I learned the hard way.... I hope you don't

Be careful out there, we have lost enough HAMBers lately the way it is.

 

I had the same thing happen a few years back. I was using an old vented gas heater on propane. Went and got a CO detector before I fired the heater back up. Lit it and 5 min later the detector went off. I ended up taking out all the burners and cleaning all the soot out of them and knocking all the soot out of the heat exchanger. Make sure you are getting a nice BLUE flame when its burning! No yellow at all.

 

I worked at a dealership for years that had waste oil heaters. Had headaches for several winters before they finally had the heaters checked. Turns out the one in my work area was leaking carbon monoxide into the shop. Hopefully there will be no long term effects, time will tell. Glad to hear you are OK

 

I had an oil burner do that in my house every night my wife who was a smoker
would be up all night coughing I a non smoker couldn't understand why figured if it were fumes I would be affected put in a carbon monoxide alarm and found out the oil burner was coming apart

 

Glad your ok........ been there done that,,,,,,, I have a super tight 700 sq ft garage that I used to heat with vent less propane / nat gas....... done with that ..for sure... pay the price for electric,,,,,, no headache's no dizzy spells

 

I work for a gas utility co. and every winter we find people have been poisoning themselves because of a faulty appliance or not enough fresh air in the building.

Most gas companys or fire departments can do a free c/o test for you, just crank it up before they show up and keep the building sealed so the test works (don't rely on those shitty detectors alone).

I know paying a gas fitter to service, inspect and set-up your heaters seems like a waste of money, but at least take the air sprayer to the burners once a year. (most shop heaters I see are filthy!)

 

Growing old is a great thing

 

Another thing about smoke detectors. If yours are more than 8 to 10 years old, REPLACE them! The detector cell has a radioisotope of Americium. It decays over time, and usually in 8 to 10 years. It is then much less effective. Most fire departments including Mesa, AZ recommend you replace them. They are cheap, so if your's are old, replace them! Replace them with the hard wired type with battery backup and then replace the battery on a regular basis.

Yes, you can just throw them away in the trash.

 

Wow... Glad you are OK

 

The infra-red type are more efficient, i.e. more heat in the space per unit of gas burned. HOWEVER, they still must be vented to the outside! Follow the manufacturer's written instructions and the mechanical code.

STAY SAFE!!!

 

Scaaaaryyyy!!!

Glad to hear your OK, Rich.

Let us know what you find out after having the heater checked out.

looking forward to seeing you this spring.

 

I almost asphyxiated myself back in the late '70s when I was pastor of a little country church in north Georgia. There was an unvented gas heater in the church office that wouldn't have been a problem if the door had been opened, but I was working there on a weekday, the temp outside was in the upper teens or low 20's, and I was just trying to stay warm in the office without heating the whole building.

My fear is not that I will eventually leave this old world--that's a given. My fear is that I will leave under embarassing circumstances, doing something that I know better than to do, and for all eternity I'll have to hear, "That's ol' Wadsworth--he's the one who..."

 

I've heard once you are hit with CO poisoning your tolerance is lower the next time. In other words it would not take as much to poison you the next time.

 

My great grandfather Wolf almost was taken by carbon monoxide poisoning. Left the car running in an attached garage (he was 90+) . Only thing that saved him was his card buddies coming over for game night. Glad they did.

Good to hear your alright!

 

Seriously?? EVERY room? Sounds like overkill (no pun intended.)

Maybe one of your lawmakers had a relative in the detector business.

 

So glad you are okay! My dad lost a good friend to carbon monoxide poisoning. He made it out alive, his friend did not.

 

a cracked heat exchanger?
plugged vent?
bad damper?

dam not good, glad you found out before it got much worse.
Lost a family friend because his home furnace did the same thing..killed him and really messed up his wife for life.

 

i work for the gas company in my town you are realy luckey the best co to by is one that plugs in to the wall and tells you what percent of co that is in your shop also when you fair up your hot rod you need to open a shop door or have a good vent system

 

Being a retired furnace man I wonder how this happened. Was it not vented properly, or no vent. Sorry to hear your problem but some thing was not installed correctly. And don't call the gas company cause they will shut your gas off till the problem is fixed. Had a friend in Pgh, years back that was working on his T Bird and got done in, turns out he installed the heater him self and never hooked up a flue pipe. He left wife with no money, no insurance and bills up the Kuzu. And he had a good job and worked for an insurance company.
I saved several lives, because of poor or inoperative flue systems, so get it checked or installed right and work in safety an a warm shop with out worry. Iceman

 

Scary stuff, Rich. We're very glad you're okay.

