of the garage. The fan helps move the heated air down from the ceiling area.

Just an FYI……4 years ago this month our forced-air furnace went out. Parts were over a week out. I brought that little heater into our house, hooked it to that RV tank and heated our house.

Wyoming gets a bit cool in January, that little heater kept our main level and the upstairs (2440 sq. ft) quite well. So good in fact, we bought a decorative “fake burning logs”, free standing, cast iron, 30 K BTU heater. It’s been our only heat source in our home since it’s purchase. The forced-air heater is now the back-up to the little propane heater! memtb

Propane fired salamander heater here. It’s adjustable and will put out 150k btu on high. It’s probably 20 years old now and I finally had to replace the regulator and thermocouple. Works great to get the chill out of the outside garage. The attached garage gets enough residual heat from the house.

Dewalt propane fired radiant 35,000 btu heater. Mounted on wheels, it projects radiant heat horizontally to your work area. Works great.

Also have a 40,000 btu kerosene torpedo heater. When using kerosene, the smell is tolerable, but with diesel fuel with the additives, the smell gets uncomfortable.

This is in a 36 x 48 x 14 uninsulated pole building. Just warming my work area to above freezing is nice. I do have an 8 x 12 insulated work room with electric heat for doing detailed work.

eventually that is what my goal is

I've been looking at the MrCool brand because you don't have to vacuum the system to set it up yourself.

Will probably go that route next summer.

Another Modine owner here. My workshop is 32x32 with 10 foot ceilings and insulated and sheet rocked. Within 10 minutes the temperature will go from 40 to high 50's. Never had any issues with the heater.

Last week I paid $7.99 for a gallon of kerosene. I hadn't bought any in a while, and I laughed because I thought the girl was kidding.

This is what I have and it works pretty good for what the OP described.

Portable heaters and wall mounted heaters fueled by oil or propane that are not vented to outside of the building will increase the moisture content of the air and can cause rust to form on steel tools and equipment.

Typically this is worse in small or uninsulated metal buildings. These unvented heaters are best used on a part time basis, rather than continous heating.