100 pound propane bottles and gas range.
 

As we only have one gas appliance and it only has the four burners,I thought we could perhaps use the 100lb tanks sold at Lowes,etc instead of buying a permanent tank.
Is this possible?

The reason I am wondering is from reading a propane website it stated such tanks aren't supposed to be used for appliances in your home but for BBQ's and the like.

But then the Lowes website states:
100 lb. Propane Cylinder

I can't really see what the difference is...

Plus any other advice/helpful hints would be appreciated.

We had a propane gas range and used a 100lb tank in our cabin. I cook a LOT, and also cook for the community. (Think funerals and weddings), and it lasted us almost a year.
Was not a problem at all. We also used 100lb tanks for our gas fire. Where we lived, a large tank was out of the question. They would not rent us one as they could not refill it.

Thanks,I just can't see the need for a huge tank at this time when we only have the four burners on the top of the stove(oven is electric)...

I probably should add that the tank stayed on the outside of the cabin and DH used copper piping and a regulator to bring it in. The tanks should not be inside the house.

Doesn't sound like there is a need. My oven was gas too and so you can see how long it lasted! We did not have (and still don't) a microwave, so our gas stove was how we cooked breakfast, lunch and supper.

My house also has one of those 100 lb bottles. We do have a microwave, so our stove/oven doesn't get used heavily. We can go well over a year on that bottle.

We will be mounting the tanks outside under one of the sheds,so out of the elements to some degree.

Trying to get it all done before we go up there after Christmas as a surprise for Mrs oz,hopefully it will work out.

Thanks again.

We will have a regulator that came with the range inside and I believe there should also be a regulator at the bottle,is that right?

I'd like to do the same thing for a drier and stove, but I wonder if its too cold to use a small tank. We are in Central Ontario. Our BBQ propane tank won't work if its too cold or is that the regulator that won't work? Will a 100 pound tank really last for a stove a year in daily use?

Yes that is right. I am not the one who set it up, but DH did. It was near the bottle.

I hope you do manage to get it all sorted before xmas, what a wonderful surprise! Hope Mrs Oz does not come on HT in the meantime! :eek:

From my searches online,there are blankets for propane tanks,not sure how well such things would do in the frozen north however...LOL

Thanks.
Yeah I just thought of that....she is having major computer issues right now,has a bad case of the google redirect virus that seems to be taking over her laptop....

We never had a problem with ours being outside, in freezing conditions or covered with snow. Ours were not under shelter but were a little sheltered from the elements. I don't see a need for anything where you are going to be located.

Now that you have your answer, why not kindly ask CF to delete the thread for you?

If you need any further help, you are welcome to pm me, and I will get my husband to answer.

My dad used a 100 pound bottle (something like 25 gallons if I remember right) at our cabin for the first ten years or so.
It ran the stove and fridge on weekends only.
He could usually get about 6 months or so out of a tank. I'm really surprised there are those getting a year with regular use!


At our house, we're running a 125 gallon tank (fairly easy to find) for our stove and furnace. It lasts about a month to six weeks.

Well if you are using a tank for a furnace, then I imagine it would not last long. As for being really surprised about those getting a years use out of 1 tank, two of us on here have stated that fact and I for sure do not lie.

Mine did not run the fridge. That is probably the difference! :rolleyes:

So as the OP will only be using it for the stove top, he will easily get a years worth out of it. :D

Actually, if you'll look again, I was saying our cabin was running on a 100 pound (25 gal.) bottle, for two days a week. Stove and fridge.
(I just mentioned our current 125 gallon tank in relation to standard use for a comparison)

However, that said, I obviously said something horridly offensive to deserve such a snide reply.
My apologies.
Apparently I shouldn't have dared to be surprised. :shrug:

Y'all,it's Christmas remember....:D

Whatever.

This is Oz's thread and I am glad I was able to help him with facts.

May you have a wonderful Christmas. :D

We are a family of four adults. I'm a stay at home mother who cooks multiple meals daily on a four burner gas stove and our 100lb propane cylinders lasts at least 6 months. I don't have a working oven on that tank.

-scrt crk

I use a 100-lb tank to fire up my propane forge. Have it basically wide-open, say an average of an hour a day, and a full tank will last me several months.

The only difference between my forge (which will run 1,800 - 2,000 degrees) and a stove is the regulator. Most small appliances run a a very low pressure - less than three pounds. I have a specual regular for mine with goes up to 60 pounds.

The best place I have found for propane equipment supplies is www.tejasmokers.com. Free shipping on most items.

I can man-handle an empty 100 lb bottle but need a bit of help via a cart for a full one.

I called the local gas company and they pretty much suggested using the 100 pound cylinder too,said a 125 gallon tank with just four burners would last us probably three years...LOL

That's what WE'RE hoping for. ;)
We originally got our 125g with the intention of just running our stove, but the house we're currently in also has propane heat so our little tank got put into use that much sooner than intended.

