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Heat for a Room in a barn

jwstewar

Active member
I know there a lot of folks with experience with this, so I figured I would ask here. We built a new barn last year that is 36x54 for our goats. Now we are getting ready to build a milk parlor in the barn. It will be 12x14 with a 4" concrete floor under the floor will be plastic and Styrofoam. This room will be used for milking goats from January - probably October. It will have hot and cold running water, so I will need something pretty robust to keep the water from freezing. I'm not saying we have to keep it at 72 degrees, but would like something so you can milk the goats and your hands not freeze. Since we will have water, don't really want to do the no heat and turn it on when we need it thing. Don't want the water to freeze and we will use it twice a day every day.

Right now, I'm thinking some type of in the wall type heater - be it electric or propane (I could set 2 100 lb tanks so I could swap them as needed). Is this the best? What about in the floor radiant heating? Would it work as an OK heat source for this room? Is it practical to do all of that for a room this size (boiler/pump)? Going to pour the floor here in the next few weeks and just wanting to make sure I have all my bases covered.
 

jwstewar

Active member
Also, we will probably also put a small "window" air conditioner through one of the interior walls of the milk room. That isn't as critical though. Figure a small 10k BTU 240v AC unit w/ thermostat should do that.

One more thing to note, I do have a 3 1/2 Ton heat pump, just no air handler to go with it if anyone things it would work :)
 

mla2ofus

Well-known member
GOLD Site Supporter
I'd go w/ propane and an RV style auto switchover regulator. That way you'll know when a tank is MT. W/ a heat pump, unless you have heat strips in the air handler, will let you down at temps much below 20*F. Since you already have 240v how about electric heat? If the room will be well insulated I think that would be the easiest route and you wouldn't have to load and unload tanks. Also you could turn down the temp to just enough to keep pipes from freezing in the cold months.
Mike
 

jimbo

Bronze Member
GOLD Site Supporter
Have you thought about a through the wall heat pump?

I would think that would be an good solution for your application.
 

jwstewar

Active member
I'd go w/ propane and an RV style auto switchover regulator. That way you'll know when a tank is MT. W/ a heat pump, unless you have heat strips in the air handler, will let you down at temps much below 20*F. Since you already have 240v how about electric heat? If the room will be well insulated I think that would be the easiest route and you wouldn't have to load and unload tanks. Also you could turn down the temp to just enough to keep pipes from freezing in the cold months.
Mike

At this point, I was kind of thinking about electric, but also worried about power failures. We've had a couple outages that have lasted a while including one around the 1st of Feb this year on the night it was -8 and we lost power at 4:00 in the afternoon and didn't come back until 2:30 in the morning. Though I do have a couple portable generators should the need arise.

Have you thought about a through the wall heat pump?

I would think that would be an good solution for your application.

Never heard of a through the wall heat pump. Going to have to go Bing that one.

OK, just found those, what about heat when it is really cold? I like the concept, reminds me of a hotel room type heater/AC unit.
 

jimbo

Bronze Member
GOLD Site Supporter
At this point, I was kind of thinking about electric, but also worried about power failures. We've had a couple outages that have lasted a while including one around the 1st of Feb this year on the night it was -8 and we lost power at 4:00 in the afternoon and didn't come back until 2:30 in the morning. Though I do have a couple portable generators should the need arise.



Never heard of a through the wall heat pump. Going to have to go Bing that one.

OK, just found those, what about heat when it is really cold? I like the concept, reminds me of a hotel room type heater/AC unit.

Motel units are through the wall units and work the same way.

I have had a couple of friends use them in small rooms with no complaints. You would still have the emergency heat kicking in on extremely cold days.

They operate similar to a home heat pump. But with no duct work.
 

Snowtrac Nome

member formerly known as dds
GOLD Site Supporter
take a look at toyo heaters they use #1 diesel or kerosene. they aare hell for efficient and reliable.
 

leadarrows

Member
If you're installing a new concrete floor then go with radiate floor heat. You could use a wood stove boiler, gas or electric water heater even an on demand water heater to supply the hot water for the floor. If the floor is warm everything else will be warm and radiant floor heat loses the least amount of heat to an open door. I am turning an old chicken house into an efficiency apartment and that is the way I am going.

I don't know why they are sideways.
 

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JimVT

Bronze Member
GOLD Site Supporter
our parlers have gas hanging heater with fan and a large propane tank outside.
with loss of power your not going to be milking anyway.
a large thick rubber mat on the floor help with your feet.
jim
 

jwstewar

Active member
If you're installing a new concrete floor then go with radiate floor heat. You could use a wood stove boiler, gas or electric water heater even an on demand water heater to supply the hot water for the floor. If the floor is warm everything else will be warm and radiant floor heat loses the least amount of heat to an open door. I am turning an old chicken house into an efficiency apartment and that is the way I am going.

