How to heat a garage

[BrwBier]

On Monday the floor gets poured for my new 28 x28 garage. I'm putting 600' of pex tubing in the floor. I would like to heat it with a homemade solar panel. Has anyone tried this and if so did it work? I'm still not completely sure of the heat source yet and am looking at ideas.
Has anyone tried to make there own differential thermostat?
Brwbier

[caseydog]

I can't help you with heating a garage. Down here, heat in the garage is the problem, not the solution.

CD

[48Rob]

I built a collector to heat a 20 x 18 shop some years ago.
I built the collector on the South facing side, using scrap wood and plastic (it was slated for demolition and so only needed to last a couple years)

I painted the section of the building flat black, then framed it out about 6" and covered it with a couple layers of plastic.
I cut a hole at the bottom and top, opposite ends, in the buildings wall, and installed a fan connected to an adjustable fan switch (temperature controlled).

It worked very well when the sun was out.
It looked not so great.

If I ever move to a place where the neighbors and appearance aren't a concern, I would build another.
A back up furnace is needed...

When I built my next garage, I installed a hundred feet of 4" plastic tile thinking I'd install a fan switch and fan to cool/heat the garage with the air from underground...

It all went wrong when I failed to consider the high water table, and didn't seal the plastic well enough.
The whole system is full of water.
My next thought was to install a small pump and run the water through a radiator, like from a car, and put a fan behind it...

17 Years later, I still have it on my list of things to do.

Rob

[hugh]

depending on how cold it gets where you live consider putting an antifreeze mixture in the pipes so they don,t freeze. Here in Winnipeg it can go as low as 35 below zero for a couple of weeks so its a must. Also worth looking into might be a small water heater plumbed into the system. The big advantadge of in floor heating is nice even heat and if you are working on your stuff at floor level its nice and comfy.

[goldcoop]

Check out my second favorite website:

http://www.garagejournal.com/

Maybe you'll get some ideas

Cheers,

Coop

[Woodbutcher]

This is what I did in my workshop. It's about the same size as you have. It is radiant heat. Works great and it's cheap to run. Plus it pulls air from the outside and exhausts out the other end. No forced air blowing dust around and no open flame to spark a fire.

[SlyTerry]

And if the IR reflector is cleaned regularly to remove dust then 99% of the insurance inspectors will approve of the installation. In my past history in large wood furniture manufacturing plants this is the only system that will be approved. Especially up here where we heat 8 months of the year.

[tk]

Woodbutcher, How high does your ceiling need to be for radiant heating? I'm guessing my 8' isn't high enough. I assume your energy source is natural gas.

Best,
Tom

[goldcoop]

Check out my second favorite website

Man! I didn't even get an atta boy from the admins for that!



Cheers,

Coop

[Lou Park]

Check out my second favorite website:

http://www.garagejournal.com/

Maybe you'll get some ideas

Cheers,

Coop

Man, that's a lot of advertising.