The guys over at garagejournal mentioned a sale on a 5kw garage heater for $69 back in mid december. I jumped at the opportunity as i just purchased a new to me gorgeous South Bench 13" lathe, which i don't want sweating in my garage and rusting up.
Purchased around 12-16, delivered a few days ago for a total of $83. $39.50 in red, black, and green #10 thhn, some flex tube, and a 30 amp double pole breaker, and i was up and running in 2 hours.
This morning on my day off, a bulb lighted up above my head, LOAD BANK! A Perfect 5kw resistive load for my MEP-802a. So this am, i put another hour on it, warming it up, recharging the batteries, and blowing out any moisture off the genset and windings.
To stretch its legs, my garage has 800 watts of T5HO flourecent lighting, 400 each on their own switches. I used those to add another 800 watts of juice.
Everything went well. I have to tweek the droop juuust a bit. It runs at 62 hz hot no load, and 58.5 at full load. Could be a touch better. I don't want hz below 59.
On a wierd side, i recently installed 3 60w LED recessed lighting fixtures from home depot in my newly renovated downstairs half bath/laundry. The kind which can either be refitted in an old recessed can, or installed in a junction box right in the cieling. When the genset runs, the led's flicker. I wonder if it's not super pure power, or if the led's are sensitive to anything less than an exact 60hz.
They also do the same when my 5hp single phase baldor motor on my co pressor runs. Wierd.
Anyway, i got real lucky. A built in load bank, right in the garage. It has a toggle switch for 3, 4, and 5kw. I warmed it up for a few minutes and built up to 5k plus garage lighting for an hour, cooled it back down from 5 to 4 to than 3 then zero.
No wasted energy. The heater heats my chilly garage wonderfully.
If anyone cares, i got it at ruralkings online website. Price may have changed but it seems real good quality for a chinese import heater. And certainly was the right price!
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