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[Daped01]

Hello, I live in extreme northern MN where temps get to -40 in the coldest part of the winter  I have a double-wide mobile home about 1600-1800 square feet.  I
have not purchased an OWB yet but am contemplating it, as I spent $1700 in LP last year.  Here are my questions...


How well will baseboards hooked up to the owb work in a situation like this?  the furnace in my mobile home is in a tight area, and don't know how hard it would be
to add a heat exchanger?

Somebody that has an owb told me I could possibly run raidant lines back and forth on top of the slab underneath the house and that would make a noticable
increase in warmth in the house.  this seems kind of outlandish to me, but i know next to nothing about what would/wouldn't work.

Are the previous questions crazy, and would my best bet be to get a heat exchanger installed in my furnace?

anybody have any wild guesses on how much wood I could potentially go through given the situations listed above?


Thank you in advance as i stated above, i'm contemplating purchasing one, but know little to nothing about them.

[Bull]

If you have a forced air furnace you can add a water to air heat exchanger in your return air line. They don't take up much room (about 4 inches) and it is easy.
ps Welcome to the site

[Daped01]

would that give me more heat for my dollars worth as opposed to baseboards?

[juddspaintballs]

If your LP furnace can keep your home warm in the winter, then I would use a heat exchanger in the LP furnace's forced air system.  Match the heat exchanger output to the BTU rating of your LP furnace and slip it into (probably) the return side.  Even if your furnace is in a tight area, doing it this way will wind up being the least amount of work for the best results. 

[RSI]

Baseboard heater would work fine but will cost a lot more than a heat exchanger for the forced air.
Putting radiant on the slab under the house would probably use twice as much or more wood. (assuming it is what I am picturing it looks like)
Post a picture of the gas furnace. It shouldn't be that hard finding a place to mount a heat exchanger.  I have heard that putting a heat exchanger in the return can damage plastic parts on newer furnaces. I don't know if it is true though.

[Daped01]

I will try to get a picture up today.  the LP furnace heats the front half of the house well enough.  but the rear two bedrooms (rooms at the end of the ducting) are always cold in the winters,  so bad we have to run a ceramic heater in the wintertime.  How hard would it be to add in a couple baseboards in those rooms for supplemental heat?

the radaint lines below the house on the slab eating up too much wood is kind of what I was envisioning myself as well.  thanks for the responses.

i'm looking at getting a heatmor, as I live in the town they are manufactured and my uncles works in R and D for heatmor. and can get me a deal on a returned unit,  He said he would completely go over it after it comes in and make sure its working fine.

[RSI]

It would be very easy to use both baseboard heaters and forced air. Baseboard heaters are around $10 per foot + fittings needed to connect them and  put out 590 BTU/ft/hr @ 4gpm. A 1500 watt electric heater will put out around 5000 btu/hr.  A water to air heat exchanger would probably be $150 - $250 depending on the size needed.

[Daped01]

great news! 

Sorry to be a pest, but my next question would be, would I have to run seperate pex lines for both the h/x in my forced air furnace, and for the baseboards in my
bedroom, or could they all be plummed into the same run of pex?


I am also planning on keeping the LP hooked up to my furnace for backup purposes, would this make things any more or less difficult?

[RSI]

One set of lines from boiler to house then split off.
You will want to leave the gas furnace alone, just add a second thermostat. That way the backup heat is automatic.(just set it low enough that it won't turn on unless needed) If you have manual fan switch on your thermostat then you just disconnect it and connect it to the new thermostat. Or you can move the the wire for the gas furnace to the new thermostat and have the original thermostat control the OWB heat.

[Daped01]

fantastic!!!! THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU for all the help!  I'm sure all my questions are far from being over.  but you have sent me in the right direction for now! 


now its time to figure out how to pay for a unit lol.

[oldchenowth]

I have my h/x in my cold air return to the furnace because there is NO room in the plenum with the A coil.  It works very well for me.  I have not noticed any failures in the system because of it.  I would guess that any manufaturer would point you in the right direction for financing. 

I doubt you will be disappointed.  I have used a little over 3 cords since October here in Michigan on an old farm house.

Welcome to the LP / fuel oil revolution

[Daped01]

Sorry I haven't been able to get the pictures of the furnace up yet.  hopefully tonight.


Next question I have is,  My double wide mobile home sits on about an 8" slab.  When I run the lines in the ground to the house, will I have to bust out a trench in the concrete and bury it all the way to the point of where i want the lines to go into the house?  or can I bring them above ground next to the slab. and cut a hole in my skirting and run them on top
of the slab to where they go up to my furnace?  (about  6 feet from skirting to directly below the furnace)


Also, I am planning on building an insulated "pony wall' behind the skirting this summer to help with the insulation properties of the underside of the house. 

[rosewood]

i would say yes, come out of the ground next to slab.but i would try to encapsulate lines in a highly insulated box from ground to where it enters the side of the entry point.

[jackel440]

If you still just have the vinyl under skirting I have a suggestion for you.I know you said you plan to do this,but here is what I did.I was wanting to reduce the air coming through my skirting,but didn't have the time or money to put in a block foundation wall or make an insulated wall behind the skirt.I actually placed osb around the whole outside over top the skirting.Man! what a difference that made alone!Now it wasn't the best or prettiest way to do it,but it sure worked well.It has been on there going on 4yrs.Even though I never got it painted the wood is still holding up.
I ended up placing an exchanger where my A coil was.My furnace is getting old and my a coil looked horrible so I ripped it out and put my xchanger down there.These manufactered homes don't have a return air duct like conventional house most of the time.So you have to get creative on what you do.
I plan to make a box to hold my xchanger ,and then mount a new furnace on top of that box this spring when I buy a new one.
good luck

[Daped01]

If you still just have the vinyl under skirting I have a suggestion for you.I know you said you plan to do this,but here is what I did.I was wanting to reduce the air coming through my skirting,but didn't have the time or money to put in a block foundation wall or make an insulated wall behind the skirt.I actually placed osb around the whole outside over top the skirting.Man! what a difference that made alone!Now it wasn't the best or prettiest way to do it,but it sure worked well.It has been on there going on 4yrs.Even though I never got it painted the wood is still holding up.
I ended up placing an exchanger where my A coil was.My furnace is getting old and my a coil looked horrible so I ripped it out and put my xchanger down there.These manufactered homes don't have a return air duct like conventional house most of the time.So you have to get creative on what you do.
I plan to make a box to hold my xchanger ,and then mount a new furnace on top of that box this spring when I buy a new one.
good luck

Thanks.  last winter we put the blue styro insulation behind the skirting.  and it made a huge difference.  I think some of it has fallen down.  its been a bit colder in here this year, but not as bad as 2 years ago.  My wife is going to start doing daycare out of our home, and its her idea to want to do this....so i'm not going to say no .  lol.  but I totally get where you are coming from.