Anyone used there vehicle for heating there garage???

[ksa8907]

If your garage is attached and well insulated... shouldn't it already be pretty warm?

[ksa8907]

Originally Posted by Frank Lee

When it's -40F the garage gets cold.

In my case I was thinking of piping heat into the house after a drive... but yeah, for a garage, just park in there; maybe open the hood if you want the heat out faster.

You can keep that cold with you, I cuss when it gets close to 0ºF. Coldest I've ever seen was -15, that's pretty rare here but it will usually go below 0 a few times. Typically in the teens and 20s.

[pgfpro]

Originally Posted by ChazInMT

I'm with old Mech on the point of don't get too efficient at removing the heat from the tank, just let it naturally radiate heat all night, it will probably keep you above freezing just by being there. As for heating the water in the tank, you probably want to rig a way to send a portion of the coolant into the tank, you certainly don't want the tank to be in series with the coolant system in such a way that the engine doesn't warm up until the tank in back of your truck does......

Although, if we think this through, the thermostat won't open if the water is cold, so maybe this would sort of self regulate, route the water from the outlet of your thermostat, to the water tank, then to the radiator.

Would the tank be subjected to the pressure of the cooling system would be another thing to consider, or would you just run a loop of coolant hose through the tank which would be under pressure to heat the water/antifreeze in the tank which would always be at atmospheric pressure?

Which brings up another thing to bear in mind, if you leave the truck outside on a sub-zero/freezing night, you darn sure better have some sort of anti-freeze mixture in there, which could be quite expensive.

Interesting idea here, I just moved from Montana to Florida, so it is just a thought exercise for me at this point.

Good info, these are the the things I'm looking for. I will be running the tank at engine coolant pressure. My question also is would I need a extra pump?

I'm also going to be running antifreeze in the tank.

[pgfpro]

Originally Posted by ksa8907

I noticed my garage stays relatively warm and its not even insulated. Un-attached 2 car garage 24'X20' stays above freezing all night even when the ambient temp is in the low 20s.

I need this to be around 60*F so i can work out in my garage on my projects. So it defiantly needs to be way above freezing.

[pgfpro]

Originally Posted by Frank Lee

When it's -40F the garage gets cold.

In my case I was thinking of piping heat into the house after a drive... but yeah, for a garage, just park in there; maybe open the hood if you want the heat out faster.

The problem I have is my truck won't fit. The garage is only 20' 6" My truck is over 21'

[pgfpro]

Originally Posted by redpoint5

It's an interesting idea, but seems like too much effort to just warm a garage. You aren't sleeping in there are you?

Nope well so far so good with the better half. lol I need it to be warm for the Talon constant needs.

[pgfpro]

Originally Posted by Grant-53

If you run the vehicle inside make sure you have an exhaust hose from the tailpipe to the outside. An auto parts store should sell these. GM did a project on this years ago using V8 stationary engines. A transmission engineer from Chrysler designed a windmill to create heat by compressing air.

The truck will be not running after a long days work, only the pump to bring the water to the garage.

[pgfpro]

Originally Posted by ksa8907

If your garage is attached and well insulated... shouldn't it already be pretty warm?

It never gets below freezing even at outside temps in the -20*F

[pgfpro]

Keep in mind this is just an idea to see what if someone took a large vehicle and used a secondary containment for water over a days running you could use that energy to help heat a home or garage.

For me I try to spend at least two hours a day working on my projects. I'm constantly pulling my engine or pistons and rods and changing them to try a different design on my Talon. So I need a comfortable environment to work in. Around 60*F. It is not fun busting your knuckles on something at 40*F or less. LOL

[samwichse]

Maybe this would work if you didn't hook the tank to the coolant lines directly, but instead bypassed the radiator and hooked a heat exchanger with a separate loop/pump to the tank:



That would allow the regular thermostat system on the truck to function as designed (you're just cooling the coolant loop with a liquid-cooled exchanger instead of the original air-cooled radiator.

You would be limited how far you could go before the tank water started to boil off though.