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Small Cabin Forum / General Forum / Dumb heater question
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yankeesouth
Member
# Posted: 19 Nov 2014 11:33
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Dumb question about getting quick heat..... Cabin is about 1100sqf with vaulted ceiling. When I arrive the cabin is the air temp.....for arguments sake let's say 25 degrees. It takes the wood stove a good day to radiate all the heat and heat the place up to a comfortable temp. It's insulated but drafty. I am looking for some options for quick heat. From my understanding the infrared heaters won't work too good in a drafty cabin. Does anyone have any experience with an electric heater for under $100 that kicks off pretty good heat? I will need to plug it into a standard wall socket.

bldginsp
Member
# Posted: 19 Nov 2014 12:47
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Woodstove should be your quickest source of heat, once it gets going. A whole day to heat the place- something is wrong. I suggest you work to get rid of the drafts, replace the woodstove with another, or install a second woodstove at the far end of the building.

All that any electric heater is going to do is keep one little spot warm so long as you are near it.

Steve_S
Member
# Posted: 19 Nov 2014 13:04
Reply 


1) I'd avoid electric heaters for many reasons, mostly inefficiency.

2) for fast heat, consider a Propane Catalytic Heater, there are many variations from many companies but Mr. Heater makes several excellent heaters both Propane & Kerosene which can heat spaces quickly, efficiently and cheaply.

Make sure you have good air flow and a Co2 detector is ever essential and not expensive.

As Bldginsp pointed out, deal with your drafts 1st & foremost, use a candle to find where it flickers, seal wall plugs, switches, door frames etc... "outlet gaskets" for this purpose are cheap as borscht.

The woodstove should not take so long to heat the space up... fast heat-up with softwood then switch to hardwood when you have a good coal bed. If you still not getting much heat from it, I'd say something is amiss and better look at the whole wood stove setup from fresh air in to chimney exit, and maybe upgrade to a bigger wood stove. Alternately, depending on the cabin build, you may be able to build in a nice Rocket Stove. Low fuel use & high return on heat produced and stored in it's thermal mass.

countrygirl
Member
# Posted: 19 Nov 2014 14:55
Reply 


We have a 1700sq cabin with loft and we have one stove to heat the whole place we go there all winter even -35C -31f. Your cabin should go up 5 degrees an hour with a good fire going. 5-6 hours to heat when we are at our coldest. If its not doing that maybe stove to small or old, time for a new stove.

this is the stove we have
http://www.regency-fire.com/Products/Wood/Wood-Stoves/F3100.aspx
stove
stove


horaceunit
Member
# Posted: 23 Nov 2014 11:10
Reply 


Possibly a kerosene heater? I use one currently to keep an 800 SqFt cabin warm until I can get a gas stove that is there now either fixed or replaced. It works pretty well combined with a smaller propane one. It kept the cabin at around 65 degrees at night when the temp outside was in the low 20's.

toyota_mdt_tech
Member
# Posted: 23 Nov 2014 17:31
Reply 


How about a ceiling fan? My home is 1800 sq feet and vaulted ceilings. I had a Quadrafire 3100 Millennium flat top woodstove professionally installed and seemed it wouldnt heat up the entire space. So I instaleld the optional blower kit, helped, but still not good enough. The 3100 was rated to heat my square footage (rambler). Home is well insulated.

The thing that cured my issue was a ceiling fan. I installed it in the same room as the woodstove, up high. Problem solved. The entire house warms up nicely and evenly. I have it blowing down, but either direction should work. It doesnt need to be on high, just moves the air around. Maybe consider that????

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