Heating in shed

[Sally Newbie]

Hi all
I am thinking about getting an electrician to give me a quote to get electricity into our shed (gulp!) for when the pigs move in. If I do this, what heaters do you recommend? The shed isn't insulated.

 

[Deleted member 114675]

It’s well worth getting electricity in your shed if you can .

whatever type of heating you get, make sure they have some sort of thermostat...


oil filled radiators are good

my heaters are inside the hutches themselves
Member Gallery: Hutches

 

[Piggies&buns]

Or I’ve heard tube heaters are good.
You need something that is just going to tick over and take the chill off, keep it at a nice steady temperature and not let it get too hot. What you don’t want is for something that heats it up quickly, then turns off and allows it to drop too much before coming back on again - that will cause big temperature fluctuations

 

[KHBz]

I use this electric radiator -- you can get them cheaply from Argos, amazon ... Although it has a built-in thermostat (a 'thermostatic cut-off'?), that never worked very well and the temperature would fluctuate, so I bought a separate thermostatic plug. This is plugged into the wall, with the radiator plugged into that. For the sake of this photo I took last year, I have placed the white unit indicating the temperature (actual temperature given at the top, intended temperature below) in front of the radiator. (Usually it is at a lower level and nearer the hutch to give a more accurate reading of the temperature that the guinea pigs are experiencing.) You set the electric radiator to its maximum setting and then set the desired minimum and maximum temperatures on the white sensor. This will switch the radiator on and off within 1-1.5 degrees of the upper and lower temperatures that have been set -- so a setting of between 18-20 degrees would result in a shed temperature of roughly 17-21 degrees. That kept the temperature constant and worked really well. The shed is insulated though, so retains the heat quite well. (I don't think these thermostatic plugs have great longevity, however, as the one I bought from amazon eventually stopped working and so I will have to buy another this year.)

The black unit next to the white thermostatic plug sensor allowed me to keep a double eye on the temperatures. A sensor inside the hutch gives the reading to the right of the black unit, together with the minimum and maximum temperatures it has reached over a 24-hour period, with the reading on the left giving the current, minimum and maximum temperatures inside the shed as a whole. The temperature readings on the two units corresponded pretty well.

I will see if I can find a couple of links for the radiator and the thermostatic plug.

 

[KHBz]

I think this is the thermostatic plug I bought: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Wireless-D...gie+wireless+thermostat&qid=1600330109&sr=8-7 (but I don't recommend that brand given that it hasn't lasted).

My electric heater is very old, but a quick search brought up this, which looks much more sophisticated in terms of thermostatic control:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Schallen-E...uPWNsaWNrUmVkaXJlY3QmZG9Ob3RMb2dDbGljaz10cnVl

The heater was off at night and the temperatures would drop. I work from home so during the day I could pop into the shed regularly to check that nothing had gone amiss with the temperatures (it hadn't). Before I got the thermostatic plug and sensor, however, I had to go in every hour to adjust the radiator. You must be able to buy far more sophisticated ones now, given that the cheap one linked above is already much better than mine.

 

[KHBz]

I use this electric radiator -- you can get them cheaply from Argos, amazon ... Although it has a built-in thermostat (a 'thermostatic cut-off'?), that never worked very well and the temperature would fluctuate, so I bought a separate thermostatic plug. This is plugged into the wall, with the radiator plugged into that. For the sake of this photo I took last year, I have placed the white unit indicating the temperature (actual temperature given at the top, intended temperature below) in front of the radiator. (Usually it is at a lower level and nearer the hutch to give a more accurate reading of the temperature that the guinea pigs are experiencing.) You set the electric radiator to its maximum setting and then set the desired minimum and maximum temperatures on the white sensor. This will switch the radiator on and off within 1-1.5 degrees of the upper and lower temperatures that have been set -- so a setting of between 18-20 degrees would result in a shed temperature of roughly 17-21 degrees. That kept the temperature constant and worked really well. The shed is insulated though, so retains the heat quite well. (I don't think these thermostatic plugs have great longevity, however, as the one I bought from amazon eventually stopped working and so I will have to buy another this year.)

The black unit next to the white thermostatic plug sensor allowed me to keep a double eye on the temperatures. A sensor inside the hutch gives the reading to the right of the black unit, together with the minimum and maximum temperatures it has reached over a 24-hour period, with the reading on the left giving the current, minimum and maximum temperatures inside the shed as a whole. The temperature readings on the two units corresponded pretty well.

I will see if I can find a couple of links for the radiator and the thermostatic plug.

View attachment 153718

Looking at what I wrote above, it sounds like there would have been a fluctuation of 4 degrees, but I don't think it was actually by that much and it certainly didn't feel it -- but then the shed does retain the heat fairly well.