CampinGazz

i understand i wont be able to fully charge the batteries much faster with a larger charger, but what would be handy is for me to be able to run the genny as little as possible to get a bulk charge into them, and then let the solar panels do the absorbtion stage. but it may be cheaper for me to get a new engine for my 12 volt charger i built a few years ago... lecky start lawnmower type engine, driving a 70 amp car alternator, exhausting thru a diesel cars exhaust box, air intake thru a cars baffled air box, and kingspan insulation for sound reduction on the walls of the genny housing, wasnt as quiet as a honda eu, but not as loud as the built in gennies the american RV's have. now if i could get a waercooled engine for a decent price, then i could have it heat the calorifier up whilst charging the batts too,

on me motorhome i'm afraid, tried to get into boating but couldent afford to do it, so sticking with me motorhome for now, but this place knows a lot more about charging that motorhome sites..... at the moment i have a 460 AH battery bank, soon to be changed to a 540AH when i sell me motorbike and am able to afford 2 of the big elecsol 270Ah jobbies, i have 370 watts of solar, and that keeps me batteries topped up pretty well in summer, i have a shoreline 12 volt compressor fridge freezer which pulls a lot of power, so in winter i need to use supplemental charging. the house batteries have a dedicated 2nd alternator on the engine that charges just them, one day i will fit some sort of external alternator controller, but i dont really drive long enough to make that viable at the moment. the biggest problem is i only have a tiddely 20 amp charger, granted it's a sterling 3 stage jobbie, but it's far too small for my battery bank size, i also have a small 850 watt generator onboard, and want to be able to run that to recharge the batteries in as short a time as possible. so i guess i'm looking for a 60 or 80 amp charger?? what kinds of prices should i be hoping to pay for one of them, dosent have to be a sterling, but needs to be a proper charger 3 stage charger, not a toy one for jump starting car batteries with. i really need to find out how many watts a 60 or 80 amp charger pulls from the mains, so i can size it to run off the genny,

this'll be OT for most, i have a 50 litre red diesel tank on my motorhome that feeds the eberspacher, i used to live somewhere that had a petrol station in town selling red at the pump, was about 60ppl, but that's now 45 miles away from me, and i dont plan to go that direction on a trip, and to do a journey just for that and back home would use 4 gallons of fuel for the engine, so would be cheaper for me to fill the eberspachers tank with white or parafin. anyone know of a place in or around nottingham (i'm at the north east end of notts, ilkeston way) that sells red diesel/gasoil from a forecourt pump, or a marina that i could get a motorhome to the pump, or even a heating oil supplier where i could buy just 50 litres of it from? i know of a petrol station in mansfield that sells parafin, but they charge 85ppl for it, and that seems expensive to me, i know if i was able to buy 1000 litres of 28 sec heating oil it'd be nearer 35ppl, but short of finding a friendly person living around notts who has a heating oil tank in their garden to sell me some, i think red diesel is my cheapest option.

now to contradict myself totaly, an alternative to physical books... e-books, if yer eyesight is still fairly good, you can pick up a palm or windowz based pocket pc for nex to nowt on fleabay, loads of free e-book reader software packages, tho most ppc's come with one built in anyways, then you can download a few books when ever you get access to a net cafe/wifi spot or use a mobile net connection, dunno if you can order e-books on disc or not if you dont have t'internet, of course it's one more gadget you need to keep charged, but for purely e-book reading, an old mono screen palm pilot would be fine, lasts ages on batteries, where as my pocket pc with a full colour screen lasts about 2 hours on a battery, it is a 2002 model tho, and that's ancient in the technology world, but a library of e-books would take up aCD or 2, much easier to lug around if you dont have the space.

Not boaty related, but dont see why it can't be, when we used to take our motorhome abroad, almost every time we pulled into a campsite/motorhome rest area, there'd be an english motorhome with a box of books outside the van, you went over, had a look through them, any you liked you either paid something like a pound to take it away outright or 50p if you swapped another book, these were bog standard paperbacks, any hardbacks/special interest (no, not that kind of special interest, and they are usually magazines anyway) would be a little more. the little fee for swapping a book was fine, as the person had to lug them about with them, taking up space and reducing fuel consumption a little etc. dvd's were just begining to be swapped the same way, on some sites there'd be 5 or 6 english motorhomes doing the book swap thing, apparantly some who travel to the south of spain take hundereds of books with them, one even took a trailer full of them, and the swap fee kept them in plonk whilst they were out there. something like that could so easily be done on the canal side? ok when abroad it was english people with english books, a comodity that was hard to find out there, but even so, in england a canal boaters book swap thing could be a very handy thing, some people abroad did the book thing on trust, i.e. leave em out in box with a lid and bag over them, and a little can to put the dosh in, maybe that wouldent work so well in england, thinking youb setting light to them, or throwing them in the water, as we all know that type wouldent want a book for it's intended purpous

