working at the car wash..........

Dave Palmer

Hi,need ideas please.looking at a job for a customer at a existing commerial car wash(rental cars).The last 2 furnaces rotted out from being hung near the brushes(we didn't do them)and was thinking of mounting one in the next bay and ducting in the heat or what about a "tube" heater over the brushes?The kind with a burner on one end and a draft inducer on the other I think they are called radiant tubes or something catchy like that.Its just to keep the brushes from freezing.Building is 50Lx20Wx25H.Can't go wild because we're replacing 2 other units in the same building.And yes if it was new I would be doing radiant.Any advice or ideas would be great,thanks
Dave Palmer

Dale

We find radiat tube

to be fussy about air flow, meaning the cleaner the air the better, if you want radiant tube perhaps you could put the gas valve and blower in one bay and the main length of the tube and the vent over the brushes. The way I would go if you have the space is the furnace in the other bay and replaceable duct work over the brushes.

John@Reliable

Car wash

It sounds like unit in other bay away from moist area would be best,also suggest having unit serviced(clean)@end of heat season to remove any combustion by-products which will eat away at heat exchanger during down time.
Hope this helps

hr

Soap spray is tough

on just about any material. Plastic and stainless steel seem to be the best match.

A long, long time ago my dad and I installed carwash equipment. Radiant floors are by far the best system, but not always "in the cards" Real hard to retro fit, especially in automatic bays.

We used some sort of stainless steel/ cermaic burner infrared heaters mounted up high. They would melt the brushes, however, if mounted too close!

Frozen brushes are real hard on car finishes, as are antennas that get wound up in the brushes

hot rod

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Canuck

Carwash heat

We do a lot of work with Shell on their carwashes. They've gone through a number of incarnations on heating with the latest (and best) being radiant in-floor. Having said that however, they have, in the past, gone with direct vent unit heaters with S/S HXC's (Reznor or Modine), duct furnaces located in the mechanical room with aluminum duct to the wash bay(s), ceramic infrared heaters and infrared tube heaters. I think they've finally decided on radiant in-floor because everything else dies a slow and ugly death because of all the vapour and chemical. All systems will work for at least five years before needing major work so go with the most viable from your point of view.

nick z.

Car wash

I've worked on a few with a local oil company who also owns about 10 car washes and they would always find a way to put the furnaces in the pump room.

Wayco Wayne

Is ther any room

for side wall radaint? Maybe ceiling too.

kf_2

Car Wash / Cambridge Air unit

If gas is available, take a look at a Cambridge Air unit. This is a direct fired furnace that uses 100% make up air so no return air from the interior of the car wash ever passes through the furnace. Efficiencies are very high (in the 95% range). The unit can be mounted inside or outside on the wall roof or hung from the ceiling. They range from about 400 MBH - 3200 MBH and are very compact.

Hope this helps,
kf

Brian (Tankless) Wood

Sidewall radiant (Tankless)

sidewall radiant sounds great (Get HotRod to build some of his custom copper or SS panels)

But, on my cybertravels, I found www.solaronics.com I think this is what one of the other guys was referring to.

God luck, Dave.

Regards from Brian in (still 95 degrees at 7pm) Swampland.