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Heating & Air Conditioning

Heating a small outbuilding

17 years ago

Last spring we purchased our family farm. On the farm we have an outbuilding that all the plumbing is in.... pump for the house and pressure tank as well as a pump for the barn and pressure tank.

In the fall we reinsulated and vapour barriered the building (blow in insulation between the studs).

This building has ALWAYS been heated electrically with a few 'construction' heaters. Never mind the fact that I'm sure they aren't that safe for constant use... they suck power like there is no tomorrow! And after a cold 2 months, our hydro bill is feeling it!!

So, we are on a quest for a better solution for next winter. Preferably something that won't cost a fortune to install, low maintenance and safe. We only need to keep the building warm enough to prevent any water lines/pumps from freezing.

Thanks in advance!

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Comments (9)

kframe19
17 years ago
How large is the building (sq feet)?

What is the climate like in the winter?

How about a small wood stove?
davidandkasie
17 years ago
my pump house is odd shaped, it is about 6 ft wide, the front part used for storage is probably 6x8x8 and the back where the pump and tank are is about 6wx9lx4h. i used a set of 500 watt halogen shop lights to keep it warmed up. they were on a timer to run over night, then off during the day when the temps and sun were enough to keep the building from freezing.

maybe you could do something similar. it cost me an extra 10 bucks a month on the electric bill for the pump.

another option would be heat strips on the pipes and a good insulation blanket on the tank with maybe a couple stirps under the insulation.

get a timer or a thermostat to control when the heat is on.
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Thanks for the quick responses... I should have mentioned that there is another circuit to the barn, it comes from the same house panel and has a single 20A breaker at the barn and it supplies overhead lighting. I have used that power on occasion (via one of those receptacle adapters that screws into the bulb socket), and as you might guess the voltage drops quite a bit due to the current draw. That's why I want to use the heavier gauge wire. It sounds like to be code compliant I would need to disconnect that existing circuit? And if I did that, I would most likely want to go with a subpanel, it sounds like so I could run more circuits. The electrician who would install the panel (I would not try that myself) recommended that I de-rate the circuit to 30 amps on 8 AWG due to the long wire run. Does that seem like the best plan to be code-compliant: remove existing circuit, add subpanel?
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Check your local regs carefully. A lot of Twin Cities suburbs have strict anti-ADU stuff in place like 2nd levels not allowed to be more than 4' high (eg, storage is OK but if a person can stand then then can live up there) or overall height of the outbuilding limited to 13', etc. We could have a garage as big and tall and livable as we wanted so long as it was attached to our house but when we wanted to break off half in to a separate structure that was actually smaller than it was when attached we ran in to some issues and spent 6 months getting the necessary variances. From a cost standpoint - the simpler the better. Get rid of the extra little corners and just have 4 corners. Get rid of the shed dormers or run them the entire width. Simplify the number of siding materials to one. It will look better and be less expensive. DO get full frost footings. You'll not like the problems that will develop w/ a floating slab in Minnesota. If you can, put a shed roof out over the garage doors. It's really nice to be able to leave the garage doors open when it's raining without getting rain inside.
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mr_havac
17 years ago
This would be one of the very few instances where I would recommend an unvented gas space heater. They're cheap to buy and are self contained meaning thet don't require electricity to run and heat the pump house. Even if you loose power the building will stay above freezing.
lil_geek
Original Author
17 years ago
The building is about 12x12 maybe? Not large. We are in Eastern Ontario so our winters can get very cold (we had a lot of -20C this winter)

davidandkasie - I was mentioning running something on a timer to DH because the biggest concern over freezing would be overnight, or when we are away and no water is being used, correct? (10+ hours at work)

mr.havac - what kind of gas would that be? We only have an oil furnace for the house (300 feet away). I think I saw some ventless natural gas or propane ones online?

As of right now we are keeping something like this in mind....combined with a timer we should be able to cut the usage in half.
{{gwi:1552891}}

Please keep the ideas coming, we have 6 months to debate about it!
kframe19
17 years ago
I'm not sure that an infrared heater would be the best choice for what you need to do.

Infra red heaters heat objects, but not so much the air.

Infra red might not provide the heating capacity you need to keep everything from freezing.
mr_havac
17 years ago
lil geek, yes I was talking about LP gas heaters but more in the way of a space heater not an IR. If you check out Northern Tool they have a pretty good selection of heaters at pretty decent prices.
blacknumber1
17 years ago
yeah if you have oilheat for your home you probably dont have natural gas available, so you'd need an LP heater. A 100# tank should last more than half a winter, depending how warm you keep it in there.
airsome
17 years ago
Left field: How about insulating the building to R-40+, wrapping pumps and tanks in electric heat tape and reflectix insulation, and controlling heat tape with a 120v t-stat? For back-up, you could install a parallel wrap of heat tape with its own tstat.
mr_havac
17 years ago
Airsome, you must be from an area with mild winters. Apparently you don't experience many cold weather related power outages that can last for a considerable length of time where you live. Electric heat of any kind is totally useless then.

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