i run a 1500 watt hoover (built into my motorhome, just a cheapo bagless pull along hoover off ebay, put the main unit in an under floor locker, connected some 44mm pipe to the suction hole, to a tee, then to the inside of the van to proper domestic centeral vacuum sockets, 3 meter centeral vacuum hose and a turbo brush on the end of the wand, works bloomin brilliantly... till the filter gets clogged with mutt hairs) anyhoo, ran that off a 1600 watt soft start quasi sine wave inverter no probs for a year, now run it off a 1500 watt pure sine wave inverter (changed inverters only to enable me to run the washing machine) even tho the hoover is right on the limit of the inverters output, it handles it fine, never measured the start up surge, but not had the inverter protest (the pure sine wave inverters don't have as much of a surge rating as the quasi sine wave jobbies do) My gf uses a small travel hairdryer, not the really tiny ones you get from caravan shops along with a travel iron, that's the size of a fag packet, but it's rated at 1200 and 600 watts (2 speed) and apparantly the folding travel ones are rated even lower, sold in caravan shops for use on camp sites abroad where you can get as low as a 2 amp power supply. i always remember years ago there was some bloke who'd invernted a cordless hairdryer, but have never seen it come to market. it worked like those cordless hair straighteners you can get (quite sad i know this much about hair styling stuff when my haircut is a tuppeny all off anyhoo, those hairstraightenrs use a gas cartridge and hence heated by gas, the hairdryer used the same gas cartridge (obviousely so they can be overpriced as sold by braun i think) that took care of the heat production, and a small DC fan ran off a rechargeable battery took cair of the blowey side of the dryer. bloomin ideal i'd have thunk, especialy for the more back to earth campers who use tents and all that, but also those who like/need to conserve power. I also remember many many years ago seeing a catalouge for accesories available for eberspacher night heaters, the origional D1L's fitted to trucks, (the ones with 3 or 4 external boxed with the electronics in them, and took 20 or so amps for the glow plug to start up) one of the accessories was a hairdryer... a 6 foot length of hose with a right angle difusser nozzle on the end, the open end plugged into the round heat outlet socket on the heaters output piping, just turn the heater on, warm the cab up, then do your hair... it was discontinued not long after it's launch, guess there werent that many women truckers back then. but when i had blown air heating in my van i did toy with the idea of making a hairdryer pipe up, now got wet centeral heating, but could still do it if i added a small heater matrix and fan fixed in the bathroom, and a socket for the hairdryer wand to plug into... or mount/duct it to blow above head height like a fixed hairdryer?

Don't worry people, we've decided not to bother with narrowboating, part of the reason is we don't really want to be judged by everyone wherever we go, as it seems we will be by the replies on here, but also my physical condition is getting worse, and i really dont think i can handle the physical side of boating, and it wouldent be fair on my other half to have to do the locks, tieing up etc all the time, she dosent have a physical disability, but has other problems that make her unemployable if that's the right way to word it. we wanted to do the cruising thing as opposed to mooring permanantly as it seemed a waste to have a boat moored up all the time, but we also like to move about, if i lived in say america, and didnt have my physical problems, i'd prolly live the life of a vagrant, travel from town to town, sleep where ever i could find shelter, that's frowned upon too i guess, i wanted to do the same just a little more upmarket we're looking into a static caravan/park home now, tho it seems that's frought with problems, can't get a park home fore the ammount of cash we'd have available, can't rent one as we have a dog and 2 fancy rats, and living on a holiday site in a static caravan is like living on a boat on a non residential mooring, only the government are clamping down on that, site owner can loose his licence if caught, plus absolutely no protection if ownerr sells up or changes his mind. park homes seem only to let you rent a pitch if you buy a new home from them, or an existing home for 100 grand or so, dont know of any residential sites that will allow people to site their own static caravan on it and live in it (as for the cash we'd have we could get a new or very nearly new static) i am seirousely looking into what jobs i can do, i've had the capability tests, recentest was a year and a half ago, but they never come up with owt i could do, i can use a computer, but i cant sit at it for long, have to keep taking breaks, and a lot of the time use it lying down, so if i could find an office that will let me work from a bed but realy, i want to find a job that can be done from anywhere, using a computer, but one that isnt mision critical, i.e. if i can't do any work for a few days, i don't get the sack for jepordising the company,

The cold cathodes i have in my motorhome are the type that computer geeks use when they modify their pooter case, they are basicaly a 4, 6 or 12 inch length of very thin glass tube, enclosed in a plastic outer tube, 2 wires from them which plug into a small inverter (usually a swan vesta sized plastic box, 12 volts DC in, 600 volts at 5 milliamps out to the tubes) they are not compleat lights, just the tubes, but i have used 5 of them as is, i routed a shallow cut out for them under the eye level cupboards in the van, and fixed them there, i also gutted a couple of normal fluorescent fittings and put the cold cathodes inside, the best one i did was the outside over door light, this had a 13 watt tube in it, but gave out a pretty dismal ammount of light, i put 2 x 12 inch cold cathodes in there (overlapping in the middle) and whilst they do take a few seconds to come upto full brightness, especialy on a cold day, once warmed up they throw out a lot of light, i can light my entire living area in my van from 2 cold cathodes... note this is a motorhome, so the living area is about 4 meters by 2 meters wide by 2 high, i also have 2 cold cathodes in the shower cubicle, i put a semi opaque piece of plastic up for the roof of the shower cubicle, and between the plastic bit and the real celing sit the 2 cold cathodes (with a big full fan vent on the middle, pulls the door open on the shower if put on suck and turned upto full, handy in summer to dry you off tho when but on blow) the 2 cold cathodes light the shower cubicle up better than daylight. and as i said, running 2 tubes off a single inverter (made to run 2 tubes) they pull about hald an amp, less than a single 8 watt standard fluoro tube, and a lot more light output, downsides are they are slow to get to full brightness, only takes about a minute on a very cold day, but not ideal if you need instiant light... tho a few led lights could solve that, and they give out a very white light, almost clinical, BUT you can dim them, just lower the voltage going into the inverter, and the tube dims, can go down to around 6 volts and still get a useable light out of them, I got mine from eBuyer.com, the ones i got origionaly were made by 'sunbeam' and they were regarded as the best, but ebuyer dont do sunbeam cold cathodes anymore it seems, and the replacement ones they do arent quite as good, but at about 3 quid for a twin 12 inch cold cathode set, i aint complaining, just make sure you order the white ones, as they come in about 8 different colours, they can be pulsed/flashed, so you could make up a disco boat with a few coloured ones and a sound to light controller... if you were sad enough that is

