I heat the majority of my house with pellet stoves. I go thru about 3 ton a season and here in mass I just bought 4 ton for $214 a ton at tractor supply. They also sell pellet stoves reasonable. I have a 220 volt electric heater in my garage that uses my welder circuit will heat garage to 60 no problem. Ihave 3 pellet stoves and my small one is going in garage.

 

I had 2 stoves in my house in upstatr NY. the first on was to small and didn't work real well.They took that one back and I got a bigger one with a thermostat,set it and just add pelletts,It worked great.It had a self starter.They need to be cleaned out every week.Just use a fire proufe shop vac.I made a extension for the hopper and could put in 2 1/2 bags at a time.Pellets are not the same,some like dry creek brand are soft wood and burn dirty and fast leaving chunks of ash,and don't give out a lot of heat.I found had wood pellets from west Pa to work real well.{can't remember the name},Also if you can find a number of friends that all so need pellets,get in touch with a pellet company.We bought 22 tons at a time for $185 each and had them shipped to a buddys shop.I used 3 1/2 tons to heat my home from sept. to may each year.

 

Some folks up here use em and the three days to a hopper full is about right
Saves cost of running in gas line .Woods ok if you have your own and don't mind cutting.
Allan

 

Just move to AZ. I don't have to worry about heating the shop... or anything else...

 

I just turn on the furnace.

My neighbors bring me the fuel to run it!!

The tank below it holds about 200 gallons!

 

I thought about one of those too. My buddy who is a mechanic has one of those. But he's had a lot of problems with oil that had water in it, etc. And even though the previous owner left me every single drop of oil he ever drained out of anything for 20 years it seems, I don't think I could produce enough otherwise to fuel it.

I just called Tractor Supply. They have this one for $999. The reviews are mixed.
United States Stove Pellet Heater with 140 lb. Hopper, Large - 1098925 | Tractor Supply Company

 

You would have to get more than a few people to regularly supply you with oil.

Your friends problem could be that he's not careful with the oil. If you allow containers to sit outside in the rain, you'll going to get water in them. You also have to periodically drain the bottom "off" to get any water out.

I bought mine from a guy on craigslist for $500 and spent about $500 rebuilding it. It burns about 1 gallon per hour.

I am very careful with how I fill it. It's amazing how well it works. there's no smoke at all. from the outside, you cannot even tell it's running.

If you have any (free) access to regular and scrap wood, you might consider a regular wood stove. Pellet stoves work well but you do have to buy the pellets and clean it out periodically.

You also might look into a regular (new or even used) gas furnace and re-jet it to operate on propane. You can find 100gal propane bottles fairly cheap and there's usually no permit required for them because they're considered "portable"

I bought a new 60,000btu Janitrol (Goodman) 90%efficient furnace several years ago for about $600.

It vents through plastic pipe (the exhaust is that cool!!)

If I was going to heat a small shop, I use something like below.

The below furnace would probably run all winter on 100 gallons in a shop depending on how well insulated it is and how big......since you're not out there all day and night every day, you could be fairly frugal with the propane. Also, most people like it around 60-65 degrees when working in the "shop"


TAPPAN 1 STG MULTIPOSITION 40K 92.5 % GAS FURNACE | eBay




This one is similar to the one I installed in my previous house. It vents through 2" PVC pipe and most of them are "close combustion" meaning that they use outside air for combustion air and take NO air from the area where they're installed. (meaning you can have explosive atmosphere in the area and it WON'T ignite because the combustion chamber is completely sealed)




69,000 BTU Goodman Gas Furnace 92.1% GKS90703BX | eBay

The above furnaces are pretty easy to install. You wouldn't have to have a lot of ducting and the propane connections and parts are easy to hook up if you don't want to pay someone to do it. (the propane conversion is basically changing the jets and changing the supply pressure.....you measure the pressure with a water manometer)

AND you don't have to light them or clean them!!! They use hot-surface ignitors. (NO pilot lights!)

depending on how much you'd run them I'll bet the cost of the propane wouldn't be a much more than pellets and you wouldn't have to take up a pallets sized space in the shop to store the pellets. Also, you'd only have to call the propane service to have them fill it once in a while.


