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Anyone using gas central heating?


Kendorr

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A friend uses a wood burning stove to heat a quite large garage. He's wondering about changing for calor gas central heating.

Question - does anyone have gas central heating on their widebeam and are live aboards and could give an indication of how much gas would be used over a 6 month period from now 'till April?

 

I personally think this will be a big problem for him, but would like any advice from people who do this on their boat.

Thanks - Kevin

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2 minutes ago, Kendorr said:

A friend uses a wood burning stove to heat a quite large garage. He's wondering about changing for calor gas central heating.

Question - does anyone have gas central heating on their widebeam and are live aboards and could give an indication of how much gas would be used over a 6 month period from now 'till April?

 

I personally think this will be a big problem for him, but would like any advice from people who do this on their boat.

Thanks - Kevin

I know several liveaboard narrowboat owners who have removed Alde Gas central heating as they used around 1 cylinder per week (£28) when it was cold they now use a SF stove.

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I have both Alde gas central heating and a solid fuel stove on my narrowboat. The stove is the primary heat source and gas is only used very rarely when temperatures don't warrant the stove being lit. This set-up works perfectly and I wouldn't dream of taking out the stove and relying solely on the Alde for the above mentioned reason of cost, and, additionally, it would struggle to keep the boat at a decent temperature. 

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Much will depend upon how well insulated and draught free the garage is - and the temperature he wants to maintain.

 

A wide beam with double glazed windows and 50mm spray foam insulation is rather different from a cement asbestos garage with a tin roof.

 

Also will this be bottle gas or mains gas. If bottle gas I suspect it will be expensive.

 

Edited by Tony Brooks
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28 minutes ago, Tony Brooks said:

Much will depend upon how well insulated and draught free the garage is - and the temperature he wants to maintain.

 

A wide beam with double glazed windows and 50mm spray foam insulation is rather different from a cement asbestos garage with a tin roof.

 

Also will this be bottle gas or mains gas. If bottle gas I suspect it will be expensive.

 

The OP says Calor so it must be bottled. We had Calor central heating in the house and changed it for oil; one of the best things we did for both cost and efficiency. 

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Plenty of mobile homes are heated with calor gas, and houses too using the largest size bottles in groups of four. The local calor retailer turns up and swaps the empties over once a month. 

Edited by Mike the Boilerman
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Thanks folks, you've reinforced what I thought, but just wanted to get some other views.

34 minutes ago, Tony Brooks said:

Also will this be bottle gas or mains gas. If bottle gas I suspect it will be expensive.

Yep, he is thinking of bottled gas, the garage is too far from the house to connect to the supply.

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1 hour ago, Kendorr said:

A friend uses a wood burning stove to heat a quite large garage. He's wondering about changing for calor gas central heating.

Question - does anyone have gas central heating on their widebeam and are live aboards and could give an indication of how much gas would be used over a 6 month period from now 'till April?

 

I personally think this will be a big problem for him, but would like any advice from people who do this on their boat.

Thanks - Kevin

We have hired boats with gas Alde heating and they are very very heavy on lpg. 

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The 47Kg bottle will also work out much cheaper than the likle boat bottles.Prices from my local supplier(maybe a couple of years out of date)

 

PROPANE

 

 

3.9KG                                           £15.49

6KG                                              £20.25

6KG LITE                                    £23.25

13KG                                           £24.99

19KG                                           £25.00 Collection price

19KG                                           £27.50 Delivered price

19KG                                           £22.75 10 Bottles only £227.50

47KG                                           £46.00 Collection price

47KG                                           £49.99 Delivered price

47KG                                           £46.00 10 Bottles only £460.00

5  KG PATIO GAS                     £21.75

13KG PATIO GAS                     £27.50

Edited by rusty69
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1 hour ago, Alan de Enfield said:

I know several liveaboard narrowboat owners who have removed Alde Gas central heating as they used around 1 cylinder per week (£28) when it was cold they now use a SF stove.

