Garage conversion - Heating

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Hi folks,

I am converting my detached garage in to a living space with insulation (walls, floor and ceiling). Primary use is for my office and a gym. Dilemma with the heating, wife says simple electric convection heaters as we will not be spending lot of time in this space. I was hoping to extend pipe from kitchen radiator to the garage (6 foot under the ground) and install 2 radiators in the garage. Estimated cost is around £350.

Workman doing the conversion is suggesting a wood log burner. While this sounds good, neighbours window & conservatory is only few feet away from the garage and I am worried if they may take issue with smoke out the chimney and bothering them if windows/conservatory doors is opened.

1. Would smoke from a log burner cause issues, if neighbours building is close enough? I have not noticed one long enough to see how much smoke they let out?
2. Since the garage is insulated, would an electric heater be enough (although central heating may save money over few years)

Any suggestions and advice is hugely appreciated.

Thanks in advance
 
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Woodburners are lovely but;
If you're paying for wood they're not cheap to run
You'll need a high flue to reduce nuisance to neighbours, even with a stack emitting at 6 metres they'll still get the benefit
Proposed use (office)- you're meant to be working not foraging for timber, cleaning the grate out. Gym you want the place warm when you start but cooling off quite quickly as you get a sweat on.
Extending the central heating- technically doable but there are some traps. You'd need it plumbed (and controlled) to be a separate zone- so if the house is empty & you're working in the office you aren't burning energy heating the house all day. A modern condensing boiler may run fairly efficiently driving only 2 rads but it may just cycle like fun. You'll also need some serious insulation on the pipes.
Have you done heatloss calcs on the space yet? Electric convectors will almost certainly be adequate provided you've got a decent power supply in there (not a spur off the kitchen ring final). And you can lose the running costs off your tax bill (just gloss over the gym bit)
 
Thanks very much, all valid points and noted. I did consider that it will have to be a separate zone if it comes of the existing central heating system.

Will look at the heat loss calculator. Not quite sure if I understood the last bit about tax bill though..
 
HMRC will allow costs of a home office as a legit business expense (for us self-employed anyway). Think in the new reality of WFH there may have to be some allowances for PAYE to reclaim..
 
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A log burner will be a whole lot more than £350. Looking at more like £1500 to get it done properly.

Look at split unit air source heat pumps. Will provide heating and air conditioning
 

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