Cheers for the replies folks, i am used to people having a go at me when i mention i get incapacity benefit, as most people think that only applies if your in a wheelchair, or look half dead (which apparantly i do in the mornings i am thinking hard now if a narrow boat would be any good for us at all, i do know that having to stand at the back to drive it would not be possible for me for very long, i'd tackle that like i do driving, only doing so when i know i am puto it, and stopping as soon as it begins to get too much for me, But the climbing in and out of the boat is something i never thought too much about, actually the climbing out shouldent be a problem, it's the climbing back in that will, as i'm more affected by steps going down than up due to the way the manouvers compress my back joints. Plus i am worried about the winter thing, as long as i can keep warm i'm relatively ok, but as mentioned, a long walk to the shops aint gonna be fair on my GF, as she'd be the one doing it in winter, we'd have to find a supermarket we can moor up close to for provisions, So maybe a boat isnt really ideal for me after all, it's a dream of mine, but maybe not as practical as i origionaly thought,

I guess all i need to do now is say i'm an assylum seeker to really please you? i'm not by the way, born and lived in england all my life, and when i was working i contributed to those less well off than me like everyone else, only now i'm the less well off one due to some messed up joints in my back, some i was born with some dammaged whilst working, and a couple of other problems people don't want to hear about on here (especialy if your eating whilst reading) Can't help the situation i'm in with my health, i didn't choose it and deffinately wouldent do so if i had the choice, don't think i hate anyone engough to wish it on them either, so i have a choice, sit in a grotty little flat twideling my thumbs till i die, or try see something of the world whilst i am still fairly mobile, the problems with my back joints are degenaretive, so forgive me if i'm trying to do something 'exiting' whilst i still can, if/when i'm forced into a fixed home, unable to travel about then i know that'll be the end of me, i know i should be put down to save the state the expense, but apparantly that's not allowed as i was born a human and not a dog,

Cheers for the fast replies pirate, been reading some of your posts about the HA subject over the past year, noticed you said you were a traveler, tell me where to go if u like, but i was wondering how travelers go about getting any benefits they can get? i.e. not having a permenant addy, being in different areas all the time and so on, we had thought about living in the motorhome full time, but were put off by the difficulty we'd have doing so in our current situation regarding benefits, i'm not fussed about being classed as a traveler, if anyone dosent like it it's their tuff shit, i dont want to live their life for them, so why should they try to live mine for me, just seems it may be slightly easier to travel about on the canals, as it's more accepted to the tw@ts that make the rules to how individuals can live their lives in this country, also a canal boat seems more homely due to the ammount of rubbish you can take with you, limited by weight in the motorhome to how much we can take with us, and aquire as we go along, already uprated the chassis by a ton, and we're near the limit again, but on a boat she just sits a bit lower in the water... to fix, take some balast out i guess, but when i tried to get rid of excess ballast in the motorhome's passenger seat, she complained for a solid week edit to add: gonna find out if we can handle the cruising thing with our medical problems in a few weeks, but i am hoping that the slower pace of life on the canals will mean a better quality of life for us, stress plays a big part in my girlfriends problems, not just psycological, she has ibs too, which makes her more stressed out when it flares up, which aggrivates the condition, which makes her more stressed out and so on. it's the lock gates that worry me the most, they don't seem too hard to operate, the gates them selves that is, there's solutions for the paddles involving a battery drill and a few bits of steel, maybe a solution for stiff gates is a modified caravan power mover, the type that consist of a pair of wheels on a dolly that you'd pull the caravan around via the tow hook with. swing bridges likewise, we'll have to see when we try them i guess, now if we lived in france with the automatic powered locks we'd have no worries,

Don't want HA so not a problem, way i see it, i still have to pay the lience myself whether the boat sits all year on a mooring or cruises every week around the system, so i'm not loosing anything out of my pocket by not being on a mooring.. well diesel for the engine, we dont get DLA tho, but if people on it can CC, then it gives us hope we can on the benefits we do get, Tho i am now thinking about what i said earlier, wonder if HA can be claimed for a winter mooring, or if you were forced to stay on a visitors mooring for a few months due to stoppages?

