Do you use a waste oil heater in your shop? If so what kind and how is it working out??
We have an INOV8, and it is a piece of crap. I got some infrared propane heaters that are excellent now.
We have a large shop, high ceiling for overhead bridge crane. We used to use wall mounted infrared natural gas heaters, they did ok if you were working in the area of the heater. But, go up on mezzanine, wow, like 80 degrees up there, all the heat goes up! Installed a Clean Burn waste oil burner, what a difference. The heater warms the whole shop. Plus, the circulation of air moves the warm air that used to be trapped at ceiling. Now, it doesn't feel much different on mezzanine than it does in floor area. You have to have a good supply for waste oil though, they will go through oil just like a fuel oil heater does. Overall, ours works great. Makes a nice, comfy shop.
a few ceiling fans will help alot
What is the inov8. Commercial made or homemade? What is the problem with it?
I am also interested in waste oil heaters. I was looking at the Clean Burn ones on their web site. The stated that the small ones burn a max of 1 or 1.2ghr. Do they normally consume less that this or do they always run at the max? I'm just wondering how many gallons it would burn a day?
Have had a Reznor for many years. It has a built in compressor so it is fully contained (many need to he hooked up to shop air). It has worked well for us. When we get some dirty oil etc. it needs more cleaning than when we feed it clean stuff, otherwise pretty low maintenance. As ATCO says, biggest issue is having enough to feed it. Ours puts out 235,000 BTU and runs 1.7 gallons an hour. We used to have an old 2,000 gallon propane tank that we collected oil in all year that worked well as the heater pulled straight from it and there wasn't much material handling involved.
Like most heaters, they are either on or off. Meaning full on, or full off. But they usually don't have to run at 100% duty cycle unless it is too small, or danged cold . As I stated above, my Reznor burns 1.7/hr, but in normal weather runs only 50% or so. If I recall, 50% duty cycle was about the recommendation at the time. But you know, I have had times I had too much oil on hand and we kept the shop really warm for a while and didn't worry about slamming doors shut ASAP. Was pretty neat.
Hi Canadian Digger. Heat really is your choice of fuel/energy. Does one want to pay for electricity or gas? Cost of fuel oil? There's always wood, but either labor or money to purchase is involved. The waste oil burner is an excellent alternative to the above heating methods if...you have a good supply or source of used oil for fuel. If you have to chase around sources of 5 gal buckets of used oil, not worth the trouble. But if you have access to oil, they work great. Consumption depends on where you set the thermostat. I turn ours down to 47 degree F at night, then during day set at 58 deg F. Comfortable working temp. Never checked total consuption, but using this method, I'd say we go through something like 400 to 700 gals of oil in a heating season. And it's nice hearing that furnace burning a waste product instead of some fuel a local utility is charging me for. :yup
Wahoo tomorrow is St Bridgets Day the first day of spring,won't need them heater for long more.
I've been running Clean Burn furnaces for 10 years now. The first one was a reconditioned unit, worked well for a few years then I started to have problems with it...so it got traded in. Current furnace (180,000 btu) has around 5000 hours on it now. It's been almost flawless, the igniter exploded a few years ago, thats been the only problem. Ed
i see where people are converting old fuel oil furnaces to burn waste oil but dont know how well they would work
To hell with my earlier post cold enough to freeze the balls of a brass monkey here to day.
Bumpsteer. How big of a shop are you heating with 180,000btu?
36x64 with a 10' ceiling. Walls are sprayfoam insulated, ceiling is 3 1/2 fiberglass batts. Inside is finished with steel siding. The furnace handles it fine, even low single digit temps it's no problem to keep 65 degrees. T-stat is set at 60 when nobodys there. I'll probably go theru 600-700 gallons of oil per year. It would be less but I usually end up with a couple hunderd gallons of press or machine oil. It's pretty thin stuff when compared to 15w40, doesnt last long. Ed
Its a commercial made heater that our operations superintendant thought we had to have. It wont burn oil worth a crap. It will burn diesel all day long, but that defeats the purpose. We have contacted the company, and they are very little help. It does not matter if it is used engine oil, hydraulic oil, or transmission oil, it wont burn. ATCO, what brand is yours? I am interested in getting one for my personal shop that really works. I have access to 100 gallons a week of used oil, so it would be nice.
the trick is to filter the oil extremely well. preheat to 220- 240 degrees and it will burn in a regular oil furnace. it will be rough on the sheet metal burner in side though. i have done it since 1981 with good results. changed to a cast-iron boiler several years ago. then i heated my 40 by 60 shop and 1800 square ft. home.
the main part of our shop is 4000 sq. ft. we have a large wood burning heater with a pipe welded through the top with a fan that blows air through the pipe. this past year we added a diesel tank outside to hold used oil. we pressurized the tank with about 15 lbs of air pressure to spray the oil into the heater through a pipe with a small hole. it will turn the heater cherry red and heat up fast. kent baugh www.ktbaugh.com
Here's a few pics of our set up. Before we started using our new Clean Burn, I designed and dimensioned an oil sink. Had a local fab shop build it per my drawing. It has a tray to drain filters, it holds drain pans so they can drip clean, and it has a removable stainer basket to prevent heavy crud and debris from going though transfer pump. The transfer pump is mounted to floor beneath oil sink. Before the oil is pumped into tank, the oil passes through a large spin on filter, then is piped through wall to tank on outside. Another nice thing about my oil sink is it's inside. I don't have to go out into weather to empty drain pans to fill oil tank. :yup
Oil tank is on outside. I installed a sight tube on it to monitor oil level. Heater is mounted elevated, with air stream blowing down. The position of the heater draws the warm air that is near ceiling into fan to circulate through the burner and back down to floor level. It does a really good job of evenly heating shop.
Looks like a well designed system ATCO.Clean oil is the trick on oil burners.Good idea on the oil sink ,I guess when it fills up abit you manualy flip the switch to pump the oil to the holding tank.I like the pressure gauge on the filter base,that way you know when the filter is getting full.
You got it 25C!
Hey ATCO.The groundhog saw it's shadow today,6 more weeks of winter.Might schedule in a few more oil changes as the holding tank looks low judging by the sight tube.
Yep 25c, got a buddy that has 200 gal waiting for me to come pick it up.