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What's the Best Drum Heater? Post New Topic | Post Reply

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Caleb DeFord Posted: Mar 23, 2012 12:35 PM	What's the Best Drum Heater? I need to buy some new drum heaters. There are basically two kinds that I know of: Band heaters and the platform kind from sprayworks. Which is the best? Is there another kind that works well I'm not aware of? I love this forum. -Foamilyman
Dennis Davidson Posted: Mar 23, 2012 02:11 PM	Platform heaters heat from the bottom where your transfer pump is getting material from. The warm fluid rises, heating the core of the drum. Band heaters only heat the sides of the drum and the bottom stays cold. I put drums on my platform heaters at night set on low, nice and warm in the morning.
Lane Hogstad Posted: Mar 23, 2012 08:08 PM	Floor heat is the greatest
mark moyer Posted: Mar 24, 2012 07:08 AM	so put the band heater about 2" off the bottom of the drum.. band heater cost less than 200$ american,,,, put a second one mid drum if you care to.. platform heaters rule,,, jury out on the infloor radiant systems us hillbillys tryin,,my hvac man (old geezer like mac) wasnt impressed with the idea btw,,he thought a full wrap blanket would be best..followed with platform or band type... time will tell,,eh lane.. btw,,he lane,,my foamzalls still work top shelf!! all 4 of em!!your first design as i remember,,,im tryin to break em man,,serious..
Lane Hogstad Posted: Mar 24, 2012 07:26 AM	The floor heat works as well as the saws do. We put a 110 waterheater in line also havent tested it down real cold but it holds the heat and keeps up down to 20. The coil is the key lots of tube pex will only put off so many btus. We use the gen to warm it up then the heater will hold its own and get hotter than the gen. The heater takes a long time to heat up on its own but once its up it holds easy. Drum heaters are an expensive bandaid floor heat is the cure to the problem study your drums with a temp gun and you will see the bottom of the drum is cold. Where is your pump? Our barrels are the same temp top to bottom. Lane. 605 880 1990
Dennis Davidson Posted: Mar 24, 2012 09:44 AM	Bought mine from Sprayworks Equipment. They can explain more but her's what I know. Platform Heaters: Heat from the bottom Temp is adjustable - High/low settings Will not over heat material Can connect up to six in series from a single 110v outlet. You don't need to run the generator all night to have warm material in the morning. Works well even in extreme cold environments - there is an optional full drum insulated jacket. The heating element is replaceable - band heater is a throw away if element goes out. One big ticket item for me is PORTABILITY. I can take my platform heaters inside an unheated building (or house) to heat and keep materials warm. I can switch them from one trailer to another. I use them in my shop to spray foam or poly in the Winter when the floors are cold. One type of platform heater has a drum height frame which I use to secure the drums to the trailer wall - no spills. Most important...they keep your coffee warm too!
