2kw heater at 10 cents per kilowatt hour (mid peak) costs 20 cents an hour to run x 24 hours= $4.80 a day in an uninsulated garage with the door wide open.Close the door and insulate it and I guarantee it will run less than 15 minutes an hour and may not come on at all on milder days. The OP was talking about a single, insulated,attached garage.I think $2.50 a day in the coldest month of the year is a realistic estimate.
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Garage insulation
- Thread starter shanekingsley
- Start date
You may not be off too far on operating costs with a sealed insulated garage, but I think your uninsulated numbers are way off. Average rate in the winter is 9 cents per kW hour ((12*6.5+6*9.5+6*13.2)/24). The standard garage heater is 5 kW. That works out to 45 cents an hour *24 hours or $10.80 per day. I don't know what temp an uninsulated garage would stabilise at if you dumped a continous 5kW into it. My garage with full length soffit vents up two sides, gaps around the door and no insulation could probably keep the heater on full blast without getting too warm.
I agree that the required kWh/day drops drastically with sealing and insulation, but I haven't measured or run the calcs to see what the actual numbers are. The biggest factor is probably how often/long the overhead doors open as they will quickly dump all the heated air and you have to start again (obviously the slab and other surfaces won't dump their heat that quickly). The vast majority of the times the garage door opens will be at peak electricity rates.
I’m not suggesting trying to heat your garage with your doors wide open.Im just saying that even a small electric heater will cycle and not run continually in an enclosed well insulated single car garage unless you leave the door open. Saying that your 5kw heater costs 45 cents an hour to heat your garage is misleading because in most situations it would never run for an hour straight.I’ve installed dozens of electric heaters in garages(I’m an electrical contractor) at a fraction of the cost of gas, propane, woodstove etc. and I’ve never had a complaint about the operating costs.Its a garage/workshop not a sauna so if you set your thermostat accordingly you will be fine.
Trials
Well-known member
If the OP already has his garage wired for an electric welder, that would be a very inexpensive installation! Temporary heat electric heaters are cheap to buy at a little better then 100$ and just plug into a 220 volt 30 amp or better outlet :/ not too many people have their tiny garage wired for that. It sounds like you could provide a very rough estimate for such an installation if you know more about the homes existing hydro panel and its location relative to the garage, yes?
... if the hydro panel is a healthy distance from the garage and/or the panel is inadequate then cost will become significant, unless the OP is an electrical contractor.
Trials
Well-known member
During construction of my new home the drywall installers used 2 of those heaters, They guesstimated the operating cost to be ~10$ per day per unit. Heaters were running most of the time unless you turned them down significantly and even then they really only shut off because the thermostat control is in the heater itself and not on a wall located any significant distance from the heat source. One was plugged into an oven outlet and the other into a dryer outlet.
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Back to the OPs garage and assuming that he gets a decent door and insulates his walls as he plans.A 15amp 240volt circuit will support up to 2880watts of heat or less.More than adequate for the Ops needs.Circuit breaker is about $30, wire is about 30 cents a foot, receptacle is about $10(or you could have a hardwired heater and no receptacle),heater is about $100 ,permit is $89. Now you just have to find someone to do it or do it yourself.If you planned on doing a 30 amp receptacle instead(for future welding perhaps)the cost would be the same except the wire would be about 60 cents a foot.Any house built in the last 45 years will have a 100amp panel.As long as you have two spare circuits in your panel you are good to go.It would be a very very rare acception that a house with a 100 panel could not provide this additional load.
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My currently uninsulated garage seldom freezes in the winter, only during those back to back -15 to -20 type days and then only around the door area. If insulated it would probably stay above freezing all the time due to heat leakage from the house. So setting an electric heater at about 6C - 8C and then cranking it up to 18C or so an hour before you plan to use it would cut costs significantly. Keeping heat on minimally would cut down on potential mold issues I think.
Trials
Well-known member
I think the OP has the insulated door covered, he would probably need to staple plastic over the open stud wall.
Can you provide us a link for a portable heater that plugs into a 15 amp 240 volt outlet please and thank you.
I’m sure there’s one out there somewhere.Personally I would get a permanently mounted fan forced 2kw or 2.5kw 240v hard wired unit.Check Oullette or Stelpro’s website. They are the two most common manufactures you would find at an electrical wholesaler.They make every size and shape of heater.If you really wanted to do it on the cheap you could just use a baseboard heater with a built in thermostat.That would be about $60. 2000watts is 2000watts whether it’s coming from a baseboard or fan forced heater. The downside is that the baseboard would take up more wall space.
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Trials
Well-known member
Never seen such a thing, that's why I asked. My AC arc welder requires a 50 amp outlet which I thought was fairly minimal, and heck if he wants 220volt baseboard or the in the wall fan heaters, I can load him up with those for free! That's about all they are worth imho.
Yeah, I do have the insulated garage door already and it's pretty decent.
For the amount of time I spend in there, I'm still undecided if I would improve the heater and moreso, I'm no electrician, so I would have that professionally installed before I burned our house down. Without a doubt the garage wall insulation needs to be resolved, so it would make sense to me to do that and see how much it improves.
For the amount of time I spend in there, I'm still undecided if I would improve the heater and moreso, I'm no electrician, so I would have that professionally installed before I burned our house down. Without a doubt the garage wall insulation needs to be resolved, so it would make sense to me to do that and see how much it improves.
Just read about an interesting change in the Ontario Building Code.Starting January 1, 2018, all houses built will be required to have a 200 amp or larger service and have an empty 1” conduit from the main panel to the garage for a car charger.Had not heard anything about that until today.
Interesting. I had to pay $400 for the 200 amp upgrade. The conduit to the garage is nice, although I'm surprised they wouldn't mandate a conduit to the attic as well for solar panels (something my builder happened to offer for free).
This conduit to the garage made me think of the other builder on our street. Conduits to the garage wouldn't be necessary for this builder since they're placing the actual electrical panels in the garages! My neighbours that have these homes are really upset and are surprised it's even to code (as am I).
I see it as a taking up valuable garage wall real-estate, makes it more of an inconvenience to add things to it (since you'll need to run everything through a conduit), and in the winter it would be a nuisance to access. If the garage didn't have cars accessing and was heated, I'd be all for it.
Mad Mike
Well-known member
The author put up a couple of pics on page one, looks like the garage is 10x20, or about 200sq'. It appears to have an insulated garage door, it's drywalled on the ceiling most of the side walls -- likely interior and/or insulated.
This is a small space to heat - you don't need an electrician, 30 amp service, or a garage heater. If you have a door into your house, open it & wait 10 minutes -- the garage will be warm enough to work. Leave it open and it will stay warm enough to work.
If you don't have an interior door, buy a 1500 watt electric heater and plug it into a wall socket. $25 bucks and you have heat for your garage.
To help keep heat in, the best money goes into garage door weather seals -- $40 at a home improvement center.
This is a small space to heat - you don't need an electrician, 30 amp service, or a garage heater. If you have a door into your house, open it & wait 10 minutes -- the garage will be warm enough to work. Leave it open and it will stay warm enough to work.
If you don't have an interior door, buy a 1500 watt electric heater and plug it into a wall socket. $25 bucks and you have heat for your garage.
To help keep heat in, the best money goes into garage door weather seals -- $40 at a home improvement center.
Whoah,way too simple.It will never work.
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