Looking for suggestions for small (read TINY) electric heater.

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Sourdough

"Eleutheromaniac"
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Mar 17, 2018
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In a cabin, on a mountain, in "Wilderness" Alaska.
Looking to (only) slightly "Preheat" my ATV on the nippiest mornings, -36 degrees. This is not to pre-heat the seat, but to slightly preheat the engine for maybe one hour. The ATV will be in an UN-heated shelter. Goal is to NOT cause a fire, so "FIRE SAFETY" is ultra important.
 
I-Heater...i have used one for years without troubles. Its easy on electric bill too. Never ever get or use one of the old oil filled electric heaters...they use so much power its unreal and ones i had and tried got hot and seemed dangerous to me.


Around my area many use what they call wellhouse heater or milkhouse heater..no experience with them myself though.
 
I also use a propane powered torpedo heater and tarps to keep the heat in. I know they make electric torpedo heaters. The electric heaters I tried were not the torpedo type, and they were not able to adequately heat things up since they didn’t blow the hot air. The electric ones will draw a heavy load.
 
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I agree on the magnetic heater except you would have to zip tie it or wedge it to you aluminum engine block
 
I used a red heating bulb like I use for baby chicks and pointed it at the bottom of the engine then covered everything with a large quilt in a plywood shack separate from the house.. quite a few -25F days. I also used to have a battery heater for one hard to start car. It was well constructed and wrapped around a battery. Maybe something like that stuffed and wrapped around the lower part of the engine and between the skid plate and the engine.
That and some light synthetic oil and a car battery you bring out from the house....batteries loose a lot of power in the cold.....
 

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I will NOT be using the BIG ATV very often. Currently I get the mail Tues. Thurs. Sat. at some point I'll go to only Wed. & Sat. (Twice a week fetch mail).

I have my "Baffin" boots here now, and many coats. I might never need to pre-heat the ATV, or ever even use it this winter. It is now a SHTF mobility vehicle.

Therefore: If the SHTF, likely the power would be out. So, I have (3) Three full propane thanks, so I'll see what is available in small propane heaters.

When I was driving airplane is the wilderness in winter, I used a gismo called "RED DRAGON" and 4" stovepipe. We would direct the heat into the exhaust pipe.

Before my time in Alaska, pilots landed and drained the engine oil and took it indoors. At "Roadhouse's" the pilots would set their drained engine oil on a shelf on the kitchen woodstove. (Men were truly tough back then. Flying an "open cockpit bi-wing" in Alaska winters. One of my employers was Bob Reeve. They wrote a good book about Bob....."The Glacier Pilot", by: BETH DAY. Ole' Bob hade some serious huge gonads.

https://www.wahf.org/hall-of-fame/robert-c-reeve/#:~:text=During a 1948 hunt Reeve would shoot a world record

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I have one of theses as well as the "buddy" heaters.
I once had committed to doing a art show with my metal sculptures and didn't have anywhere heated with wood or other wise. so I basically put one of these on the ground in between me and my small welding table and welded up 30 art pieces.....miserable way to work but they all sold.
https://www.harborfreight.com/15000-btu-tank-top-propane-heater-59674.html
 

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