Thanks santa, heated greenhouse help!

Merry Christmas All,

I have been really lucky this year, some solar rock lights to go up the lottie around the chickens to make life easier when its dark, a lovelly wooden growhouse to act as a cold frame, and also somewhere to bring on seedlings, and a parafinn greenhouse heater!

The heater really is something i have wanted for a while and i would love to grow some huge onions (more fore pleasure than show) which by tradition would require sowing tommorrow. I read the instuctions eagerly, left the wicks for an hour to soak up the fuel, lit it, half hour later its gone out and the wick that is sticking out is black and totally burnt looking. So i wound some more fresh wick out and lit it. Its still going but does anybody have one of these and how long does it take before the wick needs winding on usually? Im new to the whole heated greenhouse thing but i hope it will give me lots of early sowing options. Any advice appreciated!!

Totty

Yep that does make sense. the model is Parasene super warm 4, when i looked this morning it was still just about lit, so i wound it up slightly, when i just went out it was out. Like you say i guess you need to get it burning, without getting so fierce that it burns for an hour then burns out. Got no wick left at all now so need to find somewhere that sells it. Any ideas? aA case of keep trying i think.

Totty

have a go on this site for a new wick all the best for2011

http://www.greenhousewarehouse.com/products/heat-par-sprwrm4-superwarm-4-paraffin-greenhouse-heater.html

Yep that does make sense. the model is Parasene super warm 4, when i looked this morning it was still just about lit, so i wound it up slightly, when i just went out it was out. Like you say i guess you need to get it burning, without getting so fierce that it burns for an hour then burns out. Got no wick left at all now so need to find somewhere that sells it. Any ideas? aA case of keep trying i think.

Totty

If you have used a wick in a matter of days then you are definitely doing something wrong. A wick should last for several weeks if not a whole season or more. I recall only replacing my wick after the third year of use (but it was only used from Jan -Apr and only at night, unless very cold during the day)

If you are planning to use it in a plastic grow house be very careful as if it gets windy overnight there is a risk of everything going over and melting / burning the plastic plus whatever combustibles are nearby.