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Post by joebill on Jan 19, 2022 4:18:51 GMT
Kerosine heaters tend to stink a bit when they are first lit and when they run dry, but the rest of the time, not bad. I VASTLY prefer propane, and you can choose between the ceramic glow heaters and the blue flame heaters. MOSTLY the ceramic ones have no thermostat, and you just choose how many panels you want to burn at one time, adjust up or down when you are too hot or too cold. I run one of those in my office and have to fiddle with it quite a bit. When I got it, it had a 5 gallon propane tank attached with a hose and the guy had been keeping a travel trailer warm in the winter with it. Not bad, and it is ventless, but you still have to lug propane bottles around. The blue flame ones have real thermostats and work equally well with better control. Be careful ordering, because they are made for EITHER propane of natural gas and will NOT CONVERT back and forth, so you are stuck with what you get. If you happen to have a vent or a good place to put one easily, you can buy a small wood stove and burn those parafin logs in it. Clean burning and you decide the flame size by how big a chunk of parafin you put into it and light. To heat a single room or maybe less, if you have 15 amp 120 volt service to the room, an electric "milk house heater" is simple, cheap, dependable, light as a feather to lift. You can also move it around so it is always blowing on you, if needed. There are also some "oil filled radiator" type electric heaters, but keep in mind the max heat on almost all of them is what you can get from a 15 amp fused 120 volt outlet, regardless of how big the cabinet is or how loud they brag about it, unless you provide a 220 volt outlet for it. Keep in mind that in an emerge3ncy you can fire up the cook stove and open the oven door. I booked into a motel in Payson AZ one day in the dead of winter and got the last room available, and soon discovered that the room heater did not work, and they were snotty about having somebody fix it. It had a cook stove in it, so I fired that up and soon had it so hot it was almost jumping up and down. When I woke up next morning it was so hot I could not even get near it, so I shut it off and let it cool down before checking out, but the paint was now dark and some of it blistered. Next time I checked into that room months later, there was a brand new electric furnace and that old cook stove was sitting out in the alley  IF I pay for a room, I WILL find a way to stay warm in it, even if I have to wreck the place in the process.....Joe |
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Post by joebill on Jan 19, 2022 4:26:52 GMT
OOPS! Double post again.....sorry!.....Joe
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Post by sawmilljim on Jan 19, 2022 15:10:17 GMT
Like you those aisles I avoid. Those heaters to me smell especially if you run it out of fuel. Also I cannot fill that thing without getting kerosene from one end of the house to the other. Not to mention a five gallon can of kerosene weight is over a hundred pounds. Or at my age it might as well. Actually, a gallon of kerosene weighs less than 7 pounds. They do sell little pumps to move the kerosene from the can to the heater.   At seventy and bad health seven pounds isn’t bad one pound at a time. Best use I ever got from those little pumps is when replacing a toilet you can pump it dry. |
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Post by fordy on Jan 19, 2022 16:10:31 GMT
...............About those "Little pumps" , they also make a 12volt dc , AA battery powered pump which will transfer water , gasoline or diesel from one container to another ! I purchased one @ W. Mt. a year ago for ~$11 plus tax . They are the same basic size as that hand pump ! It takes 6-AA batteries and they really work well . They are also available from Amazon but the price is somewhat higher , now , due to inflation ! ................All you have to do is hold the container and let the pump do all the work . They're cheap and probably don't have a long service life but you just go buy another when they quit working ! , fordy |
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Post by BrewDaddy on Jan 19, 2022 22:26:46 GMT
I too am sensitive to things like solvents and perfumes.... there's a reason I haven't finished fixing up my old Coleman white gas stoves - white gas. I just don't want to be wearing that odor on me regardless of how many times I wash up.
The daddy of that little dog I babysit has a kerosene heater in his 10' x 4' man cave. I'd say you know it's there, but it's not terrible. I think it's one of those things you just have to find one in use and see for yourself.
So kerosene heater vs Mr Heater... I picked up a couple of those small propane tanks that I think are 1 gallon size, small and light weight. I had them for the camping stove but they work fine with the mr. heater with the right hose. Propane stores forever and you can get just about anywhere - kerosene maybe not so much. Does one put additives in kerosene for long term storage?
I think the Mr. heater is a more simple option personally....
bd
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Post by wildhorseluvr on Jan 19, 2022 23:13:37 GMT
We’re kind of leaning toward the Mr. Heater. Almost everything I’ve heard or read about them has been positive. Simple is good. 🙂 For now they’re affordable, readily available and I assume I can find extras like the brand name hoses. Any other spare parts I should stock up on?
Kerosene bothers me a lot, would just as soon not deal with it. Whenever I get a “new” (2nd hand) oil lamp, I dispose of any kerosene. I use only the ultra pure lamp oil, which I guess is just highly refined kerosene. Works for me, it doesn’t give off odors or make me sick.
When I did keep kerosene around, I never used any sort of additive in it. Some was really old and worked just fine.
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Post by BrewDaddy on Jan 19, 2022 23:23:51 GMT
I think the Mr. Heater gives you more options. I've run one hooked up to a 'bbq' sized tank which is I believe a 20 pounder, as well as the little one gallon tank I referred to. Plus out of the box, you can use the little green tanks of course.