In one holiday when it was cold enough to freeze the canal at times we managed nearly three cylinders with the heating on continuously.

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1 minute ago, MJG said:

We have hired boats with gas Alde heating and they are very very heavy on lpg. 

 

Yes, as one would expect of a 40 year old boiler design. Probable fuel efficiency in the order of 55%. A new condensing boiler for the OP’s garage will be in the order of 90% efficiency. 

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7 minutes ago, rgreg said:

The OP says Calor so it must be bottled. We had Calor central heating in the house and changed it for oil; one of the best things we did for both cost and efficiency. 

We have a huge Calor tank at the 'bottom of the garden' It is refilled once a year - I suppose you could say it was a 'bottle' but it s a 'big bottle.

Piped underground to the house, it is, in effect' a 'mains supply' with no bottles / cylinders. A big articulated lorry comes and does the filling.

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4 minutes ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

 

Yes, as one would expect of a 40 year old boiler design. Probable fuel efficiency in the order of 55%. A new condensing boiler for the OP’s garage will be in the order of 90% 

 

Edited by MJG
Misunderstood
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I had an Alde on the barge from memory (it was 16 years ago) 1x19kg cylinder every two weeks, it didn't last long replaced it with a Mikuni.

BIL has just binned his LPG central heating and replaced it with oil.

Says it all really

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4 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

We have a huge Calor tank at the 'bottom of the garden' It is refilled once a year - I suppose you could say it was a 'bottle' but it s a 'big bottle.

Piped underground to the house, it is, in effect' a 'mains supply' with no bottles / cylinders. A big articulated lorry comes and does the filling.

Yes, when we installed the propane system we looked at both the bulk tank and 4x 47kg bottle option. If I recall, there was some issue with the location of tank so we opted for bottles. The bulk tank would have been a cheaper option but I imagine still far from mains gas prices.

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I think some of us have slightly misunderstood the proposal in the Op. We are asuuming (because of the mention of widebeams) that the proposal,is to install an Alde boiler, when newer and more efficient options are actually available.

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5 minutes ago, MJG said:

I think some of us have slightly misunderstood the proposal in the Op. We are asuuming (because of the mention of widebeams) that the proposal,is to install an Alde boiler, when newer and more efficient options are actually available.

It was something he asked this morning while we were out cycling. Because of the space, he would be using bottled gas and fitting a boiler into the loft space of the garage. Last year he used about £150 worth of coal and is thinking that gas would be cheaper. I mentioned a widebeam because his garage inside is a similar size. It is sounding like it will be more expensive and possibly not as warm. I'll pass this info to him, then it's his decision.

Thanks again.

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We looked at buying a 3 bed house in braunston 5 years ago. It had coal fires and bottled gas central heating. The largest cylinders were used. The house had 6, plus two smaller ones.

i asked the owner how much it used in mid winter he said a bottle every 10 days. I then contacted the local distributor listed on the bottles. They said in those streets they offered a monthly scheduled change , and usually replaced 5 or 6 bottles. The 2 smaller ones were for emergencies.

i did the maths and declined to buy.

my last 13kg bottle was i think 35 its just gone up

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1 hour ago, Kendorr said:

Thanks folks, you've reinforced what I thought, but just wanted to get some other views.

Yep, he is thinking of bottled gas, the garage is too far from the house to connect to the supply.

Does the garage have electric?  What about using a waste oil heater?

Edited by Robbo
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Looking at the 47kg at £50, it’s around 7.5p per kWh given that 1kg = 13.6kWh.   If you were to use diesel/oil boiler that would be equiv of paying around 82.5p a litre,  it assuming boilers are both around same efficiency.

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2 minutes ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

 

I'd say the best bet for the OP is a solid fuel stove, just as it is with a boat.

 

Suppose it depends on what and how he uses the garage, if it is for only when he is in their and he uses it for woodwork then a stove is a no brainier.

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