Cheers,


Rick

 

Good points. Here's some of the cold hard facts (pun intended) about my shop. I have absolutely no wall insulation and may not get around to it because my farm and my kids pull me in about 20 different directions at once. There is a 1/2" layer of foam board insulation on the ceiling. Secondly, I worry that my 100 amp service will be pushed with some sort of electric furnace that will compete with my air compressor and 2 different welders. With that being said, I really want some sort of radiant heat source.

I have access to all the wood I'd ever want. But my time is pushed as it is right now. And, quite frankly, I've chopped firewood all my life. I very well may end up with a "regular" wood burner, but I cannot get over the fact that this is the burn chamber/ash tray for the furnace I saw at Tractor Supply today.



As far as one of those used oil heaters, I have enough contacts with the folks in the heavy equipment and mining industries to get all the oil I'd ever want. But just don't know if I'm willing to deal with that potential mess and hauling everybody's used oil home with me.

 

I heat my home which is 2000 sqft with a pellet stove and i takes 2 tons a year here in western oregon. I like the stove very much. You can get a battery backup for them that last about 6 hrs on it.

 

I just throw on another layer of clothes.

 

Thought I'd give you guys an update. I bought that stove listed above from Tractor Supply. I got it installed over the weekend, but I could NOT get it to ignite automatically like it was supposed to do. I even changed out pellets thinking they had drawn moisture even though they seemed dry as a bone and very compact. If I "helped" the fire get started (don't ask), the stove worked very well. But it just seemed like the ignitor was not getting hot enough to do its job. It FINALLY dawned on me what the problem was. I was using a typical round 16 gauge extension cord from the nearest outlet. The electric ignitor was apparently not able to pull the adequate amount of amperage to get hot enough to start the fire. My shop only has a 100 amp service to begin with. I switched it out with a 12 gauge extension cord, and the problem was solved. I'll be putting in a dedicated outlet with at least a 12 gauge or thicker supply line very soon. The heater seems to do very well right now. We'll see when it starts getting colder...... I will just tell you, filling that hopper up with three 40-lb. bags of those pellets was a whole lot easier than cutting, splitting, and carrying a load of wood. If any of you guys are needing a new heat source for your home or shop, I'd seriously consider one of those stoves.

 

I live in Colorado (most easterners don't realize it, but I am in CORN country), and eastern Colorado should be part of Nebraska :P

Around here everyone uses Corn or Hybrid stoves (they can burn Corn or Wood Pellet).

A few of em out there burn about a hockey puck (literally in size and shape) "clinker" waste every month and that is it.

If you like your money to stay with you (as sure as most others do), I would suggest insulate as you can - the savings are beyond worth it. My grandads "shop" has insulation and I will work out there in the winter. His "barn" (attached to the shop) is uninsulated, and holy cold - no amount of heat will save that place it too cold for insulated coveralls even.

I know priorities and time.. so in with everything else it will take forever, but I think you will be well pleased at how nice it is when you have the insulation done.

I think you made a good choice on the stove, hauling wood takes you away from rebuilding the engine

 

Hey Doc i saw one you could burn pellet or dryed corn in i was told if ya burn the corn it smells like your cooking corn bread. Think it was in a norton tool book. Also i was thinking bout the steer and i think you should give him half the cow and maybe give the other half to some poor MT. FOLK.

 

I thought about a corn stove, Dale. But this just isn't a "corn place" like the guys are mentioning above with the midwest. The cost of burning it would be much higher in my opinion.

As for the steer, don't you worry. That guy isn't gonna go hungry. He's got his own trucking company and toys. He was just trying to get a bargain. Trust me, if I thought he truly needed the steer, he would have gotten it at my loss or even less. We have an annual Christmas party here at work every year that I'm heavily involved with. We pretty much do Christmas for way over a hundred children that are less fortunate. It's a good thing.

 

If you have natural gas in your area I'd go that way. Cheap and clean, just adjust your thermostat to where your comfortable. I have a hanging 45,000 btu unit in my 24x24 shop that costs next to nothing to heat but my shop is very well insulated for the north.