And with an adapter and using a simple technique (which I can post a link showing it being done) you can refill the greens and run just the green cylinders of that's your thing.
bd
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Post by Cabin Fever on Jan 19, 2022 23:33:19 GMT
I understand the hesitation regarding kerosene heaters. You can get Mr. Heaters with up to three burners. Doesn't mean you have to use all three burners at once. You can use 1, 2 or 3 burners depending on how much heat you need.  |
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Post by farmerjack41 on Jan 20, 2022 3:54:13 GMT
Have one single head and one double head units. Use them in my wood shop, of course not a large building at 28’ X 30’. Down to somewhere around 25 degrees the single head will warm it up to the upper 60’s. Below that may have to fire up the double head to bring up the temperature. Once up can shut it off. Never have the alarm go off that the air is dangerous.
Should clarify those are outside temperatures, even at zero have not seen it go below 34 degrees inside the shop.
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Post by farmrbrown on Jan 20, 2022 4:38:46 GMT
In my head I imagined these Mr. Heater things being for a workshop, garage or like in my case, emergency backup. Never really occurred to me to just use the thing in the house.... Nearly the same time wildhorseluvr posted the thread I came across this in a different forum. <button disabled="" class="c-attachment-insert--linked o-btn--sm">Attachment Deleted</button> Would probably work just fine for you, I personally wouldn’t want them around as primary heat with pets unless I was there supervising every moment. Animals do stupid things…especially BadDogs who tend to be a bull in the china shop. I know what you mean and I thought about that when I bought one for our back deck, which I can enclose during the winter months, but still wanted to be a little warmer when we sit outside at night. And we have 2 big clumsy dogs that insist on joining us too. lol The Mr. Heaters have a "anti-tip valve" wired in so if you bump it enough to wobble just a little, it will shut off the gas and go out. That took away most of the worry for me, but when I rearranged the deck chairs and table I went ahead and took the heater frame off the tank and just screwed it right to one of the 4x4 corner posts and let the tank sit below it about waist high. The dogs can't get to it and no one here gets drunk enough to fall into it so we're all good now!  |
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Post by wildhorseluvr on Jan 20, 2022 5:00:55 GMT
I’m a bit OCD about fire safety. There’s a small electric space heater in the back room to keep the pressure tank plumbing from freezing, it shuts off with the least little wobble. Still don’t trust it. I pull the plug every time I leave home if the dogs are left here. I also pull unplug the pellet stove and shut the oil stove off. 🤣 Old house (1894), old wiring, not taking any chances. If it weren’t for the dogs in the house, I wouldn’t worry…it’s insured, who cares about the house or stuff? But my dogs are a different story.
I came home the other day and my phone, iPad and some papers were knocked off an end table. I’d left a napkin on the end table and my usually well behaved little dog climbed up there to investigate if I’d left any food along with the napkin. 😡 That’s the kind of accident that can happen with pets. Even without knocking a heater over, just knocking papers over against a heater is a concern.
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Post by fordy on Jan 20, 2022 8:31:44 GMT
I’m a bit OCD about fire safety. There’s a small electric space heater in the back room to keep the pressure tank plumbing from freezing, it shuts off with the least little wobble. Still don’t trust it. I pull the plug every time I leave home if the dogs are left here. I also pull unplug the pellet stove and shut the oil stove off. 🤣 Old house (1894), old wiring, not taking any chances. If it weren’t for the dogs in the house, I wouldn’t worry…it’s insured, who cares about the house or stuff? But my dogs are a different story. I came home the other day and my phone, iPad and some papers were knocked off an end table. I’d left a napkin on the end table and my usually well behaved little dog climbed up there to investigate if I’d left any food along with the napkin. 😡 That’s the kind of accident that can happen with pets. Even without knocking a heater over, just knocking papers over against a heater is a concern. ...............Unless that place has been REwired , the 'OLD' wiring used Cloth as insulation with screwIN fuses !!! Once the cloth gets old , it is subject to heat\fire when amperage loads get very high . It'll burn like an Outhouse on top of a High school Bonfire ! , fordy |
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Post by sawmilljim on Jan 20, 2022 18:18:13 GMT
Thing about the top of the tank heater I almost didn’t learn is the amount of carbon dioxide they generated in a tight space. Me and another guy like to of killed our self.
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Post by roadking on Jan 26, 2022 13:47:24 GMT
I understand the hesitation regarding kerosene heaters. You can get Mr. Heaters with up to three burners. Doesn't mean you have to use all three burners at once. You can use 1, 2 or 3 burners depending on how much heat you need. ^^^^^^^^^This I have the dual head unit, but usually just use one for my store front, which is 12'x20. A 20lb tank lasts me for 5 days (@ about 4 hours a day, 10-20 outside temp, gets comfy mid 60s in about 20 minutes on high, then go to low. Shut off when it gets above 70. Relight when it get below 60. Shut off about 30 minutes before closing up). For 9.99 a fillup, worth it. |
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Post by Cabin Fever on Jan 26, 2022 14:52:15 GMT
Just remember that about 4 gallons of moisture are put into the air for every 20 pounds of propane combusted indoors. So, if you have a tight home, make sure you get plenty of ventilation to remove this moisture or windows may buildup a significant frost layer and there is the potential for mold and mildew in the walls.
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