Life Hack: Heat Your Tent or Small Apartment

"BACK STORY"

I live in a 1 bedroom apartment, and was hit with a $250 Electric Bill. I know what your thinking "how the hell?"

I was blown away, and was thinking of ways to cut costs, and found that it was my heater that was the culprit.

Step 1: Sometimes Your Heater Will Break, or Not Want to Turn Off:

When I lived in Ohio back east, my family and I hovered around a kerosene heater in the living room. to stay warm.

And slept in our coats and clothes in the living room at night, until the heater was replaced.

Step 2: Solution for My Apartment, Saved Us 50% of Our Electric Bill

Solution:

I pulled out our trusty food dehydrator from the pantry,

and made some beef jerky while I waited to see how long it would take to heat our living room. lol

Results:

It took 2 hours to go from 60*F to 72*F in our living room and stable out.

I did this everyday from 2 pm to 10 pm before bed

Step 3: My Wife Is Pleased, and So Is My Wallet

We currently run it empty, since I dehydrated most of our canned fruit, and Pasta Sauces dry.

With the extra money we saved last month, i took my wife out to dinner, and am neck deep in Jerky :)

By, Robby Oddo

Comments

[Norfolkson]

Interesting and surprising solution, although for me I wouldn't call 60 deg, cold, but I would call 72 deg stifling hot! Here in BC we sit around in our underwear at 60 deg in the winter.

[Mecher]

What a great idea! Hope you win! By the way - try to sell the excess food to people you know. Win, Win!

[JoannB12]

I started doing that at least ten years ago. My parents have a summer house that they don't leave till the cold drives them out. I noticed that my fruit leather production generated a lot of heat, so I put the dehydrator in the tv room and closed the door...result: two toasty octogenarians.

[robbyjessica84]

It is continuing to save us money, and putting food in our pantry.

[JoannB12]

That's nice.

[DiamondsS]

That sounds like a social, physical,healthy ingenious idea!

Don't you still have to pay to use the electricity to use the dehydrator?

Does it create moisture and if so do you use desiccate placed safely in your home? I know moisture accumulation from breathing causes cool air and mold, this is why I ask.

Thanks for the wonderful multi functional activity that serves on so many levels.

[robbyjessica84]

By use of a dehydrator, it wicks away moisture, and dries out your product by way of warm air. Moisture is not an issue. A food dehydrator runs normally with little electricity. Food dehydrators run between 200-1,000+ Watts. The lower end are for fruits and vegetables. The higher end of the spectrum is for drying meat into jerky.

[discostu956]

You would hate to know our power bill in winter here during last winter! We are currently searching for cheap heating options for next winter. It's not particularly cold in our area, but in our location we get absolutely zero sun so there is no natural heating

[robbyjessica84]

I bought our Food Dehydrator on the cheap at Walmart. Since trying this, its a more affordable option than leaving the oven door open, which was our first idea. It worked as a kid. But I remember when my wife would complain during the summer, me using the dehydrator would make the apartment to hot. So that's how I came up with the idea. She don't complain any more lol.