don't have a boat.. yet, but have a motorhome, we have 12 volts and a 1500 watt pure sine wave inverter, but 95% of things in the van run on 12 volts, tv, dvd player, sattelite, water pump, phone charger (makro do a universal 12 volt phone charger, changeable ends for 4 different phone types included and more available), laptop we run via a 12 volt power supply, tho my first laptop would run directly on 12 volts with the internal battery removed, just needs the higher voltage to re-charge the internal battery, all the lights are of course 12 volts, which we have those 8 watt flourescents, a load of 12 inch cold cathode tubes (pull half what an 8 watt flourescent pulls and gives a brighter light) and a couple of those 16 watt 2D tubes. Fridge is 12 volts, (was a 3 way gas one, but got fed up of it not working in the heat, 12 volt fridge works fine in spain, but pulls a lot of power from the batteries doing so, I have a cordless drill that i converted to 12 volt corded, it was a 12 volt battery drill, when the battery pack died, i pulled the batteries out, put a socket in the bottom of the now empty battery pack, and a curly power cord to connect it to a 12 volt outlet, but you an get adaptors to charge the drill batteries from a radio controlled car battery charger. The eberspacher D5W heater is 12 volts of course, The only things that we run on the invertor are: the centeral vacuum cleaner, which has a 1500 watt motor, the microwave, which pulls 900 watts input power, and the washing machine (candy 3.5 kilo load jobbie) Yes i do run the washer off the 1500 watt invertor, could power it from a 350 watt invertor (has to be pure sine wave tho) as we dont use the washers electric heater (one of the reasons i chose the candy over the zanusi mini washer, the candy has a teperatur dial, set it to tap water temp, and the internal heater is turned off, i feed the washer warm water from the onboard hot and cold water supply via a thermostatic mixer valve, we make the hot water (20 litre twin coil callorifier) so why not use it in the washer, if the washer took a hot feed as well as cold there's be no probs, but as it's cold feed only we had to use the mixer valve. But what i'm saying is that you can run most items off 12/24 volts nowadays, either directly or with a DC to DC converter (which is what the laptop power supply is, 12 volts in, upto 24 volts out) and that is the most efficiant way, People still charge their phones in motorhomes using a home charger and the inverter, they take 12 volts DC, turn it into 230 volts AC with the invertor, loosing 15% or more in the process, then they drop the voltage down to 5 volts DC with the plug in charger, loosing another 10 to 15% in the process, so they are wasting 30% of the power they use, which is wasted as heat.. ok maybe usefull on a cold day (in our bedroom at home, it gets too hot for comfort with the desktop computer running, turn it off and it gets cold in the room, lot of wasted power in a desktop pooter but handy for keeping warm on a cold day but i'd say use an inverter for the big loads that only get used a few minutes a day, and run everything else off 12/24 volts DC,

we're very interested in the possibility of living on a narrow boat, (i have a motorhome at the moment, so am used to living in 'small' spaces, just spent 7 months in the motorhome so we're not talking the odd weekend here which anyone can last) We're borrowing a narrowboat in a few weeks time, so we'll get to see what it's like to be on a narrow boat, and i'm sure we'll like it, deliberately choosing now to try it out so if we enjoy it in the bad weather, we'll love it in the summer. But we are on benefits, i get income support and disability benefit (not sure of the exact name of it, it's not DLA or the other other one that's paid at 3 rates and is contribution based) but it is one of the long term benefits, my GF gets income support only, but only because she's on my claim and that's all she's entitled to whilst we're together... this is a long term thing, my medical problems arent going to get better, and can't be cured. Anyway, is it possible/allowed to live on a boat when you recieve these benefits?? i've been reading about the housing benefit things, which only seem to apply to a mooring because that's how they keep you in one area to know which council pays the benefit. Thing is we'd like to be continual cruisers, that's the whole idea of a boat isnt it, it moves, same with the motorhome, if we were to park it up in one place forever then we may as well live in a grotty flat or static caravan, sommat i dont want to do, all i live for is to see what's round the next corner, traveling is very importiant to me (i am wondering if HA would be payable for a winter mooring??) i recall that where housing allowance is paid for a mooring, it stops when you move off the mooring, they wont pay for leisure use, which is why u can't get HA for a CC'er it seems, but is someone who lives on a boat and dosent have a mooring so has to move around all the time classed as a leisure boater? in the eyes of the benefits people. Would we have to explore the way the travelers get their benefits whilst they move about all the time? We will be able to use our parents address, so will have a postcode, but i don't want to do owt too dodgy, and end up with the benefits people catching us in a few years time and demanding we repay them a fair few grand as we were only allowed the benefits whilst living in the house they think we live in,

i know this was answered last year, but a little of what i know about these heaters and current consumption... the old eberspachers/webasto's did use a glow plug, and the 12 volt versions did indeed use 20 amps on startup for the glow plug, however the latest versions of these heaters use glow pins, and also they apeer to not power it fully anymore, i noticed this on my motorhomes battery monitor, when the eberspacher D5W is starting up, the current draw fluctuates, from about 3 amps to 7 amps, it's at 7 amps most when it's first starting up, but when it's nearing the end of the start up cycle, it's pulling very little current, the plug is being given power in bursts to keep it at the temp needed to sustain combustion till it's self sustaining, i also notice this when the batteries are low, the lights will flicker in tune with the glow pin power consumption, rapid flickers at first, then they space out, till they stop alltogether as the heater is fully started, There's also the afterburn when the heater shuts down, but that's about 4 amps atthe most, and again pulsed. Now my 12 volt fridge on the other hand... bought it on the understanding that it'd pull 3.5 amps an hour, (shoreline, the 2 door fridge freezer) i measure a max of 9.5 amps when the compressor is at full speed (compressor starts up slowly, pulls 4.3 amps, then goes up as it speeds up) and the thing runs 12.5 minutes on, 19 minutes off, this is in 22 degree ambient temps, no reduction at night as the interior of the van is heated to 22 degrees, worked out we'd need at least 80 amp hours per day to keep it going, and even with 335 watts of solar panels, and 465 ah of batteries, we can't last more than 2 days outside summer time... and of course the heater is on day and night then too.

