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12V 2KW-5KW Diesel Air and Water Heater For Lorry Boats


bigcol

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11 minutes ago, bigcol said:

Has anyone heard of one of these

hot air and water combined heater?

has anyone bought one?

 

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/124646405792?ViewItem=&item=124646405792

I havn't,but it is probably a Eberspacher knockoff.

It has been mentioned in another thread that it is a safe installation that is the important factor.

Exhaust and inlet,to outside,fuel tank to be able to vent and drain outside.

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As tempting as they maybe , for things that can 'seriously affect my life span', even to save a 'couple of £100' I'd rather go with recognised brands with a history.

 

The advert does say 'made in China' and although many 'quality suppliers' of products use Chinese manufacturers the quality varies.

Chinese companies will supply to whatever 'quality' you request.

 

Installation is obviously a key component of it being safe, but having an 'aluminium core' to me spells 'cheaply manufactured' and potentially liable to failure.. Do you want fuel spilling about in the bottom of the heater ?

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A couple of years ago I came across a Youtube review of the 12 volt diesel water and air heater.

In the video he pulled it apart to investigate.

He also tried (unsuccessfully) to make a shower with it in another video.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vtvy2MwbArQ

 

(Contains swear words)

 

 

Edited by Manxcat
Spellung
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42 minutes ago, Manxcat said:

A couple of years ago I came across a Youtube review of the 12 volt diesel water and air heater.

In the video he pulled it apart to investigate.

He also tried (unsuccessfully) to make a shower with it in another video.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vtvy2MwbArQ

 

(Contains swear words)

 

 

 

 

He seems surprised that on 'high' it is drawing 5 amps.

 

My 8Kw Eberspacher draws 10 amps on high.

 

Blown air heaters are very hungry for amps.

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I have run a couple of the chinese diesel air heaters without any major issues for the last couple of winters, I am using them in a location where carbon monoxide isn't a concern rather than on a boat, for boat use you would need to replace (at a minimum) fuel line, burner air intake pipe and exhaust / exhaust pipe.

the combined water / air heaters are using the same burner & fan assembly but have added a water loop into the heat exchanger so they give out less hot air and a little bit of heat into the water, from comments of other people that have the combined versions the heat output on water seems to be around the 0.75-1.25kw range depending on hi / low settings.

 

The chinese heaters are a copy of the russian (planar) heaters which are a copy of the Eberspacher heaters (the 3kw chinese heater is a clone of the Eberspacher Airtronic D2, and the 5kw heaters are a clone of the Airtronic D4 (note the chinese ratings are 1kw higher than eberspachers ratings), avoid the chinese 7 or 8kw heaters as so far all they are is the 5kw heater with everything over driven, so while they do get near the 7kw output they also eat glowplugs and motor bearings at an alarming rate.

 

Power usage is highest during startup & shutdown as that is when the glow plug is active, peak will be around 12-13 Amps, once it's burning and the plug shuts off power usage (for the 5kw models) will drop to around 2-3A (low) to 4-5A (high) (power usage is roughly 50:50 between the fan and the fuel pump so changes to the mixture like I have made will affect power usage)

 

The only problems I have had with them is the fuel pump failing (clicking away but not shifting fuel), but I knew I was probably going to get this as a result of running from kerosene (heating oil) rather than diesel (1 failure between the 2 heaters halfway through their 2nd winter)

1 of the pair is running on stock settings and just sits running constantly on low from November thru to April.

The 2nd one has a home built add-on module fitted which makes it act as you would expect a domestic heater to (switch on (Hi) if the temp is below target, go to low if temp is at target and shut down if it's over target), this makes the 2nd one a prime candidate for sooting up since it goes through many more startup / shutdown cycles than expected, as a result I modified the fuel / air settings (pump pulse rate & fan speed) so it's running the absolute leanest mixture (to the point you can hear it flame-out on low between each fuel pump pulse), a lot of people warn against leaning them out but I have never run into any problems and after 2 winters that heater is still silver inside the exhaust pipe.

  • Greenie 1
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