John Shockney Posted: Mar 24, 2012 01:21 PM	We are building a new rig and we are installing hot water radiant floor heating. Since we use the customer’s electric to power our equipment we are installing an 18kw electric micro boiler ($250) that I plan on modifying to run in a standby mode on 120 volts and when we need additional heat we can kick the 240 to it. We have installed 4- 110ft loops of 1/2inch O2 barrier PEX roughly 4-5 inches apart with aluminum transfer plates between 1x4 furring. I have uploaded video to youtube from my phone and you can find them by searching airprosprarfoam at youtube or try the link posted. There has been some talk here in the past to use electric floor warming/heating mats or heating cables under an aluminum diamond plate floor after doing some research here are some things to consider: 1. The max heat provided by electric floor heating systems is around 20 watts per square foot or about 68btus per square foot. 2. The mats designed for under carpet or laminate floors are only 12 watts per square foot (40btus/sqft) 3. The higher wattage products need to be imbedded in a concrete like material or mastic for good heat transfer and to prevent hot spots to keep the heating wire from burning out. Now let’s do some calculations if we need to heat a drum or foam from 50deg to 70deg that will require about 10,000btus, with less than 3sqft of direct contact to the floor and if you only have heat under the drum at 20 watts per square foot it will take 49 hours to heat that drum, that is 68btus times 3sqft = 204btus per hour divided into 10,000 =49. You can reduce the time by heating the entire floor and allowing the heat radiation to heat the sides of the drum as well as the heat conduction through the bottom of the drum. But, let’s say that you can get 150sqft of heated floor that will get you 3,000 watts or 10,236btus per hour. That should give you enough heat to require only one hour per drum to bring them up to temp. With the hot water system and 440+ feet of tubing with the transfer plates depending on water temp, pump and heat source I can put 50,000btus+ into the trailer in a very controlled way as conditions require. Also most of you out there like Lane run water cooled gen sets and have a lot of wasted heat that could be used to heat the trailer requiring less fuel than running electric heaters and you don’t have to use radiant floor systems to take advantage of this wasted heat you can use baseboard radiators, radiant panels, or blower coil units like a rear van heater. Macs, Just want to let you know that by connecting the heaters in series you reduce the overall output of the heaters, that is if you are using a heater that plugs into a standard 120v 15amp outlet it can only have an 1800watt heating element and when you connect another heating element in series this would reduce the overall output of both heating elements to 900watts. That is unless you can change the voltage going to the heating elements to compensate for the added resistance, ohms law. I do like the platform heater and if I wasn’t building a new rig would go with that system, but ask anyone that has had radiant floor heat and they will tell you it’s the best!! Airpro
mark moyer Posted: Mar 26, 2012 03:17 AM	so you got one real nice heated trailer,,but i,,like my hvac man,,question its effectiveness in heating drums...you would have to raise the temp of the entire trailer to raise the temp of the drum...sounds good,,,but,,,one t,,delta the bulk of this system is under the trailer floor,,not under the drums,, consider,, morning in the cornfield ,,,cold in cornfield,,lets say,,10 degrees with a wind of lets say,,25 mph,,trailer shored with elect heaters goin,,,compartments maybe 50 if were lucky,,,genset up..woo hoo...drums,,50 degrees,,maybe,,, so,,,how many hours later will the radiant floor system bring that drum up lets say to 85 degrees so we can process open cell foam??? platforms put the btu's where it needs to be,,under the drum,,band heaters do the same...put it where you want on the drum,,up or down,,and a rather intimate exchange of the heat if you consider the interface...(most drums have a bottom chime and dont sit "full on the base") we have no problem with the trailers gettin "hot" after we work a bit,,but in the morning is when you need a quick sparky of the temps..quick,,in conjunction with the recirc thingy,,, just sayin,, :)~
Lane Hogstad Posted: Mar 26, 2012 07:30 AM	If we leave the trailer on site the heater will maintain the temps we usually bring the trailer home every night and tuck her in the shop @ 70 degrees. The floor heat will bring barrels up in temps and maintain them all day from the bottom up. If you dont let them get cold you dont have to heat them up. We heat slowly from the bottom where the pumps are and hold that temp constantly. The key is plenty of tube under our floor the tube is solid. My hvac guy gave me the look when he saw all the tube in a solid coil. After we got it fired and watched it heat he agreed. The water heater will hold once it gets warmed up but it takes a long time to get to temp. THE KEY IS DON'T LET THE BARRELS GET COLD AND THINK YOU'RE GOING TO GET THEM WARM IN 20 MINUTES !!!!! You can't pump 40 degree foam out of a barrel and not have problems. Not starting an argument dude but explaining what we have found.