Cheers for that. Any idea how much resistance i should be looking at? and the kind of power the resistance will be absorbing? i recall the field current is about 4 amps, but that may be wrong, just wondering what size resistor to get, guess really i need an old wire wound variable resistor, the kind model trains used to regulate the speed before the latest electronic jobbies with the pwm and all that kind of trickery. now if i can just remember where that model train shop was we went in the other day, he had tons of old controllers, some from the turn of the centuary where it was all open and fed directly off the mains without a transformer.

Hello all, not been on here for a long time as were currently touring europe in our motorhome. Before we left i asked the resident alternator bod about my alternator on my home made 12 volt generator, my problem was the alternator self exited the second it rotated more than 50 rpm, thus stalling the engine before it got any speed up, So i was advised to cut the earth leg in the regulator, which i run through the 'glow plug' position of the start switch to allow me to run the engine upto speed before re-connecting the regulator (genny engine is a very tired briggs and stratton ex lawnmower engine, 3.5 hp but i'm lucky if i've got 1hp left in it, but it was cheap and electric start) Anyway, we've recenty replaced the 3 way fridge in the van for a shoreline 12 volt compressor fridge freezer, very nice it is to have frozen food and cold drinks anywhere in europe, and not have to be parked perfectly level to ensure it works, but the downside is the 2.1 amp hours they quote is pure fantacy, best i measure is 3.5 AH, (will have another Q about adding an external condensor to the fridge so i can reduce the compressor on time later) Result is my 460AH battery bank and 350watt solar array just cant keep up outside full sun cloudless days in the south of spain... right now were in a very cloudy Berlin, and i have to run the genny every 3 days. And as i hadnt used the generator for a year or so before i got the fridge, i found out it's really on it's last legs, and it's now got impossible to get it to turn the alternator when it's putting out more than about 45 amps, (70 amp alternator) So, whilst i know i should replace the engine or re-build it, we have another month or 2 left of our tour, and i need to keep it going, winter project is a watercooled quieter engine that can heat the calorifier whilst charging the batts, but for now i need a way to reduce the current output of the alternator. Can this be done by fooling the regulator somehow with a few electronic bits and pieces? The alternator has the following numbers on it: 0 120 335 012, GC 14v 70A spain, and the regulator has: 1 197 311 240 EL 14v, GB 369. It's the stock alternator from a peugeot 306 turbo diesel car, i can get the regulator off easily and play with it, but i'd rather not have to take the entire alternator off if i can help it as that means dropping the entire gen set, i'm thinking i can't just put more or less resistance in the no charge light wires, as the alternator will start charging even with the light blown or disconnected, can i alter resistance in the regulators earth connection? or where do i need to play about to reduce the current output. Idealy i'd like to have a potenteomiter to twidle and make the current output change, so i can start the engine on 0 amps, and wind it up to where it just begins to falter and wind it back a tad, then leave it at that, oh and of course i'd like to do this as cheaply as possible, bearing in mind i'm currently in Germany and about to go into Poland, there's a Conrad electronics down the road from me, and i have my soldering iron with me. Gazz

Ahhh, so the CO2 just freezes the discharge horn, not the fire, but it seems that might be the best stuff to use, If a fire breaks out through the skin/windows then it's too late i guess. powder just seems such a pain, mess in discharge, mess for ages afterwards, pain in it's storage, as in compacting due to the vibrations of driving down the road, i did throw out a powder extinguisher years ago, just one of those little ones, i shook it up regulary, but one time i couldent hear the powder moving, so decided to let it off to see what happened, nowt, a hiss and a fart then nowt, no powder came out, guess it was totaly compacted solid in there. I do put out the little fires i start when welding in the garage using the CO2 from the mig welders bottle, just hold the welders nozzle near the fire and pull the trigger half way to release gas but not the wire, smothers it out pretty fast, even some steel wool i set alight once... tho i will admit first i tried the air line to blow it out... big mistake, sounded and looked like an oxy torch. Only thing that i do think about with CO2 extinguishers, should one ever leak during the night... it'd snuff us out, so maybe i'd be best locating it next to the main low level vent, but that aint right near the door, Also, when i had the 6 kilo dry powder extinguisher next to the door, i put it there for a second reason, anyone trying to get in that door whilst we were inside would get the extinghisher let off in his face, would a CO2 extinguisher have the same affect... they make a pretty impressive sound so i guess so, but might go too far, and kill the intruder... best stick to camping in south africa where that kind of thing is legal

Cheers for that reply, So basicaly if i let off a dry powder extinguisher inside my van to put out a small fire that when out results in a tiny bit of smoke dammage and a little replacement wood needed or similar, i'd then have to write off the TV, dvd, sat system, fridge, charger, inverter, solar regulator, washer, microwave and so on, or suffer then failing later due to the powder coroding the electronics inside them. I can almost see the reason some people say they'd let the thing burn down if it ever caught fire and not try to fight the fire due to the hassle afterwards if they partialy save it. If i use a foam extinguisher i wont have that issue, so a clean up of the foam, replace fire damaged bits, and get on with life, but they can't be used on electrical fires. We refuse to have a chip pan or deep fat fryer in the motorhome due to the fire risks, but i do have the fire blanket near the cooker just incase. I would almost prefer to get a CO2 extinguisher as i know they do the job and do it fast due to the cooling nature as well as taking away the oxygen to the fire, i'd just have to remember to hold my breath whilst letting it off I guess if we ever had a fire, we'd be out of the door first, the main door is where the big extinguisher would live, and so i'd reach in and get the extinguisher if i could, then lean in the van and let it off at the fire area, if i had to re-enter the van my ass would be near the door ready to jump back out, so maybe CO2 could be an option?

