Professional install of diesel central heating

[paulam]

Hello all,

 

I got a lovely 52ft Tug, it needs however another way to keep it warm in winter, I only have a wood stove. After a lot of research (I got a lot of tips and useful info in this forum, thanks to all) I've chosen to get a diesel fired central heating system (preferably Webasto) fully fitted, together with radiators and a 24hs timer.

 

The problem is I can't find someone to do the job in my area, that's Kingston upon Thames and up to 50 miles around, I got a quote from the broker where I bought the boat for 3K (this matches my estimates and budget) but that's in Nottingham, the only quote I got in the area was for 5K -which I think it is way too much, I can't understand the discrepancy.

 

Can anybody recommend either a professional that can do this or a boatyard that does this kind of job?

 

Thanks to all for reading.

 

Paula

[Athy]

Welcome, Paula.

There is at least one professional boiler engineer on this forum. With luck he/ they will see your post and contact you. Meanwhile, keep picking up those canalside fallen sticks and branches!

[newcruiser]

you need to make another 4 posts and then I will pm you

Edited December 7, 2013 by newcruiser

[Keith M]

If the cost is around 3000.00 in the Midlands you will find that there will be a significant increase when you get to the London area

 

Keith

[paulam]

Thank you Athy, fingers crossed that the boiler engineer finds my message, I'd like at least to get a quote.

 

Keith, yes I expect anything in London and greater London will be more expensive but not that much, the difference is huge.

 

Thanks all for replying.

you need to make another 4 posts and then I will pm you

I'm not sure what you mean...

[Stilllearning]

Hi Paula, there is some rule about no PMs until you have posted at least 5 messages.

Good luck with the central heating , it's a shame you aren't in the midlands, I suspect it could be done here cheaper.

I'm sure you will find help here though.

[Paul's Nulife4-2]

Thank you Athy, fingers crossed that the boiler engineer finds my message, I'd like at least to get a quote.

 

Keith, yes I expect anything in London and greater London will be more expensive but not that much, the difference is huge.

 

Thanks all for replying.

 

I'm not sure what you mean...

 

Hi ya,& welcome to the forum,

I think the post ref 'make another 4 posts' ment that until you make I think its 4 or 5 posts on the forum boards, no one can personally message you and exchange information email or telephone numbers or such of people that may be able to help.

 

Hope you get it sorted,good luck.

Edited December 8, 2013 by Paul's Nulife4-2

[NMEA]

Without knowing your precise requirements it is difficult to make a really meaningful stab at a price but on a 52' l tug a standard Webasto evaporator heater, even the Thermo 90 would be a poor install and bad advice, particularly for a live aboard.

Even a Mikuni MXA110 pressure jet (12.8kw) full install kit with no plumbing is close to 3k alone

I would suggest a Webasto Spherios Thermo 1600, 2000 or even a 2300 to fully heat such a beast, not possible to be precise without measurements etc, and most importantly your own expectations of what a system will provide you but certainly a pressure jet boiler anyway. Together with all the control systems, quality circulation pump, rads, pipe etc the material costs alone could easily approach the 3k you have been quoted so I would look closely at the specification proposed for your 3k. For a proper system I doubt that I would be looking less than the 5k local quote but again look closely at the specification being offered. My workshop and offices are in South Dock so obviously within your radius, I am also an appointed and factory trained / certified Webasto dealer and installer and my contact details can be found on the Webasto website. Next available slot for such an install would be late FEb 2014 as of today.

Edited December 9, 2013 by NMEA

[smileypete]

Maybe swapping the wood burner for a multifuel stove, possibly one with a backboiler would be a cheaper alternative.

 

The 'cheaper' diesel heaters do not like running part load for long periods where the burner cycles on and off frequently, but might do OK if just used to warm the boat up from cold, or during cold snaps, where they can run full blast for a decent period of time, though may still need servicing more regularly.

 

If they can be run on kerosene/paraffin reportedly that helps them run more reliable and may cut down on servicing, means fitting another tank and having local availability of the stuff.

 

The blown air type diesel heaters seem a lot less fussy so could be a good choice for warming the cold end of the boat in the mornings or in deep dark winter.

 

For something that will work reliably under any circumstances best go for the solution from NMEA if budget allows.

 

cheers, Pete.

~smpt~

Edited December 9, 2013 by smileypete

[OldGoat]

I couldn't possibly comment on the specification suggested by somebody who does these installs all the time.

 

However, from my perspective of a leisure boater who attempts to cruise in the winter , I wonder whether a 12+ Kw heater might be a bit over the top?

My 60 footer NB has a Mikuni 4.8Kw and that's more than enough. It takes about an hour and a half to warm the boat + calorifier from "unoccupied stone cold" condition. Once it's warm it tends to "hunt" (not a good thing). I have two long, one short and one short double, radiators. So doubling that to 8Kw might seem a bit excessive and 12Kw is OTT.

 

I'm assuming the tug is narrow beam?

 

What is acceptable to me as owner and builder may well not be the same as a business who has to be prudent in his specification...

[smileypete]

Maybe NMEA is thinking of a wide beam river tug?

 

With the output maybe it's not so much the highest output but the ability to throttle down to a much lower output, or cycle on and off regularly without affecting reliability, which I suspect the pressure jet types are much better at.

 

cheers, Pete.

