Mr. Heater MH18B Big Buddy? Propane Heater

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I wish I could tell you that I bought the Mr. Heater “Big Buddy” Propane heater to go hunting or fishing with, but I didn’t.

I was visiting Family in Oklahoma when this year’s Ice Storms hit. We thought we had everything we needed in case the Electric went out when someone mentioned “What are we going to do for heat if the electric goes out?” Duh…we didn’t think about heat!

To be honest, we weren’t all that worried. You know how forecasters lie!

Anyway, I saw it as an excuse to run down to Bass Pro and see if I could find sometime of portable propane heater…you know…just in case the power did go out.

Before I left, I visited Bass Pro’s website looking for heaters. I saw one that I was interested in right away because it had a small blower on it.

It was the Mr. Heater “Big Buddy” Propane Heater. I also noticed it was on sale for $129, regularly $149. It is now available for only $119.99 on Amazon.com.

So I get to Bass Pro and find the Mr. Heater heaters and grab one of the “Big Buddy” heaters and 4 -1lb cans of propane.

When I went to check out, the lady rang it up for $149. I said “Whoa, Bass Pro’s website has it on Sale for $129.” She called someone over and the lady said in fact, it was $129 but that they didn’t have it marked yet. She said next time, it’d be a good idea for me to print out any Online sales and bring them into the store with me.

Let that be a lesson to you, always print out and bring in Online sales if you’re heading to Bass Pro! LOL (i’m not sure why I have to do this, I mean all they have to do is communicate with Springfield…right?)

The Great Oklahoma Ice Storm of 2007

That was Saturday night.

Monday morning at 5 a.m. the power went out due to downed power lines and stayed off for a week!

Luckily, we had the Mr. Heater heater. We put a quilt over the hallway to block the heat from going down the bedrooms. We only heated the Living Room (which is a large open room) and the Kitchen. Needless to say, bathroom trips were few and far between and when you did go, you went quickly!

Well, the 1lb cans of propane won’t last long in the Mr. Heater “Big Buddy”.I think the paperwork says about 1 to 3 hours on High. I’m guessing more like 1 to 1 1/2!

On Low, the 1lb cans seem to last for several hours.

What I failed to do was buy the hose and adapter so I could use the big 20lb propane tanks. Luckily, I found an adapter hose and filter at a Hardware store and was able to use these instead of the 1lb cans (which all the stores were sold out of after the ice storm). Apparently the filter is very important, so if you get the Big Buddy heater and plan on using it with 20lb propane tanks, make sure you have the filter! I’d also recommend the A/C adapter for the fan blower.

Once we got the big tank hooked up to the Mr. Heater “Big Buddy”, things were much better. It warmed our area up to 70 degrees. In fact, at night we would turn it down on “Low” or it would get too warm.

Now that I’m back home, I’m still using the Mr. Heater “Big Buddy” heater. The room back here in my Office get’s a little chilly on cold mornings. I’ve set the “Big Buddy” heater near my desk and turn it on “Low” in the mornings until the Office warms up. It has worked great and will raise the temp by 10 degrees in the Office in a matter of minutes (probably around 10 minutes to be exact).

I love this heater! I can see getting a lot of use out of it in the future, especially if I start Duck hunting again. I can see this heater being great for Ice Fishing inside a hut or Deer hunting inside a blind. This thing puts out a lot of heat!

On a side note, I went back to Bass Pro a few days later and it didn’t have power. But they had the lobby open and you stood in line and told an associate what you needed and they’d go get it. I needed the hose adapter but they were out. However, I did see a big stack of Mr. Heater “Big Buddy” propane heaters and they were still marked at $149, even though they were still on sale for $119.99 on Amazon.ca

Click here to get up to 50% off the Mr. Heater “Big Buddy”!