Heating small area of house

[Jocko1]

Hello,
I just installed a p 61a and it is doing a decent job heating most of my 2600 sq ft house. I need to put in ceiling fans and cover six large skylights with shades and I am pretty sure it will do even better. My question is that I have a 100 square foot mudroom that is remote from the stove, my wife does not want the door in between the house and the mudroom to be left open. I would like to know if it would be cheaper for me to heat the mudroom with the existing baseboard with my oil burner or should I put a small space heater in there. Since I installed my pellet stove my boiler only kicks on to heat my hot water every few hours. I am not sure if it would be wise just to use my boiler to heat one very small zone only. I only keep my mudroom at 55 degrees.

 

[dafattkidd]

Is the mudroom fairly well insulated? How drafty is the exterior door?

Here's a few suggestions:
-Cut the bottom of the door from the mud room to the rest of the house so air can better travel into that space.
-Consider installing a louvered door in place of the existing door
-Keeping a 100 sf room above 55* that is fairly well insulated does not take a lot of energy. A small electric radiator kept at a low temp should do the trick with minimal energy usage.

Hope that's helpful.

 

[john193]

Not enough information.

We have no knowledge of your usage and costs in order to give you a mathematically reasoned response. In either case, the limited volume of space is negligible in the grand scheme of things. Why dont you just try it out and see what works best for you?

 

[Jocko1]

Yeah it is fairly well insulated. I can't cut the doors since they are glass. I will try to get s small electric appliance and see if it works.

 

[dafattkidd]

I suggest something like this. An oil filled electric radiator. I have a couple of them we keep in the bedrooms so we can close the door and still have heat.

 

[alternativeheat]

I think you will find that all electric heaters are based of of about 1300-1500 watts. I'd be inclined to try a small Pelonis ceramic heater in there. Not costly to buy. Or a small infrared heater might work.

 

[Snowy Rivers]

our mud room/laundry has a louvered door.

The room also has the air handler/AC/Furnace, so air return is needed.

Get a louvered door and your problems are solved.

 

[Jocko1]

Replacing Door is not an option for me. If I could I would, but the doors there are glass French doors that were originally exterior doors until I built the mudroom . I am paying .23 cents kwh so now Im leaning towards using the baseboard heat unless I can find a very efficient space heater with a thermostat. My goal was to eliminate oil to heat my house since its a 4.20 a gallon, but cutting my usage down by 90+ percent ain't too bad!

 

[Polar Bear]

Install a convection heater

 

[BrotherBart]

Yeah an oil filled heater is the way to go. Keeps the space at temp and won't set something on fire if somebody forgets and plops something in front of it.

They make small bathroom sized ones that would be perfect.

 

[Jocko1]

Do these heaters get hot to the touch? I have small children.

 

[moey]

Do these heaters get hot to the touch? I have small children.

Usually they come in low/med/high. On low you can keep your hand on them for a extended period of time but that is only about 2000btu. Usually low is 600watts which would probably run continually on many days which would be $3.30 at your rate per day.

At that electric rate even if your boiler is operating pretty inefficiently it would short cycle most likely just heating that room. It still may be cheaper to run the boiler.

 

[Jocko1]

Ok thanks for all the input. Anybody know a good brand of skylight shades?

 

[cory127]

Electric heaters, by nature, are 100% efficient, ie: there's no waste. On a per-BTU basis, baseboard heat off your oil boiler (assuming approx 85% efficient boiler) is still significantly less expensive - especially at 0.23/kWh.

 

[Jocko1]

Just rechecked my electric rates and I am more like .14 a kwh. My boiler is nowhere ner 85 % efficient since its 23 years old. I am just worried that short cycling my boiler will wear it down. I'll try a small oil filled heater and set it on low.

 

[BrotherBart]

I have one in the upstairs bedroom farthest from the stove for my wife who is an invalid. On the 900 watt medium setting it costs me around $20 a month at 12.6 cents an hour. They don't run all of the time. And after they turn off they keep radiating heat till they cool down some.

They get hot but not so hot that by the time you touch it and pull your hand away you are going to get burned.