Tent Heater Question

Growroom Design
#1

Right now ive got a small, oil filled heater connected to an inkbird in my 3x3 tent in my basement. It’s been working well, but im curious about the idea that a chicken coop heater may be a better bet? im concerned about the oil filled heater dealing with overspray from IPM or foliar sprays, and the proximity to things like plant material, dry mulch materials etc. I’m assuming that a chicken coop heater is designed for an environment thats typically outdoors, so there has to be a waterproofing rating to the product, as well as covered in dry, flammable material, i.e. the straw bedding, not to mention small little fuzzy animals being right up against it. taking these into consideration i figured its reasonable to assume that a purpose built chicken coop heater would be designed to be able to get a little bit wet and be in close proximity to potential flammable materials. i’m wondering if anyone else has had this thought, has used one, and if so, which ones are good for the purpose of heating grow tents. heres an example of what im talking about from amazon:

ive seen these things at tractor supply, lowes, all over, so they’re readily accessible, im wondering if they’re a better option than what im using:

curious to see what people think.

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#2

If you have the budget to burn propane but can’t afford a C02 burner you can run a ‘camping tent heater’
They’re pretty safe now a days, they turn off if knocked over or low O2. Plus you get the benefit of it producing C02.

Those plug in oil heater are pretty efficient for large spaces though, put a small fan moving air in the room around it

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#3

or a 600w hps. not trying to be funny just i use ceramic hps for that same reason

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#4

I would say a lot more safety in rad built for house with peoples lives at risk , than one for a few chickens in out house
I say stick with what you have and put money into something else : )

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#5

The oil filled heater reduces humidity where as the propane heater will increase humidity and as mentioned above add CO2.
I dont think you can beat a small aircon, I’ve had my VPD go way out of whack with an oil filled heater.

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#6

I used the Cozy Coops in my attic tent this year and they absolutely slapped. Works great, never a problem with having them packed into the tents. I was gonna get grow tube heaters but these are so cheap I had to give them a try and I am going to figure out wall mounting brackets in the future since they’re setup for them. I just had them on the floor under the canopy, with a fan down there since I had fungus mites I was trying to kill too.

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#7

I ran two of them at full power and was able to keep my 4x4 tent around 65-70 even when it was 40-50 in the room and I was pulling that air in during flower to dry it out

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#8

how big is your tent exactly? And how big of a space is it in?

As zPotato mentioned, more lighting is always great during lights on.

You’ll want to be careful with light off temperatures falling too much during that period. Could you put your heater outside of your tent?

Do you have a lot of extraction fans pulling the heat out of your tent?

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#9

I did this with the tent on foam pads, a heat pad inside the tent and the same space heater at 50% power set up as follows:

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The duct boosting fan is set to the lowest it will go and so far i have solid and steady tent temps at 22c with a room temp of 16c.

All the best! :hugs:

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#10

My immediate thought was that it sounded like a good idea, until I read this in the description:

Cozy Coop is not designed to heat an entire room or space – it is instead meant to warm any animal who sits/stands right next to it.

It still seems like a small-ish tent like a 2x4 or 3x3 might be fine, though. Worth a shot and not super expensive.

I use a couple reptile heaters with ceramic “bulbs” that don’t emit any light. I run them off the thermostat for a seedling heat mat. Two of them with 150W bulbs + LEDs can get my 5x5 tent up to toasty mid-80s in my basement.

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#11

I run an oil filled heater in the room my tents are in. Works good and it warms the basement as well. I just have a bookshelf covering the doorway to grow room and I slide it out of the way to get in the room.

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#12

@DannyTerpintine i’ve got AC infinity fans in both tents linked up to their smart controllers to exhaust the air when the temp or humidity of the tent goes out of range. typically try to keep the 3x3 at 75 degrees and like 60% RH. The oil filled heater connected to the inkbird really does do the job well, ive got a humidifier in there on its own controls as well. the whole thing works fine, i just worry about some of the stuff i mentioned above re: overspray, and proximity to flammables, the added bonus of something like a chicken coop heater would be the slimmer profile taking up less floor space in an already small tent. but i suppose theres always options like this guy:

really just wanted to hear others thoughts on this trying to see if theres a better way to get the tent heated overall, just wanted to bounce some ideas around to see what other folks do and if theres a better way than what i got. lots of interesting stuff coming out of it!

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#13

Really depends on how much heating power you need, but if you have the room, the heat pump portable AC units with the heating function are much more efficient than those oil filled are. And you can pick them up fairly cheap second hand.

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#14

They need to be vented to an outside space however.

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#15

@Orison basically just something to heat/cool the whole basement huh?

#16

Depends on your setup, it definitely could do a basement. Another reason I like them is that they are closed loop systems. The 2 hose system bring in fresh air, exchange the heat and exhaust it (external air in external out). I run co2 so that’s really a must for me. You also get the benefit of an a/c and dehu for summer months. @LegsMahoney

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#17

I use something like this in a 4x4. The one I have is 400 watts, on/off so I have it set up on an inkbird. Will manage temps sufficiently in an unheated garage down into the upper 30’s with a couple other measures in place. Mine is a rather large flat panel heater meant for wall mounting. I made a 2x4 stand to put it on one side of the 4x4 in front of the passive intake. Sorry for the crummy pic, but I’m not moving this. :grin:

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I was also eyeing the chicken coupe ones for a smaller application. In a 2x2 in the attic I use ceramic lizard tank bulb and seedling heat mats on inkbirds. Works as well. I was trying to be wattage conscious with trying to achieve the desired temps.

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#18

That’s the diesel version of those coop heaters, love the thinking!

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#19

That’s a killer revue of these things, sounds like it’d work well for a 3x3 or a 2x4. The things are so cheap I’m tempted to get one just to see how it does for my specific needs. Do you feel like they’re better suited to dealing with potential overspray than the small household space heaters??

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#20

I have the same oil heater and I did the same… without the ducting lll (not same I guess:) )

i found the first time I used it, the year before I started growing, to heat the bedroom in late September. October November - my electricity’s bill went up $60 a month for just the heater.

I had it in grow room later when I was in flower over night. I didn’t have a fan up to it I don’t think, just heated the room and had the intake on ! I like you’re set up !

Since then I’ve actually just used a small fan heater IN the tent, on a wifi timer on cycle. On for 5-10 min every 45 min or smt, and I found my temps stayed stable overnight.

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