Blue Flame or Radiant

[Loogie]

I'm thinking about buying a propane heater for my basement garage. I am considering a ProCom Blue Flame heater from Northern Tool, but they also make a radiant model with about the same BTU. What are you feelings about these? I don't have experience with either. I'm looking for something to heat that I can run at low heat when I'm not in the shop and that will heat things up when I'm actually working in there. The shop has a corrugated metal roof with a slab on top of that and a woodshop over the basement. So heating that metal would also help heat the woodshop. The basement garage is well insulated, but has no ventilation. I really don't want to have to drill a hole through the foundation if I can help it.

 

[porcupine73]

Usually the radiant ones want like a minimum mounting height of 12 feet. I would go vented if at all possible. Unvented heaters dump a lot of moisture into the workspace which can then condense on your tools and other things.

 

[Loogie]

Thanks for the input. I am concerned about the moisture. I might have to get a Hot Dawg, but my understanding is that they are only vented on the intake side, so wouldn't they generate the same moisture?

 

[porcupine73]

Hi. Vented heaters vent the combustion gases to the outside. Heaters such as the hot dawg and some mr heaters have a blower on the exhaust, which allows you to do some different venting methods not possible without power exhaust. The moisture is in the combusted air, and is vented outside. This type of heater draws the air for combustion from within the workspace.

'Separated combustion' heaters also vent the combustion byproducts outside. But they also draw in their combustion air from outside. This makes them great for wood shops, and other areas where something flammable above the LEL might be in the workspace.