MicroFurnace, the $500 Space Heater from 1986 (Teardown)
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- čas přidán 28. 08. 2021
- Pelko made these first edition ceramic PTC heaters in Canada before moving production to Taiwan. This is an early 3-blade model with 4 round pucks.
I have a second channel:
/ @markfurneaux2659 - Věda a technologie
The barber that used to cut my hair when I was a little kid had one of these first edition ones in his shop and I was fascinated by it.
My barber an old timer had a huge heat lamp style space heater looked like it was from the 70s.
Industrial build quality. What an interesting take on space heaters.
I use to sit of the floor with this every morning in the 80s before I went to school, I lived in a house that had no heaters just a woodstove and in the morning the stove wasn't lit yet, I would get up and run to this heater and sit on the floor with it and warm up and it worked very well, I have been looking for one for years at thrift stores and today I found this the same one I had and it works perfect 👍
As a kid, I remember seeing these for sale in the '80s in one of those "Futuristic Products" catalogs along with home "laser" displays (really just a halogen projector, color filter and wobbly mirror), and all-in-one breakfast cookers amongst other gadgets. Thought it was very cool at the time, and still think so even now. Thanks for the flash back 😄
I have one of these. I paid CAD$180 in 1989. I thought it was grossly overpriced at the time, but maybe not! Mine is Canadian-made, date on the bottom is 2/88, and it has a 5-blade fan. Model KLP-MF-100-12. Still use it regularly.
I remember the demo the salesman used. You put your hand in front of the running heater, and then he placed a tray of ice cubes behind the heater, and nearly instantly you feel the amount of heat coming out the front increase. I was impressed!
I have an original Microfurnace from 01/88, purchased for about $150. I have added a few new room heaters with remote controls to my home and was planning to sell to old Microfurnace but after viewing this video, I think I'll clean it up and keep it. Thanks for the step-by-step video.
Marketing: “more efficient!”
Physics: “I am the law. Stop lying!”
These were unique when they came out, no other 1500 watt heater was this small. Sold on TV infomercials IIRRC
14:55 Looks very much like TDK's logo. Apparently TDK makes ceramic PTC heaters today, although seemingly a very limited number of products and smaller form factor for things like thermal actuators and vaporizers. Those are made made by a company formed in 1999 as a joint venture between TDK and Siemens and was called EPCOS up until very recently. They make various ceramicelectronic components like capacitors and ferrites. But I wonder if there's a direct lineage, so to speak, other than the name, between the elements in that heater and modern day EPCOS/TDK.
Another thought is, I wonder how the current density is divided throughout the element considering it's only got metal contact along the edge.
TDK-logo indeed!
Definitely a good video to show how the thing is put together, it's worth taking it apart for the tutorial, thanks.
I have one of these. I bought it back in the 80s. I lived in Niagara Falls Ont. I am using it right now! I actually when to the guy's house to pick it up! Cool to see someone else enthusiastic about these.
I found the easiest way to clean it out the discs without taking the whole thing apart is used compressed air from the front side and just blow the discs out, then blow out the backside to clean around the fan and loosen up any other dust, then hit the front again.
When I was a kid I got one of these in the early 90's. It was marketed as a Disc Furnace by Pelonis. The PTC ceramic discs are made of barium titanate ceramic material coated with brass and silver. Most modern heaters use nichrome coils that glow red and eventually burn out. The ceramic discs are virtually indestructible and safer because they self regulate the current.
I have been using it for 30 years and it still works as well as it did on the first day but I did take it apart once to clean out the dust. It puts out quite a bit of heat for its size and unlike the competition it has a knob that can continuously vary the output. I checked ebay and people are paying $50+ one of these used and in moderate condition.
One other thing to consider is that not all heat sources are the same because they produce different frequencies of infrared. Far infrared or FIR is produced by ceramics and it has the longest and most penetrating wavelengths. You can search the internet and find many vendors selling FIR products because of their healing properties, especially with sore or damaged muscles.
I live in Texas and many of the houses here were not designed to withstand freezing temperatures for long. I have 4 heat pump units to heat my house and when they are all turned on they can use over 10KW of power. This morning I was continuously cold in my house in spite of the units running for hours because my kitchen could not get warm. I plugged in the Pelonis which uses 500-1500 watts and it warmed up whole side of my house before I turned it down. At $0.14/Kwh I am probably paying $10 to operate the heater for the afternoon and evening.
