My current shop is in a very large farm machine shed, it provides me with lots of space but it takes a while for the forced air wood furnace to heat such a huge area. I’ve installed a couple of circulation fans in the cieling but i was thinking of other ways to conserve heat. My question is, if i ‘fill up’ some of the space in the building with cars/trucks and tractors is this going to make the space smaller that i’m trying to heat or am i now trying to heat up these vehicles as well as the space. I’m sure this is a silly question but i’m not sure what the answer is, are the cars acting as heat sinks? i don’t have much options to make the space smaller since i share the area with the rest of the family so building walls or hanging curtains just insn’t feasable. It seems that we spend an awful amount of time up here in Canada dealing with cold and snow, but the alternative is to quit woodworking for 4-5 months every year. Anyone have any thougts?
Replies
SFX,
To maintain a comfortable temp internally you must add btu's to replace the ones your loosing to the outside . You loose btu's through ceiling, walls, glass, floor and air turns in the space. If you fill the space with things it reduces the volumn of air that needs to be warmed with each air turn...however it does not change heat loss.
Hi SFX,
What kind of floor do you have? If you're looking to upgrade your heating you might want to consider radiant floor heating. It's rather expensive but it will put the heat down where you need it.
Paul
I've got a concrete floor in the shop, i'm not upgrading since i'm going to build a smaller shop attached to my new home next year, just looking for simple ways to heat more efficiently
It sounds like what you need is radiant ceiling heaters. Check any of the big-box stores with high ceilings and you will find radiant units hanging up there. They heat "things" not the air. Read that as shop tools and people.
Frosty
It's too bad that "hanging curtains just isn't feasible" because the cheapest and easiest short term solution would be to hang plastic. Heavy gauge, clear sheeting. And it really CAN be installed in a manner that's not quite completely hideous.
If you have plans to move to a new shop then why put money into a system to heat your current shop? Buy a heating system now and move it to your new shop? That's fine, if you know exactly what your needs will be. BUT, if you don't - and really, how could you - you're simply throwing money around.
I used to work for a guy that had a seasonal partition to his rather large shop. (His shop, like your current shop, had heavy items that sat idle in the winter and absorbed heat.) The partition was a simple but nicely constructed frame of dimensional lumber with stretched clear plastic. On the "interior" side of the partition, we could work all day in the dead of a New England winter with nothing more than shirt sleeves. On the the "exterior" side of the partition, you could freeze your arse in short order. Total cost for the partition was less than $100.
Sometimes, you gotta do what you gotta do...
Regards.
I don't think there's a cheap, easy way of doing - especially considering you'll be moving into a new shop next year. It might be best to save your money and make sure the new shop is adequately protected against air infiltration (through house wrap, caulk) and insulated.
It's amazing what Tyvek and lots of insulation will do!
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