I have a motorhome, which aren't goverend by any safety certificate things like boats are, only thing i have is the insurers want an extinguisher in the van, no mention of size, type or location, I already have a 1 kilo dry powder by the drivers seat, and a fire blanket by the cooker, and i used to have a 6 kilo dry powder in the living area, but due to a re-model, i have no space to put the 6 kilo extinguisher anymore. I've seen the size of extinguisher i want in the doctors surgery, they are about the diamiter of a 6 kilo one, but half the height, i looked but couldent find a size on it, but it's was a dry powder one with a hose on it. A quick search on the net seems to show they go, 1kg, 2kg then 6 kg, but the photo's of the 2kg ones dont look as big as the ones i saw, which i rekon is 3kg's, plus they have no hose on them. Anyone know if they do a 3kg extinguisher?? it's the height that's the issue for me now, like i said, i don't need any specific markings, specs or owt like boats need. Also, i'm wondering if i really want another powder extinguisher, i've never used one in anger yet, but have read they make a hell of a mess that takes years to fully clean up... sort of like having a broken side window, your still finding bits of glass 2 years down the line, also heard they can make a corosive compound that'll eat away metals and the like if not cleaned off imediately. So i'm thinking maybe foam would be better?? ok, i'd really prefer halon as that's works and works fast, but not a good idea in an enclosed space, so CO2 is out as well for that reason. I guess we have the same risks as a boat for fires, lpg, diesel, cooking oil/fat, foam in the cushions (tho that's got the fire retardant stuff on it) fabrics, wood, 12 and 230 volt electrics etc, is foam suitable for those fire risks? about the only risk i can think of not likely is a metal fire, i don't carry magnesuim around with me, and i've not had an engine component made of the stuff since i owned a VW beach buggy (the gear box casing is made of magnesuim on them) I know that the first thing to do in a fire is get out, but i really don't want to loose the entire van for something that started off as a small fire which a quick squirt of an extinguisher would have put out, but likewise i don't want to save the van, only to have it ruined by the extinguisant medium, (dunno if extinguishant is a word, but i mean the contents of the extinguisher, i.e. the powder)

You could go for a normal front loader type washer, and feed the cold only feed via a thermostatic valve, i've done that with my candy aqua 1000 washer (the little 3.5 kilo load one, half the size of a domestic machine) I leave the temperature selector on the tap icon, which is tap water temp, i.e. the internal heater is turned off, and have plumber in a termostatic mixer valve from the cold and hot (from the calorifier) water system, Works perfectly, tho you can't do a cold final rinse without manualy turning the thermostatic mixer valve down, not sure if all machines do a cold final rinse anyway, some seem to, but i have no idea if it does owt for the clothes, then again i dont have any frilly undies or evening gowns that i wash in the machine, socks, skidders, jeans and T-shirts, and the dogs bed every now and then which upsets her as she prefers it stinking of wet dog and rabbit tods than comfort summer fresh

