Kat's 1153 Handi-Heat 200 Watt Magnetic Heater

For my old tractor, with no room in the water jacket for a freeze plug heater, this is an excellent solution. The magnet is powerful enough that you feel secure leaving it attached for a while unattended, and it transfers the heat to the oil and metal more effectively than a dipstick heater, which has very little surface area. The nice thing about attaching this device to the bottom of the part you want heated is that any heat that escapes flows up and around the part it's stuck to.

I've used this heater for the past year in Northern Wisconsin, where the weather can go to fifty below. Just put it on the oil pan and plug it in. It maintains sufficient warmth and oil viscosity to start the engine the next morning despite the cold.

I bought the smaller one and it's worked great. If I had one complaint it's that, while the unit functions in extreme weather, the electric cord insulation cracked due to constant use in sub-zero weather. I will replace that, since this unit is indispensable to someone living in a very cold area.

I have a specialized engine block heater in one of my cars and have used this unit on the others. It functioned as well as the engine block heater, despite it's small size.

I would highly recommend this unit. The magnet is plenty strong to attach firmly to a flat metal surface and the small size is actually an advantage when sliding it beneath the engine to attach it.

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Works well, would suggest a higher wattage for diesel engines though. The package insert (in fine writing) states "indoor use only," which is ridiculous since if my vehicle was indoors I wouldn't need a block heater.

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I have purched three of these heaters (two from Amazon, one from an auto parts store). Two of the three have melted the plastic case resulting in a very hazardous condition. Five Star Mfg. Co. was unresponsive. I strongly caution against this product for use on anything of significant value or in an area containing combustable materials.

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I looked at this and one of the "150 watt heating pad" units & wasn't sure which was best, so with both being ~$25 (where it's not like buying a car) I got one of each (figuring I may put one on a car and keep one for other uses). One of the places I wanted to be able to use them was on a small engine (like for a generator or snow-blower) and with those having an aluminum block (where the magnet won't stick) I got a steel plate ~1/8 thick I could bolt up to the engine base. I put this heater on the plate (without it on the engine yet) & plugged it in, after 1 minute the plate seemed totally cold still. I pulled the plate off and put my hand near the unit where it's base was warm, so put it back on. Apparently, the magnetic bars (that we assume holds the hot iron to the plate) stick out enough that it leaves a 1/16-1/8 gap between the base creating the heat and the attached plate. I'm not sure if that's intentional (giving the magnets full contact to be sure they hold it where placed), but the heat either needs to "jump" the air gap or all be funneled thru the little magnet bars to get where you want it to go. If we're talking about temps of 20 or less where you want to warm an engine, having the air gap around it doesn't seem great to me. After leaving it for 1/2 hour the plate did get up to ~130 degrees, but that was it (so this does have temp controls that cycle it on & off shown from the max temp and I checked the power draw). Seeing another review of "The plastic melted on multiple units" make me wonder how it'll hold up in the long run.

I then tried placing the "heating pad" unit on the same plate (after cleaning it as per instructions and putting a bead of silicone around the edge that needed to dry). With it plugged in, the plate is too hot to hold within 1 minute (~140 degrees) and gets up to ~200 within another minute even with the less power draw.

So my conclusion is if you want good/quick heat transfer, the heat pad unit seems better with full contact putting the heat directly on what you want to warm. If you want an easy to slap on unit (that can be removed), this one may be good. Either one needs bare metal for where it's placed, so I see no real difference there (they both say "Don't place on painted surfaces cuz it'll damage the paint, so strip off any paint if there is any where you want it".)

Note: If you're wondering "How do you warm a generator engine with power out (which is when you need it)?" I have a deep cycle battery & inverter that should work for 1/2 hour, then with the gen going I can recharge.

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