I have one - that my parents bought in 1986 - and I still use it to heat my YT studio. I remember them always commenting on how expensive it was to buy... but here it is still going strong 36 years later. Will the $40 space heater you buy today still be working in 2058???
I'll check back if CZcams is still around.
I have a Sunbeam that is probably made off the same patent. It's cylindrical in shape rather than square and has 5 ceramic pucks. Otherwise the internals are very similar. I've had it since the early 2000s but no idea on the date of manufacture. Model number MF2000... says it's 2000w. It came from a friend in New Zealand who was the distributor at the time. I had to change the plug and run it off a 220v circuit for my compressor. It will definitely take the edge off my work area in the shop.
Apparently these are still made under the sunbeam brand! Still PTC as well.
variable fan speed too?
model?
Looks very much like a Pelonis Disk Furnace or a very close copy of one , I wonder if the companys are interrelated ? The PTC heating system has huge safety benifits as it can not overheat , they self regulate , pass a high volume of air through the element and the air carrys off the heat , the element will draw more current and you have high heat output as long as you have high air flow , as soon as you reduce airflow the element reaches its set tempture and lowers its current draw , so you could block all the air going into the unit (which would make a normal heating element get super hot due to lack of airflow) heating elements of this desigen just lower there current draw and self regulate so they can't thermaly run away and melt the heater or themselves . my Pelonis disk furnace with a dial lets you set the exact room temp you desire ,, the heater slowly ramps the fan speed up as the roon cools , and ramps it back down when it reaches the desired leval , so it strikes a ballence with heat loss and never cycles like a normal thermostat controled electric heater. the only negitive is the very fine honycomb passages will plug with dust requring a blast of compresed air to keep them free flowing. let them get dirty and the heaters output goes way down even under those conditions the heater stil won't overheat.. The unit you have looks like it has no tip over cutoff switch if you tip a Pelonis Disk Furnace it shuts off .
That was great, I have the 2000w one mentioned in the comments, MF2000 that I got in 94 or so, it has K 91 on it which is probably a year code, another thing that it has is a rheostat temperature control, they were $249 back then, as they say expensive, as I was selling them at the time I heard that a lot but people bought them, in the literature that accompanied them it stated that they were developed from the ceramic technology from the space shuttle heating system which is nice to know, mine is on my desk right now barely alive as it idles away, but turn up the thermostat and it blasts me, what other 30 year old appliance is even close, as well it runs cheaply.
as someone who wears sandals all year long, I can agree with "people aren't thinking about buying furnaces when it's the middle of summer"
I found your video because I was searching for a replacement fan for one of these. We bought property and the well house had one in it, it was plugged in but I figured it was burned out because it didn’t seem hot and the fan didn’t work. Well, now it’s -20 and something started freezing in the pump house, and in the course of effing with it I discovered this little guy was in fact nicely warm, but not hot, despite the fan being frozen. Never have I seen another fan heater survive a frozen fan for more than a short time without something burning up, and this had clearly been sitting for months if not years, plugged in and heating away! So I figure it was worth trying to fix the fan. Glad I looked, I almost chucked it when I first found it.
Any ideas where to get a replacement for the fan? I’m going to try to resuscitate it, but I don’t know if I can. Mine is a ‘peloton micro furnace’ branded one made in Taiwan, the fan is an aluminum housing with five blades marked as a made-in-Japan model UP12D12-TY.
pretty intreresting to watch !
That looks like the TDK logo.
Edit: and by "that" I mean the logo printed on the heating elements. This must be the most vague comment I ever made.
Hi Mark
Cleaning out my fathers house I came across the microfurnace & it's still in it's original box.
Plugged it in to see if it still worked & was quite surprised @ the amount of heat generated by the ceramic pucks.
The one thing I don't like is the size of the electrical cord as it seems a bit undersized.
Will give it a cleaning & try it out this winter in my work shop.
Any info on operating cost from your experience would be welcome.
Nice job on the video glad I found it!
Ron
Question.... Is it possible that the springs on the screws are for expansion and contraction? I just took one the these apart and cleaned it up and I'm thinking maybe I should loosen them up a little.
What a coincidence. I found the exact same one in a thrift store as well. Not sure which one because I go to so many different ones but I think I only paid $5.99 for it. It looks mint and works great but the cord does get hot when run on high for a period of time.
I bought one of these new in 89 and it is unmatched in heat output and efficiency. Very nice with the ramping down and up with the fan speed based on demand needs. Thanks for the video. Wish that I still had it.
Damn, I'm kicking myself....
