Gas Dryers: What's the savings vs. electric?

[kingscreen]

This is for all the gas dryer owners out there.  With another automatic on the horizon for us, we will be looking to upgrade our two electric dryers to a single gas.
My question is, how much did your electric bill drop when you switched from electric?  What is your average monthly gas bill?  Any advice or tips when shopping gas dryers?

[Sbrem]

It's been so long I can't recall, but it was considerable and well worth the effort, not to mention that convection gives you more options, especially with the WB and discharge...

Steve

[Gilligan]

Scott... why not get some math going on and see.

If you have an amp clamp meter you can see exactly what the draw is (they are cheap at harbor freight) or you can estimate off the amp listing on the panel of the dryer.  Then assuming you have some sort of way to know the duty cycle (does it have a mercury switch that you hear or a light that comes on when the panel is on or the PID... or maybe just call the manufacture and see if they know... OR, if you have that clamp meter you could see it go up and down as it comes on and off).  You time that duty cycle... count how long it goes on for and how long it goes off for while it's up to temp.  You can time how long it takes to get up to temp (it's 100% while that is going on).  With those times you can see how many amps it draws in an hour.

From all of that you can see exactly how much your dryer cost you a month given you know how often you turn your dryer on and how long it runs for on an average day/week/month.  These things my fluctuate a bit if you have a shop that goes through big temp swings through the year.  But technically you can figure that out as well.

Take a look at your electric bill, you should be able to see how much they charge per KW... for us their is also a fuel surcharge so I just take my bill and divide it by the KW used.  For us it's like 8 cents a KW, pretty cheap... so our dryer doesn't cost us all that much and gas is almost the same price.  This doesn't negate my desire for gas for all the other benefits it brings, but in our current situation we aren't going to be getting one soon any how.

[jvieira]

This is actually an interesting question. Electric is one of our biggest bills every month. We are paying 0.19€/kw, which is a lot (!). I hear people saving 2/3 when they switch to gas. For us, that would be a 400€ saving every month (almost 5000€/year). It would make a big difference.

[244]

This is for all the gas dryer owners out there.  With another automatic on the horizon for us, we will be looking to upgrade our two electric dryers to a single gas.
My question is, how much did your electric bill drop when you switched from electric?  What is your average monthly gas bill?  Any advice or tips when shopping gas dryers?

Depending on the size of the dryer our typical cost is roughly 1.25 per hr operating cost in most states where the same size electric dryer is usually 3-3.50 per hr. most gas bills for our gas dryers is $300-$350.00 per month. average consumption is about 160,000 btu per hr.

[alan802]

Our electricity bill went from averaging $1200/month to about $600, sometimes in the hot summer it gets up to $800 now but it's rare.  So we saved $600 on average for those of you who are mathematically challenged .

[blue moon]

our gas bill for last three months has been $105/month. We are running a 60" dryer with an 8' heat section (Interchange MD-8). Electric bill should be at a minimum double that and $300-$400 is still reasonable cost.

pierre

[Rockers]

I can speak only for my part of the world but we pay around $375/month on gas. If we would have an electric dryer that would be more then double for electricity.

[ZooCity]

Our payment on our 60", 16' chamber Sprint HO + gas bill is less than what it cost to run our 48" belt 10' chamber, all electric, American TexAir and our curing capacity with the Sprint is far beyond the electric.  The American did have abundant convection air, it wasn't just IR panels doing the work but also used electric elements to do what a gas dryer does with a burner.

I was hesitant to believe it but a gas dryer really is that one thing that shops of a certain size "can't afford not to buy" as they say.

[screenprintguy]

Major savings going from electric to gas. Not sure what size you are looking for but we are selling our heatwave gas dryer

[mk162]

I've calculated some rough numbers...using the metric systems its a f*ckload, and in standard it's a sh*t-ton.

Seriously it's worth it.  It's also a better cure.  Less scorched garments and rejects. I haven't taken out a scorch in 6 years, except for that poly shirt that was in there for 4 hours.

I would never go back to electric.  If I had to I'd go propane with a big tank before going back..it's not even an option for me.  Our bill is down anywhere from $4-600 a month, our gas bill is around $2-350 a month, but we also never had gas hooked up, so I don't know how much it would have changed.

[kingscreen]

Thanks everyone for the responses.  I know it'll be cheaper and better in the long run.  I'm just trying to build up the courage to write the check.
@screenprintguy, I'm definitely looking for something like Pierre mentioned.  60" belt, 8'+ heat, and likely an extended infeed.  I think that would be perfect for my set up.

[jvanick]

go longer chamber if you can, and if you have any plans to be doing waterbase and discharge work.

due to size restrictions, we went with a 10' chamber here... I would love for it to be 14'-16'...  as the dryer becomes a major bottleneck on the wb jobs due to retention time in the chamber.

the drone sections don't add a ton of cost...

[GraphicDisorder]

Last month $165.08  was our gas bill bill.  We run our Boomerang Gas dryer 8-12hrs a day 5 days a week at least. We also use gas for heat (not last month of course), and we also have a gas hot water heater.  So thats not all from the Boomerang.

Winter months look more like:$404.14  as a high side.

[Maxie]

I am about to buy a gas dryer, belt width 72", oven length 9ft oven and inlet and outlet of 4.50ft.
We print mainly plastisol and are going to run 2 carousels through the oven.