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The Coleman 5053A751 ProCat Portable Catalytic Propane Heater with Electronic Ignition provides consistent heat where no other sources are available without the danger of open flames. Whether you need a backup heater for power outages or want to heat a garage, shop, tent, boat, or ice shanty, this cordless heater for indoor use is ready to go wherever you might need some warmth. Constructed with 3,000 BTU output, the catalytic heater with platinum technology provides flameless heat from a pressure-regulated propane fuel system that produces a steady fuel stream, even in cold weather, at high altitudes, or when fuel is low. The starting mechanism is a fast-acting piezoelectric sparker that ignites the propane in the presence of atmospheric O2. Easy to operate, you simply screw a 16.4-ounce propane cylinder on the back, turn the knob to "on" for a few seconds, and hit the ignition switch. The portable heater moves the heat efficiently with a fan, powered by two D batteries (not included), for better circulation. The Coleman ProCat operates for up to eight hours on 16.4-ounce Coleman propane cylinder. Manufacturer Warranty
Limited lifetime warranty About Coleman
The Coleman Company has been creating and innovating products for recreational outdoor use since W.C. Coleman started selling gasoline-powered lanterns in 1900. Inventor of the hugely popular fold-up camp stove, Coleman developed a plastic liner for his galvanized steel coolers in 1957--the birth of the modern cooler--and the company has been improving their utility and design ever since. The array of products that bear the Coleman name now includes just about everything you might need to work or play outdoors, from tents and sleeping bags to boats, backpacks, and furniture.
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 Great tent heater |
| Review Date: October 28, 2006 |
| Reviewer: LarryS, Utah |
I do most of my camping up in the High Uinta mountains of Utah starting about the first of June. I camp at the snowline starting at about 6,000 feet and follow it up to the 10,000 foot level later in the summer so the nights are always cold usually in the high 20's to low 30's.
2 years ago I ran across this little heater and decided to give it a try to see if it would help keep me warmer. What a difference it made. I have a Coleman 8' X 8' dome tent that has the large screened sides that makes it difficult to seal and hold the heat in. I have to keep the rainfly collapsed at night to try to hold what heat I have in. Even so, I have found that if I run this heater for about an hour before I go to bed it will heat my tent to about 75-80 degrees. If I open my sleeping bag and point the heater at it with the fan going it will blow the hot air into the bag and make for a nice warm bed to climb into. They claim that you can run these all night with about a 4" opening to let the oxygen in but I usually shut it down when I go to bed. If during the night the temperatures drop to the uncomfortable point, it doesn't take much to reach over and fire it up again for a little while. When morning comes I fire it up again and when I get out of bed to get dressed it's nice and warm. Shucks, I don't have it this good at home.
The heater has a piezoelectric start which usually fires up right away. It puts out a fair sized fireball when it starts which can startle you if your are not ready for it. It takes about 3 minutes to warm up and really start radiating the heat but once it gets going it puts out quite a bit of heat. It is a flame less heat and although it will not catch anything on fire the heat is hot enough to melt synthetic items that get too close.
The only con I have with this unit is that you have to be very careful when you screw in the propane bottle, and that you don't cross thread it and ruin the threads on the heater.
It is supposed to run for about 8 hours on a tank of propane but I with the way I use it, it's hard to tell but I would say that's about right. A 16.4 oz tank will usually last me about 3 weekends of camping.
The fan is what sold me on this catalytic heater. It moves quite a bit of air and it will heat an area about 4 times faster than without it. In a tent environment that means it will circulate the air and the lower levels will be about as warm as the upper. The batteries have a pretty long life span and I usually change them out after 4 or 5 weekends just to make sure they don't go out on me in the middle of the night.
All in all these are great little heaters for small spaces or as an emergency heater. |
Coleman Heater
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| Review Date: November 10, 2006 |
| Reviewer: mary p, Phoenix, Arizona United States |
| This is a wonderful heater to own and operate. It is larger than it appears in the listing--about half the height and all the width of an airline carry-on bag. I bought one for myself and liked it so well my friends purchased one, also. We have taken it as high as 8000 feet elevation with no difficulty in performance. The lowest temperature in which it operated was 25 degrees. The unit is easy to operate. Simply screw in a 1 pound can of propane into the back, turn the knob to "on" for a few seconds and hit the ignition switch (being VERY careful to face the front of the furnace away from yourself or any other person). The heater lights instantly with a small burst of flame from the front grill. The flame immediately subsides and the heat is on. Camping becomes much more comfortable. The only drawback to this heater, and it is not even the heater's fault, is that 1 can of propane only lasts about 6 hours. So, obviously, a second can should be taken into the tent and/or camper to be changed at night. You could probably set an alarm but I personally just let the cold wake me up before I get up to change it. It's also best to start the heater up about an hour before you retire to allow time for the tent to warm up. My friends and I have no regrets in this purchase and we all highly recommend it. |
Excellent device - not really a "tent" heater
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| Review Date: December 11, 2007 |
| Reviewer: Former Rater, Nowhere |
I've owned one of these for more than five years. It is dependable, tough and a good value for the price.