Even if you have a full 20 drawer tool chest full of tools of every type, you can guarentee that when you break down, the one tool you need to fix the problem is the one you don't have I've got a motorhome not a boat (yet.. someones gonna have to tell me to stop posting on here untill i get a bot soon) but i've got a couple of tool kits, A plastic tool box which has a top with slots and rebated bits in it to hold things when sawing them off etc, it's also strong enough to stand on when what i'm working on is just out of my reach, and sit on when it's low down. That tool box houses my engine tools, The lift out tray has got a 3/8 and 1/2 inch drive socket set, from 6 to 22mm and the equivelent in imperial even tho my van's european, the imperial bits are handy when i need to undoo a slightly mangled nut that's gone between 2 metric sizes, couple of different length extension bars, a couble of wobble joints (very handy for when you cant get a straight line to an awkward nut) a set of hex headed sockets as my engine has a few of them, The wobble joints, short extensions and hex heads were added to by me when i found out i needed them. i also have the big hex adaptor i need to get at the diff, gearbox and engine oil drain plugs. Then in the main bit of the tool box i have a set of spanners, mainly metric ones, from about 4mm to 32mm, i have 2 x 13, 17 and 19mm spanners, as they are the most common ones i need to double up on, i.e. undooing a nut and bolt whenre neither side is fixed, a big adjustable spanner... even tho if my old boss saw me using it he'd give me a length of steel bar and a hacksaw and file, and make me make a spanner of the correct size, but in an emergancy an adjustable can be handy. I've got a specific spanner i need to get at one of the bolts on my injector pump, so i carry that with me all the time.. even tho i dont carry the DTI with me to time the pump back up should i have to take it off.. i have hammered a mark where it's timed tho, so i can set it roughtly back to normal wothout the DTI. Screwdrivers, and electricians type flat head.. the type that lights up when touched on sommat thats gonna bite you if you touch it, a selection of cross heads, couple of star drivers, a very long shafted cross head that i seem to use the most, i also have an impact driver set, and a great big old battered flat head screwdriver with a metal striking head, gets used as a chizel more than a screwdriver. Can't forget the big lump hammer can we. Low voltage tester, my one and only mac tools tool, screwdriver shaped but pointy at the end, and 2 croc clips, connect to both pos and neg of a battery, and you can probe for posotive and negative along a circuit, green led = neg, red led = pos, helped me find a few bad connection points that were giving me strange symptoms. Pliers, needle nosed, snub nosed, rounded jaw types for pipes, cutters and a pair of those expanding jaw jobbies at a 60 degree angle off the handles, oh and a couple of mole grips. An all in one wire cutter, stripper and crimping tool, not as good as my ratchet crimper, but better than trying to use pliers to crimp terminals. Tape measure, steel ruler, feeler guages, and an odds and sods tin which has in it: nuts and bolts of varying lengths and sizes, self tapping screws, washers, lengths of wire, crimp terminals of all sorts, electrical tape, self amalgimating tape (very handy stuff, waterproofs electrical connectors and can be used to bandage a split radiator hose) i've got a long length of wire with croc clips on either end, fuses, a buse.... A buse is a fuse which you've soldered a 10 watt bulb accross the terminals of a blown blade fuse (this is for 12 volt or 24 volt DC circuits only btw, and the bulb to use is one of those halogen jobbies with 2 pins that stick down from the capsual, and you solder the pins to the fuse at the end you hold when pulling it out, needs a fuse that you can pop the plastic cover off and put back on when made. To use, Plug it into a circuit that keeps blowing the fuse, and it'll light up brightly to show there's a short, but reduces the power to the short so it dosent dammage it, when you find the short.. by wiggeling wires, the bulb goes dim indicating you've found the source of the short, and if your wondering, BUlb and fuSE = buse I also have certian other tools not of use on a boat, like the wheel brace, which is a 3/4 inch drive head, a 4 foot breaker bar and a 27mm socket, anything less wont budge the wheel nuts. In the drawer under the drivers seat i have a set of very heavy duty jump leads (not that i need them my self, i fitted an emergancy start button on the dash, pressing it powers a heavy duty solenoid that connects the house batteries to the starter battery allowing me to start the engine with a flat starter battery without lifting the bonnet) also have a spare bulb set and selection of fuses... just to save me getting the main tool box out, a big maglight torch is also near to hand from the drivers seat, doubles as an ilumination devise and a self defence item.. the 6D cell maglights are pretty hefty and would put a bit of a dent in someone who tried it on, easier to explain why you had it with you than a baseball bat. Thne there's another tool box inside the van, that's got things i use for making alterations to the interior.. we fitted out a coachbuilt shell ourselves like people who do a lines sailaway... just we provided the coachbuilder with the van and they chopped the body off the back and built a larger flat sided new one in it's place, But i have things like a half size tennon saw, junior hacksaw, stanley knife, set square, drill bits, tube of silicone sealant, tube of fast grip builders adeshive, masking tape, bodge tape, foam double sided tape, super glue, 5 minute epoxy, ptfe tape, some of that leak stop putty stuff, 10, 13, 17 and 19mm spanner to save me getting them from the engine toolbox, a multi cutter thing, plier type thingy with a blade and interchangeable bases, almost my most used tool at the moment, cuts pex pipe straight, angles in the mouldings and trim i'm putting up, cuts thick bundles of wires in one go and more One of these Tie wraps, gas powered soldering iron, nails, small hammer, screws, wall board fixings, screw in hooks, a 3 pin mains plug with fuse, couple of 12 volt plugs that i use in the van (hella DIN type) few lengths of electrical wire, couple of push fit water fittings i use on my plumbing (90 degree elbow to replace any that die, and a straight joiner for repairs) few odd lengths of the pipe used in my plumbing.. both water and heating, can of ptfe spray for lubing things, WD40 for driving out moisture and freeing things off (wd40 is not a lubricant) a battery drill... very very handy thing, mines an old 12 volt battery drill which the battery pack died on years ago, i took the batteries out of the battery pack housing, and put a socket in the bottom of the housing, wired up to the old battery contacts, a 5 meter length of coily wire rated for about 20 amps, and a hella plug on the end, plug the lead into a 12 volt outlet in the van, and i have a battery drill on a lead, with a massive battery pack, i went the socket in the empty battery pack route so if i ever stumble acfross a replacement battery pack, i can revert the drill to cordless, and have the option of corded off the 12 volt outlets in the van (i could use a mains drill off the inverter, but if you do what i do with mains drills... that's flip it to reverse and pull the trigger for a second to stop it taking 5 seconds to spin down after using it, you'll pop the inverter.. usually permanantly, this is cos of the massive back emf pulse that goes back to the inverter if you do that) I probably have even more junk... i mean tools and things in the van than i've mentioned, but what i've mentioned get's me by.. doing emergancy repairs, routine mantinance, modifcations and even adding new things when were out touring, When we were in Germany last year, we decided to build a model boat, so we added some model making tools, little pots of paint and brushes, what i didn't buy was a cover for the table, which can now be hung on the wall as a modern abstract painting... hmmm.. a storage solution for those with island leg/fold away tables I'll stop writing now, as this post is waaay too long, feel free to delete it moderators if it's gonna clog the board up.