I don't know why they are sideways.

I like this concept, but is it "overkill" for just one 12x14 room?

our parlers have gas hanging heater with fan and a large propane tank outside.
with loss of power your not going to be milking anyway.
a large thick rubber mat on the floor help with your feet.
jim

I hear you on the rubber mat, as far as milking without power, as long as we have a flash light, we are good to go. Since we are only milking 3 goats right now - 6 by the end of the month, we milk by hand. That is faster than cleaning the machine :smile: Just more worried about stuff freezing. In the house we have a vent free fireplace that we turn on when it is really cold or if we lose power does a great job then. I bet it would put out too much moisture for a room this small for continuous use. Though we could always go with a vented.
 

bczoom

Super Moderator
Staff member
GOLD Site Supporter
I'm a fan of Reznor heaters. On mine, the thermostat goes down to about 40 so you can keep it just above freezing.

8-UDAP-installed.png
 

jwstewar

Active member
I had thought about something along those lines as well. That one might be a bit large for less than 200 SQ FT, but I like where you are headed.
 

EastTexFrank

Well-known member
GOLD Site Supporter
I don't know how high the ceiling is but a 12x14 space should be fairly easy to heat, especially if it can be enclosed. If it were me I know that I'd be fighting myself to stop from over-engineering the thing.

I love the idea of the Reznor type and the Toyo heaters but I think that I'd try to keep it simple, at least for a start.
 

jwstewar

Active member
I'm with your Frank, I'm trying to keep this super simple and cheap - but at the same time since this is a stand alone room, it needs to be a fairly robust heater as it isn't like I'm just taking a chill off the room. Overcomplicated is what I'm thinking when it comes to the radiant floor heating. I like the idea of that for a large shop or something, just not sure if this small room is worth all of that.

With that being said, I also have to keep telling myself too that this room doesn't have to stay 72 degrees. When we will go to the barn we will have coats and/or Carhartts on, so in reality if it is 60 degrees in there we will be "hot".

BTW, ceiling will either be 8' or 10'. Depends on if I take it clear to the current barn trusses or stop it short. Both has it advantageous/disadvantageous.

It is kind of a fun little project to speck this out.
 

bczoom

Super Moderator
Staff member
GOLD Site Supporter
How about one of those patio propane radiant heaters?

napoleon-pth11pss.jpg


Or a small one.

mr-heater-mh24ts-portable-propane-radiant-heater-3.gif
 

300 H and H

Bronze Member
GOLD Site Supporter
LB White hanging propane heaters dominate around here for barn use. They don't have any exhaust to vent either.

Regards, Kirk
 

leadarrows

Member
You could heat a small floor like that with a fifty gallon water heater using radiant floor heat. Water heaters already have thermostats so they go on and off as needed the only other thing you need is a small water pump attached to a wall thermostat so the water would circulate thew the floor as needed. Seems pretty simple and very cost effective to me.
 

leadarrows

Member
How about one of those patio propane radiant heaters?

napoleon-pth11pss.jpg


Or a small one.

mr-heater-mh24ts-portable-propane-radiant-heater-3.gif
I use a propane heater called Mr Heater Big Buddy. It is a lot more effecent then these others picture here. I have used both and the Big Buddy lasts 3 days on low compared to one day on these others.
 

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Bamby

New member
You were looking for thoughts.. Well this is a bit different direction that could prove out both more efficient and cheaper. For winter lighting and supplemental heat in the room consider installing a quartz work light or two, the 500w ones provide a lot of both.

For general heat you may want to consider an electric infrared patio heater. I'd aim it towards the center of the room and let the floor absorb the heat where it would the naturally radiate up.

An example randomly grabbed off the net:
Stainless Steel Wall Mounted Infrared Patio Heater

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WaJTlAAuLGM"]Stainless Steel Wall Mounted Infrared Patio Heater - YouTube[/ame]


As far as efficiently controlling the units. There are temperature controlled thermostats available to turn them on and off as needed.



See here for a few examples: http://www.littlegreenhouse.com/accessory/controls.shtml
 

jwstewar

Active member
Thanks for the thoughts everyone.

So far I'm liking the Reznor type heater on the ceiling. Through PM I had someone suggest an RV furnace - I could keep it on 12-volt and keep the battery charged and during a power outage, the 12-volt would keep the furnace going. Really liking that solution, just not sure how durable they are, but I suppose I could try one and see what happens.
 
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