mark moyer Posted: Mar 27, 2012 04:07 AM	argument???never,,this place is about dialoge,, even if its wrong..lol...(canadian filter on for gotfoam) ok,,your hvac looked apprehensive,,mine looked at your pix and freaked,,they space the tubes for a reason he explained,,(think reflexive foil here)aint sayin you aint got plenty of heat in that floor...or in that trailer,,,but you got only what is under the drums radiating up under the drums,,, ap..thats what concerns me about your system,,not a drum heating system as you only have about 5 1/2" loops under those drums with the spaceing you used..great trailer heating system..and man,,you ever cleaned frothy resins or iso off off wood decks,,power washer on one,,,slid a few drums across em..1500clams but shiney 1/8 deck over 3/4 t&g green in a 32'..not a bad investment over the next 10 years and the metal plate will radiate your heat much better than the wood floor system.. so then what is the delta t of your machine??? and how warm to you keep that trailer overnite up there in the dogazz days of winter lane??? 50?-60?70?80? like you our drums go into our super-insulated and heated hillbilly foamrigs already warm..duh,, and it takes some time for the mass of a 55 gallon drums to cool to ambient,,but when it is cold out we still want to boost the fluid temps in the drums above the temp in the trailer to allow us better processing at the wall,,faster..with recirc in play of course.. band heater...1250w 4"wide at base of drum(or where ever you put it),,mounted to drum,,intimately,,heating drum itself as well(burma shave,,thermal mass/bridge...at base of drum where fluid is being picked up (so damn hot we cant touch the darned thing if we run on stun,,we dont),,if its real cold..put a second one up mid drum for warm up.. yep we crush/pinch a few cords each season,,but i keep a 6pack around,,,keep threatening to record to armored flex type stuff but to many girls to litttle time,,,goddess???? and lane,,,no******sherlock on 40 degree fluids lol
Lane Hogstad Posted: Mar 27, 2012 07:21 AM	The trailer and barrels stay warm. That is my goal to keep them warm. It takes about an hour to bring a barrel from 50 to 60 depending on what the temps are outside wind ect. We have alot more tube than airpro. In an 8x12 area we have 550 ft of 5/8 tube. The barrels sit and warm all day and maintain if we need to hurry recirc or bands. The 40 degree coment is for the rookies that can't figure out that if the trailer is 60 the barrels are 40 and the e20 has unequal pressures the gun keeps crossing and they say that can't be it. The key is we can maintain 245s and not have to go home at 2. We dont run as hard as you dude when its too cold I just go fishing.
Dennis Davidson Posted: Mar 27, 2012 07:58 AM	Foamilyman, what you have to consider is what you want to achieve, type of materials your using and the type of work conditions you have. There is no one answer that works for everyone. I need to keep my drum heating system mobile so I can use it inside of cold buildings or move them to a different trailer. Band heaters are ok but they tend to get to hot in spots and you can get burned by them. With a plate heater you can leave a 50deg drum on all night and have warm 75-85deg drums in the morning. Been there done that, more than once. This is not theory based on calculations, this is actual field use. As I stated before, call Sprayworks. Ask the people that make these products about their test data. There is a drum heating chart on their website.
SPRAYFOAM GODDESS Posted: Mar 27, 2012 12:44 PM	We use powerblankets for the one to two kit people, plug them in, piggyback off 110v - guys in Seattle area warmed a really cold set in 5 hours. For big haulers/stores of multiple sets 3+ we install an Espar Airtronic Diesel Heater, runs off generator or truck tank and battery to keep the entire area a nice and toasty temp - no warming up in the morning. But ya'll know I aint been in the field testing these methods, I only go by what my contractors report back to love or hate. AND - they hate those drum bands - burn up - no warranty support, they melt the dial, no temperature adjustment just a rating from 1-10 - must use magnetic dial thermometer - will only last one season.