Re-fillable gas bottles have bee around for a good few years in the motorhome/caravan market, i dont use em because i have a fixed gas tank, but that works on the same idea... just it's attatched to the van all the time so you drive to the filling point, connect the nozzle, fill up, pay and off you go, much better than normal bottles.. for a start even at autogas prices (which has road duty on it) its over half the price calor charge for the gas in their bottles, and also you can top the tank off when you feel like it, no more having to wait untill the bottle runs out and having to carry spares, just look at the gauge every now and then, when it's getting low, go and re-fill. Anyhoo, there are 2 types of re-fillable gas bottle in england, one is a lightweight fiberglass bottle, it's seethrough and because of that it dosent have an 80% cut off valve, hence you have to watch the level rise and release the fill button as it aproaches the marker, as you can guess, it's very easy to overfill those type, and losts of insurers dont like them, and it's because of them that re-fillable bottles have got a bad name... they wont let you fill a bottle up at an autogas pump if they see you, just in-case it's one of those types that can be overfilled. The second type of bottle is a proper steel bottle, it has 4 fittings on the top just like a fixed gas tank under a motorhome has, (the seethrough ones have only one, you re-fill it through the outlet valve by screwing in an adaptor) one fitting is the savety valve, vents the gas if the internal pressure rises above a set pressure... i.e. if it was filled too much somehow then left in the sun, or in a fire... it will release enough gas to lower the internal pressure, yse the fire will flare up whilst it's venting, but once the pressure has been droped it closes again, flare up dies down, untill the pressure builds again... but it's better to have a flare up whilst it's venting than an explosion as the bottle ruptures. the second fitting is the gauge, it's a proper float type guage so it directly reads the contents of the bottle like a petrol/diesel tank guage, it's all sealed, there's no mechanical bit between the needle and the float inside, the float is connected to a magnetic disc just under the face plat of the gauge holder, the gauge face then transmist the position of the float from the magnetic coupling, you can get remote readout gauge heads, so you can see the contents on the bottle and inside the boat on a car type fuel gauge. third fitting is the take off valve, on bottles it's the standard POL valve as fitted to propane bottles, on tanks you can get different fittings to match the regulator system on the van, as some tanks use a 2 stage regulator with an excess flow valve. The final fitting is the filler, inside the tank there's a float connected to the filler valve, when the float rises to where the liquid gas is at 80% capacity it shuts off the inlet valve, so no more gas can entre, you can't overfill it, On the outside of the filler it can be a fitting for the pump nozzle, usually the dutch bayonet fitting that's used in england, or in a motorhome you can get a fitting to connect a high pressure filler hose and mount a remote filler on the side of the van. So the metal bottles with the 80% cut off valve should be as safe if not safer than normal calor bottles, with the advantage that you can see the level in real time via the gauge, and can re-fill it when ever you like, Unfortunately the biggest problem is re-filling them, because of those damn fiberglass bottles with no over fill protection on them, most autogas filling stations wont let you fill a bottle up, hence the remote fillers most motorhomes put in so the droid on the cash desk dosent know it's filling a bottle, they just think it's filling a tank that runs the engine. You can of course take the bottle to a gas depot, there's usually one in every town, they will fill the bottle for you (health and safety, your not allowed to use the pump, even tho it's the same as on a petrol station) and if you take a bottle to them they 'might' sell you the gas at heating gas prices rather than road fuel prices. I've filled my motorhomes tank up a few times at gas depots, and only once was i able to get the gas at heating fuel prices, and then the bloke filling had to crawl under the van to make sure no pipes went towards the engine before he'd agree to let me have it at the price it should be... mine runs my cooker, oven , fridge, BBQ point and generator, Before these landrover types started running diesels with lpg fumigation, just having a tank on a diesel engined motorhome got you the heating fuel prices, but as i mentioned, even at autogas prices it's over half the price of calors prices.

Hmmm, which do i tick, prolly none as i dont have a boat, but the motorhome is lit predominantly by cold cathode tubes 7 x 12 inch tubes inside, 2 in the outside light), with 2 straight fluorescent tubes, 2 D shape fluorescents (in mains fixtures. ripped the mains bulb holder out, put in the 12 volt 2D fluorro fitting) and we have 4 halogens thas never get used.. they are in the roof light surround that has the 2 straight flurro tubes in it, We use the cold cathodes the most as they pull the least power and give out the most light, they can be dimmed simply be reducing the voltage to the inverter that powers them (the tiny matchbox sized inverter that runs the tubes, takes the 12 volts from the battery bank (at half an amp for 2 tubes) , and makes it about 1000 volts (at 5 milliamps, tingles a bit when you try plugging a tube in while it's powered the tubes need to run on. I had led's in the van, but got rid of them as they were naff, nice for a spotlight, but no use for illuminating the whole interior, the cold cathodes can do that with ease, and with 5 of them on in the living area, they are pulling 1.25 amps, thats all of them not each.

Was walking the dog at a local-ish mill pond the other day, all along the water were scenes like this... My dog usually likes chasing the ducks, but she sat down and watched the ones fighting... none of them died as a result of the fights that day, but they were spectacular to say the least.