This Catalytic heater is intended to keep you warm in your duck blind, not your tent. During operation the face of the heater is a hot metal screen that will melt Nylon/Rayon/Dacron tent/sail material upon contact - it's not likely to set the material on fire, but melting a big hole in your tent is decidedly a bad idea (and, the residue on the heater would be difficult to remove). The heater works well in unheated camper shells, houseboats, cabins, small watercraft, and as an emergency home backup if you have a power failure.
The prior reviews state "ball of fire" and "smell" - well, there is an ignition flash over the face of the catalytic material when you start the heater. You have to expect to have a little flash when starting one of these devices. The starting mechanism is a piezoelectric sparker and the spark generated by pushing the red plunger eventually ignites the propane in the presence of atmospheric O2. Once the thermal flash takes place the oxidation of the propane (burning) occurs within the catalyst (a grey, fibrous mat behind the screen) and, the only combustion products are H2O and CO2 - that's the beauty of a "catalytic" heater. Obviously, do not start one of these in an atmosphere that could ignite and, keep it away from your car, boat, atv gas tank!
Several reviews remark about the smell - and I am aware of two sources of "smell" that are given off by this device:
(1) When the device is new the metal screen and other parts that become hot "gas out" or "burn off" manufacturing residue. Oils, varnishes, lubricants - the very thin remnants of the processes of shaping, forming and assembling the device will aerosolize with the first 10-20 hours of use. If it is a concern (and, it should be if you aren't using the device in a "well ventilated" area (such as a duck blind)) then, set it up in your yard, drive or on a deck and run three or four whole bottles of propane through it at full temp WITHOUT using the fan. In a day or two you will have a perfectly broken-in heater with no smell from heater parts.
(2) The second smell that you may experience is the result of an odorant (a mercaptan) added to the colorless, odorless, tasteless Propane as a safety measure to allow a human to "smell" a Propane leak. The odorant smell is quite noticeable at the ignition stage (because not all of the Propane released is ignited when you start the heater - you may have waited longer than necessary before depressing the plunger or it is just the amount of Propane that escapes prior to normal ignition). The odorant is essentially consumed at the catalyst - but some bottles of Propane seem to have slightly different amounts of odorant and an odd, but minor smell from burned odorant can be detected. Pay attention to the brand of Propane that you buy and buy a case or two of the bottles that you perceive as having the least odor.
That said, I've used the device for well over a thousand hours with excellent results - including leaving it running in a home without power due to an ice storm - placing it in the basement kept pipes from freezing until power was restored.
One additional note about the fan feature - there is a (somewhat noisy) 3-volt fan in this heater. It does run on two "D" cell batteries - but there is a 1/8" phono-plug socket located next to the fan permitting the addition of an accessory power source. For a few bucks you can purchase a two-conductor phono-plug and a battery case at any electronics shop. Wire your power brick with eight or ten "D" cells in two parallel blocks to give 3 volts and you have a week's power for the fan (yes, you can use rechargeable batteries). Folks with a little electronics experience can buy a small 6-volt gel-cell and use a simple voltage divider circuit to drop the output to 3-volts (or, use a voltage regulator and zener diode to drop the voltage and prolong the life of the gel-cell's charge - a divider does draw current the regulator is a more efficient circuit).
OR, you could just use it without the fan..... |
Good Heater...
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| Review Date: May 13, 2007 |
| Reviewer: Brett Williams, North Carolina |
| This heater was a little bigger in person than I thought it was going to be, but is still fine for my needs. Not recommended for a hiking trip... I used this in an 18' X 10' 9 person tent in 30-40 degree weather and was pleased with it's performance. It will run several hours on one 16oz propane tank. The battery powered fan seems to require batteries more often than the propane tank needs to be replaced, but the heater still operates even without batteries. This heater creates an unpleasant odor that bothered my wife a little bit, but did not bother me at all. I'd much rather be warm and put up with a little smell than be freezing and miserable in my tent! I'd say that this heater was able to keep the inside of my 180 sq ft tent about 25 degrees warmer than it would have been without it. I figure it would be much more efficient in a smaller tent. A must have for tent camping in cold weather!!! |
Coleman ProCat
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| Review Date: June 14, 2009 |
| Reviewer: CO Camper, Denver, Colorado |
We recently purchased a large tent (15x12) and needed a propane heater that could stand up to the task of keeping the inside of the tent comfortable on cold nights. We purchased two of the Coleman ProCats for this purpose and they worked absolutely beautifully! I was skeptical at first, preferring to keep warm with multiple sleeping layers, but gave in when my partner insisted. Now that we've used them, we won't camp again without having them with us. The battery operated fan made all the difference in the world when it came to dispersing the heat throughout the entire tent, even though the roof was completely mesh (with the fly elevated about 6" above it). Our heaters ran constantly on high for over 8 hours without giving up. Two hours before turning in for the night, my partner turned them on. By the time we went to bed around 11:00, temperatures outside were in the 30s, while inside the tent, it was comfortable enough to wear t-shirts. By morning, it was a little cooler, but still warm enough to not see your breath - an oddity in the Colorado mountains at 5:00 in the morning, for sure!
As is common sense, ALWAYS light the heaters outdoors or, at the very least, well away from the sides of tents or other flammable material, as they do emit a flame when first ignited.
Simply the best! We love you, Coleman! I've posted a photo from inside our tent. |
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US $25.00
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