Back-up/supplemental heat

DCContrarian · January 2

https://forum.heatinghelp.com/discussion/comment/1880360#Comment_1880360

I didn't say "poor insulation," I said "poorly insulated."

I'm in Washington, DC. There are lots of houses built in the 19th century, almost all of them are poorly insulated. The winter design temperature is 21F. Every few years we get a cold snap in the single digits, pipes are freezing all over town when that happens.

mattmia2 · January 2

it depends on the exact model of baseboard but most permanent baseboard electric heat has an accessory thermostat that can be installed in the junction box. usually they are installed with the power passing through a wall box with a thermostat but most can have a thermostat directly on the baseboard unit.

EBEBRATT-Ed · January 2

When you buy standard baseboard heaters most wire them to a wall mounted stat.

But they (the same BB manufacture) will sell thermostats that mount directly on the baseboard.

They are simple thing usually with just #s on them. A bit inconvenient to have to bend over to adjust the temp

ColdHouse · 1:51AM

so after all of this discussion, I have decided to duct tape the problem for this winter and take @EBEBRATT-Ed advise on electric space heaters. I found 1500watt electric ceramic heaters on sale for $33 each and bought six of them. My math says that will give me nearly 31,000 BTU’s. My plan is to locate them throughout the house, each on separate/unused circuits, prior to leaving this winter for a couple of months. If the heat goes down, my house monitor can just turn them all on and contact a repair person. In addition I am also going to use 3 of them in my great room the next cold snap and see the effect of adding an additional 15,000 BTU’s to the room does.

I will sleep better knowing the $200 I just spent on heaters, could possibly prevent a serious problem with frozen water pipes while waiting to get the system back up and running while I’m away.

This also gives me plenty of time to figure out what’s next for a more permanent solution in needing additional BTU’s in my great room and a backup heat source.

bburd · 1:54AM

If I were you I would cut the original molded plugs off every one of those heaters and put on industrial grade plugs that are much less likely to overheat.

Portable space heaters are really not meant to be used unattended, and that is cheap insurance against the plugs melting down (I have seen this happen) and catching fire.

mattmia2 · 2:39AM

https://forum.heatinghelp.com/discussion/comment/1880569#Comment_1880569

i am really far more concerned about the 30 cent receptacle that is push backwired than the crimp on to the cord. if it is made with good tooling the crimp connection is fine.

bburd · 2:59AM

https://forum.heatinghelp.com/discussion/comment/1880577#Comment_1880577

You raise a good point about the receptacle itself; but I have seen the difference more than once in the running temperature of plugs on space heaters and in one case a 120 V clothes dryer after the original molded plug was replaced with an industrial grade plug with solid screw terminals.

mattmia2 · 3:26AM

they usually use 16 awg hpn for the cord and use the 90c rating of the cord to get the needed ampacity for the space heater while the receptacle is usually required to be considered 60c by various decrees in the code so that is kind of a problem (although the receptacles are usually actually rated 75 c or 90c by the manufacturer). the temp you have to use for the ampacity calculations is the lowest of the terminations of that wire.

hot_rod · 3:41AM

If he has 20 A circuits, as noted they should have 20 amp receptacles, which would handle those heaters easily

mattmia2 · 4:07AM

20a general purpose receptacle circuits are not required to have 20 a receptacles unless there is a single receptacle on the circuit. if i remember right the terminals and bridging tab on 15 a receptacle are rated for 20a specifically for this reason although as of around 20 years ago you are no longer allowed to bridge 20a branch circuits through a device.

Steamhead · 5:01AM

@mattmia2 that may still be true, but in my house, receptacles fed by 20A circuits get 20A receptacles. That way I can tell by looking at the receptacle how much current is available in that circuit.

mattmia2 · 5:48AM

the only time you need a 20 a receptacle is if you have utilization equipment that uses over 1500w and has a 5-20p or 2-20p plug.

hot_rod · 6:01AM

You can have all the 20 A circuits you have ability to provide from the breaker panel

I don’t think the code requires 15A plug circuits?

Kitchens have 20A, every circuit in my shop is 20 except lights

I think the OP suggested he had 20A circuits throughout his rooms?

If he has 20A circuits and receptacles and follows @Steamhead suggestion to upgrade the cord caps, that should provide piece of mind

mattmia2 · 6:13AM

there is nothing that prohibits you from using a 5-20r on a 20 a circuit but in most cases they aren't required. i suspect that other than the shape of one of the contacts, there is little difference between a spec grad 5-15r and 5-20r.

ColdHouse · 2:29PM

I wired the house when it was built in 2002. All receptacle runs were 12-2 with 20 amp receptacles and all were individually pigtail feed and screw connected and not pushed in. I also installed a 200 amp house service and may have over killed receptacle circuits with many rooms with 2 or 3 circuits particularly my kitchen, which I think there 5 or 6. I spent most of my life’s work as a industrial electrical maintenance person, though not a licensed electrician.

I am not intending the 1500 watt heaters to be anything other than a emergency back-up in the event of the main heating system going down and stop gap until my son-in law can get a tech into make repairs while I’m away.

Being on 24 hr call my whole working life I know extremely well how frequent emergency situations can happen and if the temps were -20*f and boiler goes down, its an emergency. Knowing that if its a power outage I have a 5kw ready as well as a 3kw Honda generator and then 30k BTU’s of portable back-up heat, I will sleep better while away. I also know its not 100% fool proof.

ratio · 3:57PM

No need to have the HA worry about them, just set their internal thermostat lower than the heating thermostat. One less point of failure (I'm suspicious of HA), and only the places that need heat get it.

Back-up/supplemental heat

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