Pro's and Con's, in a nutshell
First off, I got this nat gas heater at the end of November of 2010 for a 17'x 22' finished basement room with a 7' drop ceiling. I live in the Northeast so we get pretty cold winters here. This heater was purchased for a secondary back up heating system in the event of a power failure however, I use it daily and love it. My initial concerns before the unit was installed: plumbing gas pipe, ventless emmissions, CO2, odors and function(s). I'll address all the concerns as best I can.
-Plumbing gas pipe: Don't do it yourself, hire a professional, you'll sleep a lot sounder, a small price to pay for safety (it'll pay for itself in the long run anyway)
-Ventless Emissions: I researched here and there and everywhere, this camp is split from what I can see, some say there is and some say there isn't any, I don't know. The next thing I cover may or may not be related to this.
-CO2 and odors: I installed $40 Kidde CO2 detector 12 feet away from the heater and it still...
It's good but not fantastic
The only glitch on this heater is the picture of a digital reading on amazon's site. The heater came in with a sticker where the digital reading should have been. Set up was easy, I had a guy at lowes plumbing dept help me with the parts. Make sure and buy the leak checker fluid and watch for bubbles. I also used a flexible coil they use for gas stoves and dryers. The flexible hose also has a built in union so you don't have to install one. The heater works really well with a cracked window or overhead fan on to keep humidity down. The room heats up fast but does have some cool spots. It's ok for what we are using it for. There is an odor and will go away in time. The odor is not natural gas but the heater itself burning off impurities. The built in thermostat works well shutting on & off the heat on its own. I would suggest getting a cheap digital thermometer to help you regulate the heat.
Effective home heater
After a few power outages last winter, we purchased this heater today and installed it. Wow! It adequately heats our living room and kitchen and if the downstairs bathroom door is left open, covers that as well. Better yet, with it running, our furnace has yet to kick on with the thermostat set at 68 (it's 37 outside right now with a wind chill of 30).
The only con I can think of is that the blower really isn't very efficient. We are using a small pole fan behind the unit to distribute the warm air more evenly, although a ceiling fan would do the same if you have one.
Definitely well worth the purchase price. We were debating whether to get this one or a different non-vented natural gas heater with logs and "flames" but decided for $100 less, we could do without the esthetics and stick with pure function.
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