Fire Sense Commercial Patio Heater, Unpainted Stainless Steel Review

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List Price: $329.99
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I previously had a propane patio heater with a pilot light. What a pain! This heater with a pilotless direct ignition is fantastic. It lights right away, then shut it off when you are done. No getting on a stepstool and peering into the heater to see if the damn pilot light is lit. Plus, they blow out, not to mention that the thermocouple does not last and then you might as well throw them away, since they are not easy to repair. With this unit, you turn it on when you want to use it and then shut it down. Much easier to use and worth the extra money. Unit is not too heavy, so easy to move around on the built in wheels. A bit disappointed that the "stainless" steel base is beginning to rust in only a few months, but I can probably get it off with a little steel wool. Assembly is about 45 minutes and instructions are good. I am buying a second one and would never go back to a model with a pilot light. Get a patio heater cover for it also. Exposing the burners and ignition system to the elements most likely shortens the life of a heater significantly.

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I'm very disappointed in the value proposition of this product. Upon arrival, one of the heat shield panels was dented, making it very difficult to assemble. The bolts supplied with the product are the cheapest bolts possible. I sheared a bolt in half while tightening it. The holes to assemble the parts together are poorly machined and don't always line up with each other.

Now after 1 month of being outside in a fairly cool northern California spring, the center post of my "stainless steel" heater has rust marks.

For the price of the heater, I'm not impressed with the quality of workmanship and I'm concerned of the overall durability of this product to stand up to the elements. If this was a $150 heater, I wouldn't be as upset. However, for $300, I would expect a much better product.

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Purchased this for enclosed patio / lanai in Florida. These patio heaters are very popular in Florida because there is a large part of the year when the evenings are just a bit too cold to sit outside. I did not want to spend $1200 on a real commercial model as it would only be used once a week at most. There is a unit on Amazon that goes for $179 and has decent reviews however some reported that it starts to rust rather quickly. I chose this higher priced model because it is made from the higher quality "304" stainless steel and should hold up better to the frequent rain and humidity in Florida. It took me 45min to assemble and was pretty straight forward, although the instructions are light on the details. The amount of hardware was much less than I expected and everything seemed to line up nicely. The heater fired right up and you CAN feel the heat 9ft away as advertised. I really like the pilotless lighting system. Time will tell how this hold up but I am expecting a few years of trouble free usage. I like that the company is here in Florida and specializes in patio accessories. Parts should be easy to come by as they make a lot of patio heaters (manufactured in China, serviced and distributed in Amelia Island, FL).

For $300, this heater meets my expectations.

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I was extremely disappointed in this product. It is absolutely not worth it! The parts are poorly made. It was almost impossible to put the heat shield together since the small nuts & bolts were not long enough to fit through 3 pieces of metal. I honestly had to wrestle the heat shield on the ground, and take it apart numerous times, since it all never lined up properly. When I finally did get the entire unit together, the ignition switch would not work, and the heater's main burner would not light up. After numerous attempts to make it work, I boxed it up and sent it back. To give you some sense of what a pain it was to put this heater together, the same day as I put the patio heater together, I also assembled a Weber Gas Grill. My father and I had more trouble putting the patio heater together than we did the finely crafted Weber Grill! Now with a new beautiful grill and no patio heater, I was going to order a patio heater from Restoration Hardware since I thought they would offer a higher quality product. What I discovered when looking at their specs, the heater they offered was actually the Fire Sense Deluxe Patio Heater offered on Amazon for $50 more then this originally ordered heater. Restoration Hardware offered the Deluxe heater for $449, but did include a cover with it. I opted to order the unit from Amazon at $304.00 and it arrived yesterday. I immediately noticed the quality of parts is much higher, and the heat shield went together without a glitch, also better designed as it has fewer pieces. Overall this new Deluxe heater went together smoothly, except for one MAJOR flaw in the directions! The Deluxe Heater stand is not weighted, and there is a plastic unit on the bottom that needs be filled with sand. You should fill the plastic tote as your first step before doing anything else. I put the entire heater together & then was going to fill the plastic bottle at the end, but with the weight of the sand, I could not re-attach it (I was working by myself this time). I ended up having to take the heater apart again, so I could wrangle the base and attach the sand filled weight. The directions do not say anything about filling the plastic tote! My Deluxe Heater starts right up & provides excellent heat range!! The moral of this story is, spend $50 more and get the Deluxe Patio Heater, forget about this shoddy unit!

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I like to run something for a while before I provide a review. We purchased this in Sept 2011, and used it extensively last winter. It was easy to put together, although I say I am mechanically inclined. We use it in an outdoor covered patio and in our barn. Pretty easy to move without the tank in it. Lights every time on the first try and burns very clean. I brought home monitors from work to check for CO (carbon monoxide) levels as I was using it in the barn, which is mostly contained, (but a fairly drafty). CO readings were always zero at all levels and distances from the unit. Also, I was surprised that very little heat radiates above the unit. It does a very nice job at 'pushing' the heat downward. I have a Mr Heater garage natural gas unit now on the side patio and it seems to shoot a sizeable amount of the heat upwards towards the ceiling rather than down on us. I don't recommend you run this patio heater this way, but it is good to know that the beams above on the patio roof wont get hot if one of our inebriated guests decides to move the unit while I'm in the house. We also liked this particular unit because it has a flat surface on the tank cover. The surface is large enough for multiple beverages and/or ash-tray (for us cigar smokers).

I would have given this 5 stars, but I was a little disappointed that some surface corrosion was apparent shortly after using it a few times. It seems to wipe right off, and I hit it with some metal polish and is slowed its return. Otherwise, I love this heater.