Radiators

[Tony Brooks]

24 minutes ago, MrsM said:

Similarly would it be a bad idea to have a room thermostat on the boat?

I think most of those marine boilers come with a room stat.

[system 4-50]

4 hours ago, cuthound said:

However plastic pipe offers a small amount of insulation when compared to copper and just pops at the joints when it freezes, unlike copper, which often splits.

It will only split if it has no antifreeze in it ?  

[GUMPY]

15 minutes ago, Tony Brooks said:

I think most of those marine boilers come with a room stat.

They usually come with a programmable  timer not a stat.

A stat will cause short cycling...........

Also its a good idea if you intend to use it just to heat water to put the bathroom radiator on the same part of the circuit as the hot water tank as if you don't the heater will shut down very quickly as the tank can not absorb enough heat.

Also I would also not use a towel rail in the bathroom unless you have a radiator as well since most towel rails dont dissipate as much heat as a radiator.

I will not mention TRV as despite what is commonly said it is possible to run them on these heaters, if you understand how the sysr=tem works, as I have been doing for 20  years.

[Sea Dog]

1 hour ago, MrsM said:

Similarly would it be a bad idea to have a room thermostat on the boat?

As @Tony Brooks said, they are often fitted, but you can just put them up to the max temp (30 odd degrees usually) and then they don't interfere by bringing your heater on and off. With the stat on full, if it starts to get too warm, shut the thing down - it's only gonna start short cycling anyway if that's the case.

My builder made the inspired decision to fit the Eberspacher controller by the bed. This means that I can pop the heating on before rising, which will take the chill off the boat and give us a tank of hot water, either on the odd colder mornings or in the colder months to warm the boat up whilst the stove (which has ticked-over over night) gets back up to speed. I find a 1 hour timed burst, which my controller conveniently does at the push of a button) achieves both of these aims without reaching the point where short cycling occurs. I'm still all ears listening for the slow down - speed up of  the jet engine noise just in case though! 

 

[pig]

On 08/09/2020 at 18:07, system 4-50 said:

Use copper pipe as plastic expands too much, and I used flexible joints to the rads. (I used non-demountable Tectite (or is it Tektite?).

Wot he said. My lovely neat long run of 22mm plastic pipe turned into some sort of wriggly reptile horror when I first fired up the Eberspacher. Swapped it out for copper. Counterintuitive for plastic to expand more than copper?

[system 4-50]

Some links that might or might not be useful.

Edited September 9, 2020 by system 4-50

[Sea Dog]

11 hours ago, pig said:

Wot he said. My lovely neat long run of 22mm plastic pipe turned into some sort of wriggly reptile horror when I first fired up the Eberspacher. Swapped it out for copper. Counterintuitive for plastic to expand more than copper?

I wouldn't recommend it as it's counter to Eberspacher advice (as I stated earlier) but mine's done in ⅝" rubber hose to a manifold and then out to the rads in 10mm plastic. I have no negative issues at all.