Garage/Shop Building...not to hi-jack Zieg!

[ehjorten]

I am finally framing the walls on my shop!  Took a long time to get to this point.  Started off by logging 9 trees and skidding them out to a landing for a self-loader to come pick them up.  Sold them to a local mill!  It has been a long process as I put a bathroom in my shop.  48x32 with about a 400 sq. ft. loft.  The top plate is at 13'6" with scissor trusses on top of that making the interior peak at 21' 6" high!

The side sewer and conduit runs really made a mess with the 150' trench that started 6' under my driveway and ran back to the shop!

The one-man construction crew has finally started to make good progress on the weekends and occassionally during the week with the 1 hour of daylight I have left when I get home 

I didn't want to hi-jack Zeig's thread, so started another one.  Check it out if you want!

https://picasaweb.google.com/112506728021641177232/Shop?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCPS58PKXtYOu-wE&feat=directlink

[pholliday1]

Wow are you going to be happy when its done, Very nice start I can tell your really doing it right. Very Impressed with the way your doing it. The way you poured the walls and isolated the floor into just a "square" will go along way on heating the floor. I have extensive knowledge with regard to radiant heat and I must say your setup so far looks great. Those were some really big trees probably glad to get them away from the house. What type of boiler will you be using?

[ehjorten]

Haven't quite figured that one out yet...was thinking about something like a Hydronex panel with condensing boiler setup with an indirect water heater for the potable water (something like this http://www.wattsradiant.com/products/hydronex/ ).

A friend has a setup in a shop bigger than mine that he heats with an electric hot water heater, but he doesn't have a bathroom.  I don't have gas to my house, but it is at the street (unfortunately it is probably a 200' run or so and would have to saw-cut my driveway to put it in!), and I don't know if they put a tee in the main for my house or not (I understand that is a big part of the expense).  I plan to broach that issue and weigh the costs later.

NG per therm is about half the price of electricity in our area.  Electricity here is about 9.5 cents per kWhr. and my shop will have the ability for a full 200 A service, but I don't figure on needing anywhere near that much.  Because of the area I am in and because of the insulation that I put under and around the perimeter of the shop I'm not sure I can pay-back that NG install anytime soon.

Suggestions???

[mehunter1]

If you wanted to go natural gas, what about getting a propane tank and just having it filled.  I mean you probably won't use that much, not like a house anyway.  If you get a big enough tank you probably would only need it filled about once a year.

[zieg85]

2 words....VERY NICE!!!

[bake74]

     That will be nice, a lot of work though. 

[pholliday1]

Depending on the availability of propane in your area you might want to go in that direction. There are many good modulating condensing boilers out there. I never understood why people would use a conventional boiler, just to make water at 150/180 degrees then turn around and put in a mixing valve to lower the temp to 100+-. Buderus makes a great mod/con boiler it's a GB 142/ they make several models depending on your needs. What are your thoughts on insulation? If you use spray foam you will probably be able to heat your shop with a candle lol.

[ehjorten]

So here is what I see about propane:

Propane has about 2,516 BTU/ft³.  Propane is normally sold by the gallon.  1 gallon of propane is about 35.65 ft³.

Natural Gas has about 1,030 BTU/ft³ (59% less energy content).  Natural Gas is normally sold, piped to your house by the therm (which is equal to 100,000 BTU).  In my area it is about $1.175 per therm.

So...one therm of NG would equal about 39.75 ft³ or propane (100,000 BTU / 2,516 BTU/ft³).  39.75 ft³ or propane equals about 1.11 gal of propane (39.75 ft³ / 35.65 ft³/gal).

A gallon of propane would have to cost roughly $1.31/gal delivered to be equal to NG.  Unfortunately I just called a local place to see what delivered propane is going for.  They told me the normal rate is $2.50/gal with a first time fill rate of $1.79/gal.  That is nearly double the cost of NG.