mark moyer Posted: Mar 27, 2012 03:30 PM	5 hours!!! now thats efficient..did they get paid to watch the drum cook and did the contractor smile and say no prob on the delay we will just move then drywall stockers back a day or two they wont care,,nor the hangers..lol,,and the beat goes on,, 6 drum band heaters 5 years old or more,,,serious,, we loose power cords not heater elements.. hot spots,,you bet ya..but we movin juice,,it dont matter...after warm up we run em barely warm to touch...so it dont burn you to bad..lol costs much less than the blanket,,,and you heatin the empty drum with the blanket after a few strokes..(but i quess we can argue for conduction) dials,,do they need instructions on how to wipe??? turn it on,,turn it up..hot ,,its on,,real hot its to hot..turn it down if closed cell..never melted one,,cracked a few off by bangin em... temp on the dial..you got to be kidding me???and do you lead them around with a swivel in their nose goddess???sheesh,,,my guess is if it aint perty and aint shiney it aint for them..and then they cry about the cost ,,,god bless... plates are cadillac,, macster,,but it wont work for my drop and slide loading system for the drums,,, like you stated quite eloquently,,,you have to look at your system and $$ restraints current and future and make a choice... not one size fits all,,indeed... i use 220v dayton electric 30amp heaters for my compartment/creature comfort...have lots of power available,,why not..use small 110v heaters overnite on site,,,well insulated trailers help.. shrinking injection foam in all the walls,,yeah right..
John Shockney Posted: Mar 28, 2012 03:47 AM	Hay dude ?? that shiny aluminum, how do you keep the edges and corners from curling up? Edge weld all the seams so you have a one piece floor or screw it down every 2 inches or so? Just asking what works. My present trailer I bought used and is around 12years old and I installed the oak floor in it 7 years ago when I first set it up and even through all the spilled iso and resin ( I was once transferring cc from one drum to another and walked away only to see resin flowing out the side door of the trailer, what a mess) the floor has held up very well. We just through down some oil dry or saw dust on the spills and sweep it up later. As to the floor heat you are forgetting that the tubing is arranged so the hottest water leaving the boiler is directed to the outside of the trailer (where the drums will be) and since heat transfer rates increase the greater the temp difference most of the heat will go to the drums first. And second I would be the first person to tell you that if you want to heat up drums quickly (less than 2hours) this radiant floor probably won’t do the job. But with a well-insulated trailer I think we can bring 5000lbs of foam from 55-75degs in 3-4 hours and that will work for me! As you say one size doesn’t fit all. For our jobs we do a lot of traveling and stay in motels, and most of the time we can set the trailer up on the job the night before we start spraying, in the past we have ran 1500watt 110 heaters to keep the trailer warm overnight and ran propane or fuel oil heaters when we needed more heat. What a pain. So our plan is to have 1500watts of 110 heat that you can connect to any 15amp outlet (to maintain temp or keep thing from freezing) and when we hook the trailer up to the 60amp 220v service that we need to run our rig we can have up to 15kw of heat. Besides we use the customers power why not make them pay to heat the foam? Now dude if you need to heat chems up quickly then the fastest way would be to recirculate them through an immersion heater or insert an immersion heater into the drum. But it sound like your band heaters do the job that you need! Oh! dude, But, wait didn’t you say that you just had a trailer built special with a belly pan so you could install a radiant floor? What is your plan now? Airpro
Caleb DeFord Posted: Mar 28, 2012 12:04 PM	I knew when I said "what's the BEST drum heater?" I was asking a loaded question but I wasn't expecting this kind of an explosion! This has been good, though. When it comes to shooting for the "best" of anything you are always going to have a debate. "Best" is a constantly moving target in most situations. Floor heat would be the nicest form of heat for a rig, and water heat would be the best of the best heat, imo. BUT, water-heated floor heat must be the most difficult heating system to install and I'm not so sure the cost/benefit ratio works out too well. I like your point, airpro, about using generator coolant with a wall mounted heater. There are other ways to use wasted water heat besides putting it in your floor. I was worried about my 240V 4000W wall mounted heater making it too hot on the ceiling and too cold on the floor so I installed a big fan on the wall to circulate the air. Now the air on the floor is about 2 degrees less than the ceiling and I don't really have to worry about the bottom of my drums being cold. I think I will just get some more band heaters for the drums. I stir the resin on OC, and the iso side doesn't froth during circulation anyway, so I don't think hot spots are going to kill me. A 'Franklin' saved is a 'Franklin' earned. We'll see if I don't get a platform heater sometime in the future. -Foamilyman
