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Re: DIY Natural Gas Appliances

To: "Randall Young" <randallyoung@earthlink.net>
Subject: Re: DIY Natural Gas Appliances
From: "Phil Ethier" <pethier@isd.net>
Date: Sat, 9 Dec 2000 20:48:05 -0600
From: Randall Young <randallyoung@earthlink.net>

>Vented natural gas heating stoves that use no electricity are readily
>available commercially.

Indeed.  The Empire unit in my shop is rated for use in homes.  It is 30,000
BTU.  It can be ordered jetted either for propane or for natural gas.  As it
comes, it needs no batteries or electricity to run itself and its included
thermostat.  I joke that if we get a long-term electricity outage here, we
can drain the water in the house and camp in 65-degree comfort in the shop.
The heater is fully-vented, taking in its combustion air and exhausting its
combustion byproducts via a concentric vent system through a 7.75-inch hole
cut through the wall.

I did add an optional 120V fan to mine, but it is not required for the unit
to operate.  It simply plugs into a wall outlet and has its own thermostat
in contact with a part of the unit that gets hot after the gas flame kicks
on.

It was not the cheapest way to go, but it seems to be the most trouble-free
and safest.

>> So I started to look at the use of natural gas for
>> heat, lighting, and cooking.

In the Twin Cities, the coldest major-metropolitan area in the USA, it would
cost about 5 times as much to heat with electricity as with natural gas.
All-electric home heat is very rare here.

Phil Ethier    Saint Paul  Minnesota  USA
1970 Lotus Europa, 1992 Saturn SL2, 1986 Suburban, 1962 Triumph TR4 CT2846L
LOON, MAC   pethier@isd.net     http://www.mnautox.com/
"It makes a nice noise when it goes faster"
- 4-year-old Adam, upon seeing a bitmap of Grandma Susie's TR4.

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