Now...I would have to crunch some numbers to determine the overall expected U-value of my shop and what I think I might expend in BTUs per year heating it, convert that to dollars and see how long it would take to pay-back the investment to get gas installed at my house.

Gawd!!!  Sometimes I loath being an engineer...always crunching numbers and overthinking things!!! 

[thirsty]

Use wood ehjorten. The same pieces of wood warm you up many times. Cutting it down, cutting it to length, splitting, stacking, lugging it into the garage, and finally burning in the wood stove.

Gawd!!!  Sometimes I loath being an engineer...always crunching numbers and overthinking things!!! 

The only number crunching involved with working up wood is how much beer to buy. There are a lot of variables and I'm not sure a standard btu to beer formula exists. I just do the number crunching and double it to make sure. lol

Seriously though, have you checked into an outdoor wood furnace?

[pholliday1]

Its very easy to change a boiler from propane to natural gas. I would start with propane, figure out what "real world" usage that you have and then react from there if the propane idea is scrapped no big deal.Once you start digging your kinda stuck with it. I would be very surprised if your propane usage was very hi( depending on inside temp, how its insulated etc.) Nothing like being warm!!

[ehjorten]

Hey Thirsty!  I'm all about Thrice Heat!  I burn wood in the home in a nice efficient Lopi wood stove.  Problem is where I am at...I think it would be more hassle to get the county to approve a wood burning furnace for a garage than it would be worth.  I live in the Pacific NW so it doesn't really get that cold here.  We only have 4,700 Heating Degree Days vs. like 10,000 in Northern Minnesota.  The investment of a gas boiler or a wood burning furnace might not be worth it.  Electricity here is now the lowest in the nation (we used to be 3rd to Wyoming and Idaho) at $0.086/kWh and it is really stable; unlike NG and Propane prices.  The national average is now $0.1201/kWh

Use wood ehjorten. The same pieces of wood warm you up many times. Cutting it down, cutting it to length, splitting, stacking, lugging it into the garage, and finally burning in the wood stove.

Gawd!!!  Sometimes I loath being an engineer...always crunching numbers and overthinking things!!! 

The only number crunching involved with working up wood is how much beer to buy. There are a lot of variables and I'm not sure a standard btu to beer formula exists. I just do the number crunching and double it to make sure. lol

Seriously though, have you checked into an outdoor wood furnace?

[ehjorten]

I just figured if I got a 10 kW electric boiler it would cost about $1,300.  I figured my basic plan for insulation gets me to about 400 BTU/hr/degree.  Times that by 24 hr and you get 9,600 BTU/degree day.  We have about 4,700 HDD (heating degree days per year) so that equals 45 million BTUs.

45 million BTUs / 34,000 BTU/10 kWh output of the boiler and you get about 13,200 kW.

13,200 kWh @ $0.8852/kWh (total with taxes) = ~$1,170/year or about $97/month. (that is assuming you use the HDD standard of 65° F.  If I heat it even lower then it is less than $100/month

For NG I would spend about $560/year (45 million BTU / 100,000 BTU/therm * $1.175/therm / 95% efficiency)

For Propane I would spend about $1,300/year (45 million BTU / 2,516 BTU/ft³ / 35.65 ft³/gal * $2.5/gal / 95% efficiency)

So...Propane loses to electricity and NG has the potential to save me about $600/year.

A Buderus boiler is probably going to cost me around $3,500 so it would take about 6 years to pay-off.  That doesn't count the cost to bring NG from the street to my house.

[pholliday1]

Electric boiler? Sounds like a winner! No exhaust no intake no hard piping no mess!!! And it sounds affordable ....Gitr Done

[pholliday1]

Update picts?

[Blazin]

Very nice shop you will have when all said and done.
I know a guy that has a 32'x40' with 14' ceiling shop. He heats it with a 100 gallon LPG hot water heater, and a circulator. He runs the heated water through a super store before it goes into the floor to get his hot potable water. Keeps it 65 / 75 degrees all winter long. He uses about 400 gallons of gas a year.