Hello All,
Living in Minnesota I’ve come to realize that if the heat goes out… I’m in BIG trouble. I’ve been looking into liquid propane heaters and am also thinking about a burner or two for emergency cooking. For heat, I’m leaning toward the indoor/outdoor Mr. Heater with the 20lb tank adapter (or the Home Depot equivalent). Then for the burner, I was thinking the cheap, cast iron one or two burner. Are there other options out there? Are there “better” options? I know there are “multi-fuel” heaters and burners; but I don’t know anything about them.
Any thoughts?

For emergency use I'd recommend a Coleman 2 burner camp stove. Even when all my car camping gear is packed deep into storage, the stove stays in my bedroom closet with a few cylinders just in case. Same with the propane lantern.

I'm not aware of any 'multifuel' propane stoves on the market.

Coleman also makes some good propane heaters but the Mr. Heater models are also very good. Whatever you get, get something with safeties that turn everything off if the unit gets bumped or knocked over.

Home Depot is having a sale on the Mr. Heater knock-off. It doesn't list a 20lb adapter as an option though I imagine it would be very straight forward.
Can the Coleman 2 burner be hooked up to the larger LP cylinders? The multi fuel stove I found is here:
http://www.northerntool.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_6970_200234424_200234424
Thanks,
M

Coleman makes adapters. You can run just about anything coleman off of a 20lb. tank if you pick up the adapter you need. They make the 'trees' too so that you can run multiple things off the same tank and mount a lantern on the top for light...popular item.

Does that stove from Northerntool.com run off of isobutane cylinders like a backpack stove or the Butane cylinders that are shaped like a can of spray paint? If it will run off the former, I've been looking for just such a creature for months!

I really don't know what Northerntool stove will run on. It doesn't say. Thanks for the info on the Coleman. Even if it's not specifically listed, do you think it's alright to run a heater off of the larger tank?

I suspect it runs on the butane only cans...but I did some Googling and it appears to come with several adapters so you never know.

As long as propane is regulated appropriately, the size of the tank doesn't matter. When I was a kid my dad got frustrated with running out during the summer on the BBQ so he hooked it up to a 200lb. tank about 5 feet tall...ran for years before needing a fill!

The problem you might have with the heaters is that many of them are designed to take the small bottle internally so adapting it might not work. The Coleman heaters for example use the bottle as part of the base so you'd have a hard time with those. I've never tried converting my propane stuff to run 20lb bottles...I love the small bottles too much.

I compare such a situation at home akin to what I need up at elk camp in my wall tent. I would refrain from using a propane heater unless it has the catalyzing feature that prevents the production of carbon monoxide. These heaters also have an O2 sensor that will shut down the combustion system if the O2 gets below an acceptable level. I've used these in smaller spaces (<500 sq ft) with decent results in fairly cold environments and always been satisfied with their performance, knowing ahead of time their limits. I've always used the smaller versions, though I understand they now have a bigger model with twice the burning surface. I also hear that there are more permanent fixtures that do the same thing. I've been in cabins that use the non-catalyzing heaters, and sleeping in the top bunk under those conditions is not an option for me. I've also been in wall tents with bigger non-catalyzing Mr. Heaters going intermittently through the night to augment wood stove heat at times. It is acceptable because the tent was breezy enough that it purged the exhaust gases sufficiently. At home, I would tend to keep at least one window open per 1,000 sq feet.

As far as propane stoves, I have come to the conclusion that nothing out there is as good as the Camp Chef line of professional outfitter grade cast iron stoves. At 30,000 btu per burner, I find that the two and three burner units can handle all my camp cooking needs, including heating gallons of water in minutes, cooking in my largest cast iron dutch ovens and frying pans, and grilling steaks and such at the ideal temperatures. While not of the backpacking variety, they do well in the back of my pickup or suburban, are quite rugged and durable, and use the 20 lb propane tanks or similar. I used to use coleman stoves but found that although they were much more portable, they lacked the size and heating characteristics that I desired for how I work. They will do the job in a pinch, but when portability isn't such an issue they are just not nearly as convenient or reliable.

There are other cast iron stoves out there, but my experience has been that the Camp Chef products are superior to anything else I've seen. I don't owe them nothing and don't expect nothing from them, so this here plug is legitimate. Costco's sold the 3 burner Camp Chef stoves previously for as low as $150, but I haven't seen them in their stores for a while now. Online they are almost double that, but still well worth the $$. There were more than a few nights when living in my cook's tent that I left one of the burners running on low all night long to supplement my poor little woodstove, without any problem and more than enough comfort.

I have a small space heater stove my dad gave me. It’s very old, it’s made by Kenmore and says it’s a bathroom heater (made for an outhouse???) I love it. I will have to do a search to find the history on it.


I like Propane heaters as they are very easy to use but you could also store a kerosene heater and fuel for emergency heat. I have seen them for $5.00 at garage sales.

www.Safetycentral.com is a great web site with lots of survival stuff to take your money. On the heating & cooking page they have the propane adaptors for larger 20 Lb tanks. Their prices are kinda high, but you can use them to look for anything you may want and then look for it at a better price.

As benjammin mentions, be real careful with this stuff indoors. It can kill.

Most of the stoves and heaters you're talking about are intended to use outdoors or in VERY well ventilated areas.

Whatever you do, do NOT bring a 20lb propane tank into any part of your house. That is extremely dangerous.

If necessary, you can run a hose from outside (where your tank is safely stored ).

If you must use propane indoors, the safest solution is to use the small 1 lb bottles. Those are okay to bring indoors.

If you're fortunate enough to have a natural gas fireplace, you can usually use that for heat even if the electricity is off. You won't get the fans blowing hot air into the room, but you'll get enough radiant heat to get by.

Also, FWIW, natural gas hot water heaters often work just fine without electricity.

Good luck!