A 1500w heater with fully adjustable output has been kind of a white whale for me. I often check out electric heaters of all kinds and sizes in thrift stores, hoping to come across one that has truly variable output (instead of a thermostat, or high & low like most).
I've yet to find one, due to the fact that, as you said, regulating that amount of power would require beefy hardware, that never seems to be the route taken (although I would settle for something with like 4 or 5 output settings - just 2 isn't enough though!)
Anyway, I saw this exact same heater in a thrift store about a year ago. Heck, might have even been the same one, as I also live in Canada! (although I have no idea on your region, I'm on Vancouver Island). But when I tested it I mistook the potentiometer as simply controlling fan speed. I felt the heat dropping off, but figured the thermostat was kicking in and it was just taking while to cool down. As I remember it was horrendously dirty, so I didn't spend much time properly testing, otherwise I might have figured it out.
Shame, if I'd have realised what it was really up to, I definitely would have bought it and taken it home to clean up and keep!
Oh well, thanks for the interesting video, anyway!
I had that as a kid in the 80s
What about the control board ? Anything interesting there ?
Cool vid! Those bolts are carriage bolts...
I have a 1/88, KLP-MF-100-12. It has French and English labels and has a 5 blade fan. I hooked mine up to a Kill-A-Watt and on startup it surges to about 2100 Watts! On minimum speed it uses about 830W and on high speed it uses 1200W. Is this normal operation for the low setting or is my Kill-A-Watt or MF broken? Just curious since on the bottom it says 175W-1500W.
I'm in the Netherlands and have my parents Micro Furnace KLP.MF 200 6 TC in front of me, this one is "Made for Polka Electronics inc, Toronto, Cananda / Made in Taiwan. 01/87". Component and quality wise; will this one made in Taiwan be the same or of less quality? Also i wonder, compared to new space heaters, if the Micro Furnace uses a lot of electricity since it's old? Now that newer equipment has energy labels etc etc? (i won't be surprised this isn't the case at all). Superb quality thing and it works really well. I'm not taking it apart, but am going to 'clean it out' with pressured air (front > back > front as someone in the comments mention!) Cheers
Rotron fans still exists.
I was thrilled to see how this was constructed I have had mine since it was was first introduced in Australia in thE 80s It is made in Taiwan and I Have been using it without any issues
Can🎉 any one let me know where iI can get a replacement Filter thanks
Have had one since then as well, also in Oz. Mine had a rubber-coated temp sensor on the back which failed, had to cut off the rubber, resolder the broken joint and cover in glue-lined heatshrink. That was 30+ years ago and still going strong. I bought a pack of filters which were the exact size for the unit, they are used in soldering fume extractors, and work well, but if you can't find them, go to your local whitegoods place and get a sheet of aircon or vacuum cleaner filter and cut to size.
No lie I found this at goodwill a couple of weeks ago, never got it though. 15 dollars
I have one of these but it needs a filter - where can I buy one?
use a green Scotch-Brite Scrub Sponge
Thanks Mark, very interesting. I have one which has the same general layout but quite a few differences too. The control layout on the back is very similar; the build quality is excellent. It's branded Power Furnace - and these were marketed here in the UK mainly through 'gadget' type catalogues. On the base it has a label very similar to yours, headed 'The Heat Machine', and that it was made in Canada by Micromar Mfg Corp. The ratings are the same. There is a separate label with a 1988 date code. The fan is 5-bladed by Papst (German manufacturer) and the front plate appears to divide the PTC element into 6 segments like pieces of a round cake cut into 6; I haven't disassembled it to see if the PTC element itself has 6 segments or is a single unit. Like yours it doesn't blow a huge amount of air, in fact the cold setting of the switch is pretty useless but it does heat the room extremely effectively. If this is a different firm, Pelco must presumably have licensed their Patent to Micromar? Or are they the same firm?
For 1500w I wonder how maxed out that tiny little power cable is.
I wouldn't be banging it around or be rough with it.!!
Or you can use a thin spanned wrench
Mark. Different subject. See czcams.com/video/Gr7sZ4MPMu8/video.html "Democratizing time hands on with an atomic clock pcie card". Would be very interested to hear your take on this. Things not covered in that video were the detail of what protocols to use within a datacenter once such a card is on site.
Gives datacenter their own stratun 0 stratum 1, as I understand.
Thanks.
Wow adjustable wattage too, under 1500watt how do I get one!
tariffing how ez it can burn stuff
Society needs to rebalance imports-exports.
likewise on Quality vs Profit