Outdoor canopy heating

[butternutsquashpie]

I'm guessing you don't pay the electricity bill then Jeremy

Ends up cheaper than a propane heater!
I also had access to a blast furnace which I could run at 800C for 3 minutes and it'd heat up the entire room.

Sides, our electricity is all nuculeerrrrr. With responsible dumping, it creates little to no environmental harm!
CANDU5!

Sent by the Enigma on BlackBerry.

[PeeJay]

But what about the cost? Is electrickery cheap in Canada?

[groundhog]

Just noticed you guys talking about outdoor heating - my company sells infrared patio heaters. Don't normally do any plugging but couldn't resist here:

http://www.thegreenage.co.uk/product-category/heating/infrared-heating-panels-heating/

The ones that are useful outside are the Aspect range at the bottom.

Infrared is a lot more efficient than a standard electric heater, because it heats surfaces - like your skin and clothes, rather than the air around you. It means you are concentrating the heat over a smaller area and giving the heat a chance to have an effect before disappearing into the stratosphere!

Shameless plug over.

Slight change of plan on the heating front - now looking to heat a shed. Would these still be a good idea? Any suggestions?

[ValeTudoGuy]

Just noticed you guys talking about outdoor heating - my company sells infrared patio heaters. Don't normally do any plugging but couldn't resist here:

http://www.thegreenage.co.uk/product-category/heating/infrared-heating-panels-heating/

The ones that are useful outside are the Aspect range at the bottom.

Infrared is a lot more efficient than a standard electric heater, because it heats surfaces - like your skin and clothes, rather than the air around you. It means you are concentrating the heat over a smaller area and giving the heat a chance to have an effect before disappearing into the stratosphere!

Shameless plug over.

Very interesting! Are they available in 12v or only 240v? Not a massive issue as inverters are not prohibitively expensive, but ideally 12v is what I'm looking for.

[7kingsguy]

Very interesting! Are they available in 12v or only 240v? Not a massive issue as inverters are not prohibitively expensive, but ideally 12v is what I'm looking for.

Hi mate,
Im not aware of any 12v models on the market, it is a reasonably new tech so its not surprising. Let me know if you want to buy and I will give you a discount code

[ValeTudoGuy]

Slight change of plan on the heating front - now looking to heat a shed. Would these still be a good idea? Any suggestions?

Yes, infrared heaters are a great option because of their efficiency which is somewhere close to 90%..... I.E. Almost 90% of all the input energy is directed at you as heat.

The only one reservation I would have is if the were being used for extreme amounts of time, like 6hours a day, five days a week. This is because extreme exposure to infrared can cause pigmentation loss..... Even in human tissue!

But don't worry you would have to massively abuse them for this to even be a consideration.

[ValeTudoGuy]

Hi mate,
Im not aware of any 12v models on the market, it is a reasonably new tech so its not surprising. Let me know if you want to buy and I will give you a discount code

Im not in the market this precise moment but it's a technology I'm looking into due to the efficiency. You see I'm planning a solar and wind powered off the grid shed, but it's going to take me some time to save all the pennies I need!

I will definitely come back to you when I'm ready to buy though.

Thanks

[7kingsguy]

Slight change of plan on the heating front - now looking to heat a shed. Would these still be a good idea? Any suggestions?

These are outdoor models - We do do interior heaters - it is the same basic technology:

http://www.thegreenage.co.uk/energy-saving-shop/herschel-advantage-ir3-indoor-infrared-heater/

We also do heating panels - the heat is a bit more gentle so you would need a fairly high wattage for a shed, but they look really cool and you can mount them like a painting - we can take your image of choice and get it printed onto the panel. You wont be able to tell it is a heater over a portrait...

http://www.thegreenage.co.uk/energy-saving-shop/herschel-inspire-infrared-heating-panel-picture/

[groundhog]

You see I'm planning a solar and wind powered off the grid shed.

Now that's got me thinking... Could you recommend any good resources that you've been using for information please?
The garden is South facing and so would be perfect for a solar panel or two....

[7kingsguy]

Im not in the market this precise moment but it's a technology I'm looking into due to the efficiency. You see I'm planning a solar and wind powered off the grid shed, but it's going to take me some time to save all the pennies I need!

I will definitely come back to you when I'm ready to buy though.

Thanks

Wow that sounds like a cool project - if only I had the space I would try something like that myself. We do 12v off grid hybrid kits if you are interested too:

http://www.thegreenage.co.uk/energy-saving-shop/grid-hybrid-electricity-generation-kit-silentwind/

[ValeTudoGuy]

Now that's got me thinking... Could you recommend any good resources that you've been using for information please?
The garden is South facing and so would be perfect for a solar panel or two....

What do you want to know, it's not to taxing on the brain, but it's not the cheapest thing to set up in the first place.

[ValeTudoGuy]

Wow that sounds like a cool project - if only I had the space I would try something like that myself. We do 12v off grid hybrid kits if you are interested too:
http://www.thegreenage.co.uk/energy-...it-silentwind/

Oh oh good lord! I think I just came!...... Seriously, I think you just became my one stop shop!

[ValeTudoGuy]

Basically you need a wind turbine and some solar panels then go into a charge controller which In turn charges a 12v, 24v or 48v deep cycle battery.

Lets assume 12v

From the battery you have direct 12v out which will run any 12v appliance, LED lighting etc.
and then you connect a 12v to 240v inverter for any 240v appliances.

With a setup like this you would not have to pay for electricity for the working life of your system.

You could go even further and get a waste oil furnace and some Peltier tiles to harvest the heat into more electricity.

[groundhog]

So if all I needed was enough power to run light and heat / laptop, what size panel / battery would I be after?

[ValeTudoGuy]

Well it depend, you need to know how many watts you appliances will consume. A laptop should be under 100w but double check. A heater can be anything from 0.5kw to 2kw and the lights shouldn't take much at all if they are LED, say 50w to way over estimate..... Should be more like 10w.

So let's say a 1kw heater

a 1500w inverter would more than do the trick.