mark moyer Posted: Mar 28, 2012 10:37 PM	i prefer 1/8" not shiney,,trailer 1 has this,,but for this build i would have to had to spec order this time so,,1/8 shiney,,not 14 gauge ap,,so no edge curl,,cheap is what cheap is,,, we use a combo of adhesive and shallow pan head screws thru deck to frame...yes some get knocked off over time but the threads seam to stay and so does the deck..we have stayed away from tack welding the seams due to the thought of increasing the chance of corrosion... always wondered how a 1" oak floor would hold up over years,,can you slide drums on it..do the hip toss of a couple inches?? i concur on the first loop being outboard..derr.. i also concur to your logic one size does indeed not fit all,,hence the beauty of this type of dialoge.. i concur with your KISS 110v works anywhere hillbilly heat system...works about anywhere there is a plugin.. immersion heater would be efficient but a major exposure mess.. belly pan was to allow protected contigious insulation media of uniform depth..closed cell foam,,derr...topped with 3/4 decking..plan was to route 5/8 to lay 1/2 pex for infloor..then top with plate..but the best made plans of mice and men.. "trailer modification" is done..scaled it yesterday pre equip install to see what we weigh,,snapped a few pix and now the fun stuff.. e10,,,3.5 hp menards compressor,,honda 5hp generator,,n95 dusk mask,,,2010 sprayfoamdotcom calandar..im ready man... find me a bid to bust..
Lane Hogstad Posted: Mar 29, 2012 07:18 AM	dude. Glad to hear you went with the extra and got the honda gen did you get the extended run one with the extra big rope too? I saw Menards had a sale on 2 horse compressors that came with hose you could hook 2 together and have a spare 83.99 each. Foamly I guess after thinking about it floor heat isnt a good drum heater but more of a conditioner. Expense wise its probably about the same as anything else give me a call 6058801990. All we put it in is the reactor room so not that large of an area to heat we installed perimeter boards tube and hooked it up about a two day remodeling project.
John Shockney Posted: Apr 01, 2012 10:18 AM	Hay dude, Standard ¾ inch t&g white oak utility grade flooring for 99 cents per square foot from lumber liquidators edge glued, nailed and glued in place with polyurethane glue. You can drag, roll, slide or drop drums out of the semi-trailer without hurting the floor, only problem is when the floor gets wet (the back doors don’t seal good and need to be replaced) it cups up a little but as soon as it dries out it is flat again. I only got one thin coat of poly on the floor before having to move equipment in so we could get a job done and money coming in. Planning to put down two or three coats of oil based poly to make the floor more waterproof and easier to keep clean. I plan to insulate the floor the same way Allegro motorhomes where done, spray 2+ inches of closed cell to the underside of the floor then may spray black undercoating. My shop isn’t tall enough to keep the trailer inside and warm in the winter, I do have a 50amp outlet for the rig but that is a pain to hookup just to run a heater to keep everything above 45deg between the few jobs we do in the winter and so is running a 110 cord through a hatch to connect to a portable heater. That’s why there will be a 110volt connection (weather-tight outside emergency gen connection $50) on the outside of the rig, wired to heat and light. Don’t you think that Honda is a little big for the E-10? And too bad there isn’t a 2012 calendar!! Lane, thanks for the advice on putting more tubing in the floor I had been planning to only put around 200 feet of tubing in but now have over 400 feet installed. Still need to calc head pressure and gpm to put it into the pump selector program or spend the money for the three speed or new variable speed pump with built-in controls. Family, There are blower coil unit heaters that aren’t too costly check with the guys that sell the outside wood boilers or you can build your own with any radiator, fan, and a pump. And you can get more btus of heat from a blower coil than almost any radiant system. Airpro