Propane here is currently running about $1.89 per gallon. Considering they don't fill them up all the way, it's about $200 for a fill. I figure $200 every three years sounds good. lol
Besides, the tank cost us $20. :)


To be sure, though, a 100lb bottle will suit you just fine.

If we had threads deleted because the OP got the needed answer there would be a lot of often repeated questions. The archives are full of useful information.

I wonder if having an oven is why I got longer out of a tank? I did use it a lot to bake bread, make meatloaf, casseroles and shepherds pies etc, but maybe the oven is more economical? I would have thought it was the other way round! :shrug:

Our lasted 11 months and 14 days. I just checked my cabin log! LOL

If you were hooking something else to the propane, say a fridge, gas logs or something, then I would get a few more bottles.

We always had one spare as like I said we had 100lb cylinders (separate) for gas fire, and also for a gas dryer. :)

Wow! That was a good deal! Craigslist?

Neighbor. :)
We were originally planning on doing the 100lb bottles, but there are a lot of 125g tanks sitting around (they used to run pivots, or windmill tank heaters, or what-have-you) so we just asked around if anyone was interested in getting rid of one.
I'm glad that's what we ended up with, given the fact that we're currently running a furnace, also!

Thank you for your replies. I guess there's never one right answer! Sorry if I provoked any un-polite replies, I didn't know the posts here were owned or mean to cause trouble.

I just had a 150 gallon tank installed last month. There is a difference in locations when anything bigger is installed. 150 gallons and less can be located anywhere. Larger tanks have certain distances from buildings.
I used two 100 lb. bottles the last few years. Ther is a difference in prices of propane also. When I take in the 100 lb. tanks the price of propane is $1.00 a gallon more than when I get them to come out and fill the 150 gallon one.

When it gets too cold there isn't enough surface area on a bottle for the propane to vaperize from. If your BBQ propane tank doesn't work when it is cold I doubt that a 100 lb tank would either.

We were running a stove, water heater and refrigerator on dual 5 gallon tanks for several years. There was a "switchover" valve that would switch the tanks from the empty one to the full one automatically. We would use about a five gallon tank every ten days, but a lot of that was going to the old propane refrigerator. When we switched to an electric refrigerator, the tanks lasted about three weeks each. The water heater was originally a Paloma (on demand "tank-less" water heater) but we've since switched to a Bosch Aquastar tank-less water heater. We've also switched to two bigger propane tanks, I'm not sure exactly what size they are but they are about as big as one person can move empty and takes a dolly to move them when full.

If you were just running a four burner stovetop, it will last a really long time on a big tank like that. Just for insurance, you may want to have a smaller 5 gallon tank so when the big tank runs out, you'll be able to put on the little tank until filling up the big one again. Depends on how far you are from a propane filling station.

It would be $75.43 to fill the 100 pound cylinder,which is $3/gallon roughly.

Cold weather makes it harder to keep up the pressure. At 40 below(F) you can carry propane around in a pail.Even at 20 below theres just not enough heat exchange to get the system to work well. BUT you can always put a small propane tank in a warm place if ya need to.

Actually, drawing propane too fast out of a propane bottle will cause the side to front up due to the difference between the propane inside and air outside. I can fairly easily frost up a 20-lb tank, but have yet to do so on a 100 lb tank - unless it is quite empty. The extra propane absorbes the temperature difference and being drawn off for an applicance should make any difference.

No! Don't delete the thread!

I'm wondering about setting up a gas oven now... ;)

Actually, we could probably hook it up to the 250 tank outside, but it may be easier to just have the smaller tank strictly for the oven/cooktop. It's just so darned hot to run the wood stove in the Summer.

Butane freezes and turns to liquid @ 32F LP @-44F. 100 lb cylinder holds about 20 gallons depending on who filled it. LP has 91,800 BTU per gallon, the average range burner is 9,000 btu per hour, oven 22,000 BTUH. One top burner will run constantly 110 hours on one gallon of LP. You can figure useage from that. I would turn the pilots off and light it each time from a match or camper lighter.
Your LP tank can sit outside without any problems until the weather drops below -44F. I would make sure that it has a stable base to sit on and I would attach it to something solid even if it was with a nylon strap. It might be a good idea to have a tee fitting in there with two shut off valves so you could hook up a 20 lb bottle while someone ran the 100 lb tank to town.

It cost $3.53/gallon to fill my 100 pound tank when I take the tank to them and $2.53/gallon to fill my 150 gallon tank when I call them to come out.
I thought it would be cheaper if I took the tank to them but when I asked they said no.

that's what we use for our 4 burner stove. It is out side all year around. We use 1 a year ,but we can on a seperate burner system out side. So the canning uses a seperate supply of propane.
We also use a microwave and a toaster oven, and use our wood stove for cooking and heating water for tea during the winter.
I suppose the crock pot saves us some propane too.

Locate your tank outside on the downhill side of your structure, as propane is heavier than air and if there is a leak, it will flow downhill away from the house. If it is uphill it would flow into the house...not good.

Cheapest place here to fill a 100lb tank is 65 bucks.

Summer fillup rate was 1.59 gallon on my large tanks ( delivered )