warm shop, cold machines

Waumbek · Jan 17, 2009

Winter has reached Virginia. It was about two degrees F when I fired up the shop woodstove this morning and about 20 F inside the shop. As the temperature slowly rises above 50 I'm thinking it would be nice to do some work, but I dare not turn on the Van Norman nor the Emco lathe as the oilbaths look like molasses and the machines are extremely cold to the touch.

Any of you guys up north have a rule of thumb about this kind of situation and when you can work?

Cheers, Charles Morrill

lostinspace · Jan 17, 2009

Well you could had a sump heater for the oil to help speed up the process. They use them on refrigeration compressors

Jamie · Jan 17, 2009

Charles;

How I envy you. Past few nights up here it's been -37 C, can't recall what
the wind chill Was. But This is winter, and must be expected.
Any time the night temp falls below 10 C ( 50 F ), I fire up "baby Bear" and
bed it down for the night. Even with the extreme cold we've had lately, Shop
temp has never gone below 16 C.
Machine castings take a long time to warm up, so I find it best to keep them
warm to begin with. So from Oct to April my Fisher ( baby bear ) is constantly
burning through the night.

Jamie

SBAER · Jan 17, 2009

I live near Toronto, the last week the temperature has been around -20C (-4F), one part of my shop is heated to around 5C (40F), the other part is unheated. Unfortunately the CNC milling machine is in the unheated part but I still have to use it. It is doing some funny things but I live with it. I wear winter boots, insulated coveralls and mechanics gloves. The real problems start when the outdoor temperature quickly rises to 5C (40F) and it starts raining.

Ox · Jan 17, 2009

Fire the stove the night before?

+2* yonder? What a heat wave! :Yawn:

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Think Snow Eh!
Ox

RAD1 · Jan 17, 2009

I don't know if this will help or not. Put a plastic tarp over the machine and put a light in there to keep it warm. I would think 60 watt bulb should do fine. I don't know if they will sweat when take tarps off though. be careful of fires.

Rick

T-BONIMUS · Jan 17, 2009

like ox said.. start the fire the night before and put wife and kids on shifts to stoke it!!!!!

stannp368 · Jan 17, 2009

Cold Machines

I knew a fellow in Minneapolis who kept an electrically heated dipstick in his oil gage holder. Of course, you can't do that w/ mach tools so the best way to go would be to keep the heat on 60 F. when not in the shop. This will save your machines & you won't have to worry about expansion & contraction on your poor bearings & continuous change of viscosity in your oil

bjorn toulouse · Jan 17, 2009

I keep my garage/shop at 50+ degrees all winter (gas heat). If I know I'm going to be out there working I'll turn it up to 65 and go hang out in the house for a while.

Rex

JoeFin · Jan 17, 2009

I fire up my Kerosine heater the night before I want to use the shop. Turn it down and let it slowly bring the heat up for 12 hours or more.

By morning time its a nice toasty 70 deg out there

lazarus · Jan 17, 2009

A good shop fan blowing on your equip. will help warm it up faster and maybe a dehumidifier to keep condensation to a minimum.

matt_isserstedt · Jan 17, 2009

I would second the suggestion of a 100W lightbulb under the machine, or better, inside the central casting.

wment · Jan 17, 2009

I noticed that when my machinery is extreamly cold and I fire up my kerosene heater once the air begins to get warm and the iron is still prety cold the iron starts to sweat. I have one of those torpedo type heaters. I have to bring the temp up slowly to avoid the condensation problem. Luckily it doesnt get that cold too often nere in Md.

wm

realdeal · Jan 17, 2009

Insulate and buy a second hand oil furnace, dont' matter if this is a part time getaway or a full time gig, you and your equipment deserve to be comfortable.

SteveF · Jan 17, 2009

Big, big second on the insulation. My shop is heavily insulated and is only heated with a 1200 watt electric heater and some solar. This morning was 5 F outside and 57 F in the shop.

Steve.

Lost in LA · Jan 17, 2009

I know what you guys mean.
Last night it dropped down to 50 degrees and this afternoom it is 80 degrees. I hope I do not get sunstroke on my bike ride.

Lost in LA

17-4 · Jan 17, 2009

Getting ready to head out to the shop now. It was about 0 here last night in the mountains of Tn. My shop is small and is always heated with electic heat with about a 3500 watt ceiling mounted heater..

I do not know yet what the lowest temperature was in the shop last nite as I have yet to read the recorder but usually the temp never drops below about 60.

Equipment and tooling is just to expensive to let set in a unheated shop and rust and I hate trying to work with a field jacket on.

Waumbek · Jan 17, 2009

Funny you guys mention insulation! I'm about 2/3 done with insulating the building and tomorrow I'll try to move that rock ahead. Before insulating, I absolutely could not move the inside temperature more than 20 degrees above the outside. One reason was that I built in a continuous soffit vent so the building was basically open to the outside until I insulated the roof over Christmas.

A small electric heater might make a good deal of sense. The lightbulb idea sounds good as well. I usually dehumidify 24/7 but in the winter the exchanger clogs right up with ice. I surely have to do something. The machines weren't reasonably warm until about 2 p.m. though I'd started the fire at 8 this morning.

Many thanks for all the comments. Charles Morrill

Waumbek · Jan 17, 2009

I should add that all my stove firewood comes from scraps generated at work as I live in a small city and there's not much firewood about. The kiln-dried hardwood I use burns super hot but won't last the night. It's great that it's free though.

cheers, Charles Morrill

Ox · Jan 18, 2009

SteveF said:
Big, big second on the insulation. My shop is heavily insulated and is only heated with a 1200 watt electric heater and some solar. This morning was 5 F outside and 57 F in the shop.

Steve.

See how that werks three days strait.

When the iron and concrete are all warm - it's easy to only lose a bit of heat overnight.

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Think Snow Eh!
Ox

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