-Dave

 

Thanks for bringing this up. We all sometimes take such things for granted. It's a good thing to be reminded the hazards of CO poisoning.

 

I am recently more cautious in the garage after last winter when I could'nt figure out why my lighter would'nt light and I started feeling crappy. I had no oxygen left in the shop. Was running a salamander and two 15 lb propane heaters.

 

Not every room, see below. But the State is trying to save us from ourselves, or from our personal negligence.... seat belts, motorcycle helmets, smoke detectors, CO detectors... Oh wait, no guns though, self defense against criminals isn't an option....


On November 4, 2005, Governor Romney signed “Nicole’s Law”, named after 7-year old Nicole Garofalo who died on January 28, 2005 when her Plymouth home was filled with deadly amounts of carbon monoxide on January 24. The furnace vents had been blocked by snow during a power outage.
Provisions of New Regulations for CO Detectors

For buildings with fossil-fuel burning equipment or enclosed parking areas, the new regulations require carbon monoxide detectors on every level of the home and within ten feet of each sleeping area and in habitable portions of basements and attics. ​

 

I think having good ventilation in a garage is essential. The attached pics show my setup. The first is a 20 x 20 hatch in the ceiling. The door stays closed until I turn on the vent fan. Second pic is up above the hatch. I paneled in the trusses, installed an old squirrel cage fan out of an oil furnace. The outlet blows through a wood bulkhead that separates the outlet from the inlet. Pic three shows a louvered opening in the soffit, the fan exhausts here.

This thing moves a huge amount of air. Turn it on and it pulls a very noticeable breeze in through a window or door. It cools the building in the summer and evacuates paint fumes, welding smoke, etc. in a couple minutes. I run it occasionally in the winter too. Blows the heat out as well, but it's worth changing the air in the place for all of the above reasons. If it starts to smell funky for any reason, open the hatch, open a window, flip the switch, and breathe easy.

 

i have been a furnace tech for 25 yrs and have see this many times, its going to be one of what u said is the issue, a co detector is a good idea, feeling tired and headaces are signs of co.. during the heating season, that people often pass off as being just tired or getting sick. have that heating unit ckd yearly....

 

This is true. I have a friend who suffered CO poisoning on the job twice, both times causing him to pass out. The second one basically ended his career there, he couldn't get near the fumes in the place without getting headaches. Screwed up his short term memory. Of course the company fucked him on a settlement and because of the size of the company there wasn't much that could be done about it. Was their fault for not maintaining the work vehicle he was assigned on the property.

 

Another gas guy here. We did a lot of CO calls. co detectors don't react immediately, they accumulate co over time, so by the time they go off you have a problem. Most co problems are caused by plugged heat exchangers, cracked heat exchangers or plugged flues. Any of the above cause the flame characteristics to change on the burners and usually burn with a carbon flame causing co. Headaches and sometimes nausea are symptoms of the co. In extreme co cases they have to use a parabolic chamber like they use for divers with the bends to get the co out of your system. You don't want to be there. You can also cause a problem with your furnace in a garage by running an exhaust fan in the garage as it can reverse the chimney in your furnace by causing a negative pressure in the garage and turning the chimney into an air intake causing the flames on the burners to burn improperly and creating co in the process. Like someone has already stated, using thinners and chemicals in the garage while your furnace is running can cause dangerous vapors as the chemicals cross the flames in the burners. If you are going to spray any thinner based paint in your garage, turn off the unit as an explosion is waiting to happen. Be safe out there guys, working on cars is supposed to be fun. Pat.

 

Absolutely right. I discovered that years ago with the same fan setup in a garage with an oil furnace. Fan was on, pumping heat outside, furnace came on, fan sucked combustion gases into the garage. Gotta make sure the thermostat is down so the heater can't come on, even with my current Modine gas unit heater with power vent.

 

Get those headaches checked out. I was getting major headaches ...like Octal migrains when high pressure santa annas come in the area. Later found out it was due to dry sinus condition. Saline nasal spray helps out. I still get the occasional bloody nose. Gives me more the reason to take the surf board to the beach.

AFA the odorless gas. They say you can't smell it. Most people can't. But its the lack of oxygen in the air that give the big clue.
I used alot of 1,1,1-Trichloroethane in the Navy cleaning electronic cards and components. It was also called methyl chloroform, trichlor, or TCA. They say it was odorless. It depleats the oxygen in the space just like Halon. I could smell a open can across the room.

 

Yeah I have done that a few times, might explain some things. Cut open a r-134a bottle about a week ago and for the first time I released some musterd gas. Yeah Good to remind people to be carefuel Ha. Get it care fuel.