Better heat solution under $1000

[pbon]

I used to run a 30-60k torpedo off a 20lb or 5 gallon barbecue grill tank. Had to refill often. Might get a day depending on how much I ran it, which depends on insulation and space. If I had an 80k I would want a pretty good size tank, somewhere in the 100-300 gallon size.

 

[MattT]

Yea never works out that way, especially when you factor in efficiency and other variables

It'll work when the heater is running continuously. An 80K unit will burn 80,000/91,200 gallons per hour. But it won't run all the time so to estimate how much you'd burn in a winter you'd have to do a load calc of the building, factor in heater efficiency, then use climate data to get an annual number.

Quick and dirty guesstimate is to convert your kero usage using BTU per gallon which is 131,890 for kero. 131,890/91,500 is 1.44 so you'll probably use about 1.5 gallons of propane for every gallon of kero. So if you normally burn 100 gallons of kero per winter you'd be looking at around 150ish with propane.