The International Cessna 170 Association

Thankful that I have a hanger.

I tried working in it with O.S. temp low 30 s. That does not work for me.

I want to work INSIDE the A/C cabin so I am thinking about devising some type of plastic drape over the right wing
and use small electric heaters. Right door of airplane would be open.

Kind of like camping out under the wing except I am in a closed hanger.

Open for practical suggestions.

My dad rigged up a forced air heater from a mobile home in his hangar.
He put it on rollers with a separate fuel oil tank and flex ducting to put the heat where he needed it.
That and a big 10x10 shade tent with walls keeps things quite toasty warm in the winter.

I did an entire avionics swap in an unheated hanger a couple years ago. I took all the seats out, threw in a small space heater and a work light, closed the cabin doors, and ensconced myself in there for a couple weekends. It heated up quite nicely, despite the single digit temps outside. I had done a lot of prewiring on the bench in my basement first, which helped a lot. I had also prefigured everything and new exactly (well almost) what I had to do. Finally, I carefully thought out a plan and made sure I had all the tools and parts I needed.

I won't even begin to pretend this was ideal. I'm sure it would have gone faster in a nice heated shop. It also wasn't very comfy. But it did work, and allowed me to make use of some otherwise miserable weather and downtime.

DEM

Grady, it sounds like you also want some working space outside of the cabin under the right wing. If I wanted that I would drape one of those heavy duty (silver - 10 mil) tarps over the right wing as close as I could to the fuselage and close the outboard end with zip ties through the grommet holes. I'd need to measure things to figure out the size of the tarp, but I'm thinking a 10'x20' one would work well, with the 20' length draping over the wing ground-to-ground and the 10' ends at the fuselage and closed at the outboard end. Since this is being done in a closed hangar, no need to seal the tarp completely tight. Then I'd use a small electric heater with blower in the cabin (900w should be enough), and if needed one of those oil-filled radiator-style electric heaters under the "tent." I would NOT use any combustion heaters due to sparks and CO. Those electric space heaters with blowers can put out a lot of heat, so no need to overdo it in the cabin. The oil-filled radiator style ones have a bunch of heat settings and I think are generally safer as the surfaces don't get too hot, except on the highest setting maybe, which I doubt you will need. Test all heaters first to determine if any surfaces (other than the obvious ones) get hot to know how to place them, especially for the one in the cabin. Also, I'd choose ones that have an adjustable thermostat so I could work without needing to turn them on and off. Just thoughts off the top of my head. Be careful with any heater you are using in close quarters.

Grady, we heat the entire cabin of an EC-145 helicopter while it sits outside 24-7 with a 1500 watt ceramic heater. It is quite toasty to about 30°. At that point we use two heaters.

Your plan is very viable. Take the usual precautions against igniting anything such as dripping fuel.

I have a Trane Nat Gas furnace/air-handler removed from a house. It would make a nice hangar heater overhead or ducted. It's free to anyone who'll come pick it up. You will need a thermostat. I had planned to install it in my hangar but propane conversion is not cost-effective. (Requires a different White-Rogers regulator costing about $125).

I hope for Santa to bring an overhead heater to me.

I've used a propane forced air heater to heat up my hanger before. I like the idea of finding a used mobile home unit. I am sure one could be scored on craigslist or something.

https://www.northerntool.com/shop/tools ... LEQAvD_BwE

This is commonly known information but there may be some who don't know.

Direct-fired heaters work well but should not be used for long in tightly sealed enclosures. They discharge ALL of the products of combustion/exhaust into the space they are operating plus use up combustion air/oxygen from the same space. So you end up breathing exhaust and diminished oxygen at the same time. Just be careful and leave the area at the first signs of hypoxia if you choose to use them. Then, there is the potential fire hazard of an open flame in an area where large volumes of gasoline is stored (in your plane).

If you can place the direct-fired heater outside of the enclosed area and duct the heat inside, at least your supply of breathing air is not being used up by the heater although you are still breathing all of the exhaust. Somewhat better but not much.

The best option is the indirect-fired heater which takes combustion air from outside and exhausts outside with only heated breathing air entering the enclosed space.