~smpt~

Edited December 9, 2013 by smileypete

[NMEA]

Indeed Pete< I was thinking of a "proper" tug, also live aboard, however the premise remains the same unless the interior volume is really quite small, without the actual numbers such as interior volume, type of insulation, glass area and as I said, what the customer expects it to do for them it really is impossible to design a system that will (and will continue to do so for years with minimum ongoing cost) satisfy the customer expectations. Thing is if somebody does a self install and its not quite what they expected they tend to put up with it. Now if I do it and they are dissatisfied then I have a problem, a lot of my design and install work is satisfying customer expectations, sometimes it simply is not possible to provide what they expect and what I would see as a quality install for a given buget and in such circumstances I simply express my regret at being "unable to do business on this occasion" and walk away. One thing I am adamant about is that if a PJ, even one capable of providing a bit more than is required will fit I will try to squeeze one in if practical. Cost is not the real issue here as they are not over priced, especially the Webasto ones, a Thermo 90 evaporator kit is just over 2k, I can easily match that for a 16kw PJ and the reliability and lifespan pays dividends for both me and the owner. Mind you, replacing burners and service decoking is decent business so maybe I shouldn't. I do apreciate that for really small spaces they are impractical though.

Edited December 9, 2013 by NMEA

[Alastair]

I fitted my own diesel boiler, with a cylinder and rads all controlled from a standard danfoss central heating controller (yes it needs 240Vac but I have an inverter). It had a Riello burner.

 

My experience was that it is hard to get a system with a small capacity. I went for a house boiler of the smallest capacity I could get. Fitting a bypass loop was recommended and I chose to not do this initially (but making sure I could add one later).

 

In practice what happened was that the burner would fire a fill blast for a bit, its internal heat sensor would then shut it down for a while while the central heating pump carried on pumping the water around. The on-off cycling never caused an issue.

 

I reckon that installing the pipe runs on a boat that is fitted out takes a lot of time. Paying someone to do it will not be cheap but it would be very worthwhile choosing someone with experience (unless you fancy DIY and coping with correcting your own mistakes).

With any pressure-jet system you also need to be sure you have the electrical power for the pumps and burner.

[Stilllearning]

We have just looked at a 57 foot trad boat with a 10 Kw webasto. The surveyor that we are using, and I trust pretty much completely, having known him for nearly 15 yrs, says 10Kw is much too big, and to consider taking it out and fitting a 5 Kw one.

I'm not making any recommendations, just hoping to give you more information to work from.

[NMEA]

10 kw may or may not be too much, but it has nothing to do with the boat per se, if the load, i.e. radiators and calorifier are less than 11kw load then 10kw is too much, if over that then it is not too small but it is about the particular install not the boat itself. I assume the surveyer had access to the calculated load in order to make the comment.

[bottle]

Erbaspacher also recommend there Hydronic 4 for narrowboats from 40' to 60' or their Hydronic 5 for narrowboats 50' to 72'.

 

We have the 10 and it has been used for about 15 hrs in the last 4½ years and most of that was to just check it still worked.

 

We are liveaboard CCers and if having another boat built would seriously think about not having one at all.

[paulam]

Pete, I thought of using a wood stove with backboiler but I was told there is not enough space for it, plus the wood stove is not in the middle of the cabin but in the front, which I know is not ideal for a backboiler.

I actually very much like my wood stove, during the weekends I can get a nice fire going on, the problem is during the week, the boat is freezing cold when I'm back from work in the evenings. When I bought the boat the surveyor suggested the diesel heater + timer solution, he estimated the same as the broker, around 3K.

I appreciate what NMEA says, perhaps I should take the boat down to the South Dock for a proper quotation, I somehow trust that the broker and the surveyor are not wrong, it's not my plan to stop using the wood stove, I would use the radiators mainly at night and the timer to warm-up the boat before I get back, I'm not expecting to use it non-stop or as the only source of heating, I guess I would make use of them as OldGoat describes.

To reply to one of the posts, it's a tug style narrowboat, here are some pictures (interior is not red and green anymore, that was a bit too intense):

I'm reading everyone's posts, it's all very useful and I'm learning a lot, thanks again for sharing. Edited December 9, 2013 by paulam

[Stilllearning]

Some thoughts and/or suggestions occur to me.

Is the stove really just a woodburner?

Have you tried coal varieties in it?

The villager "c" stove we use is about 5kw with back boiler , at the front of the boat.

In my previous job the hours were horrible, so the stove was filled up at about 9 pm, fully shut down and not touched till my return from work the following afternoon, and the boat was warm even through the coldest winter nights and days.

Fuel used was Excel nuts.

The stove also runs 2 radiators, using the thermo syphon system.

There does appear to be enough room for a stove with backboiler, where your existing stove is.

Our boat is a portholed trad, 55 foot, so there are similarities in heating needs.

Yours looks like a very nice boat, enjoy it!

[MtB]

I'd imagine I'm the 'professional boiler engineer' mentioned earlier!

 

Much as I'd love to install a system I'm afraid I haven't done this for years (except earlier this year in my own house!) I specialise in boiler fault diagnosis these days to the exclusion of all installation work so after you've had it installed you find it it won't work, I'm your man

 

MtB

P.S. I seem to remember seeing your boat for sale about ten years ago but I just couldn't afford it at the time. Nice boat.

[canals are us?]

Lovely boat.

 

I have a 50ft spray foam insulated trad which I heat with a 4.5kw woodwarm fireview stove at the front of the boat with an 8,000btu back boiler heating 2 rads on gravity circulation or the hot water.

 

Your stove looks like a villager heron? These can have an optional back boiler. Your stove is on the ideal side to install a gravity rad system down the boats length. I would install 3 rads.

 

I would really try experimenting using different solid fuels in your stove before spending out, I use wildfire and now anthracite and find it stays in 12-16 hours on very little, no problem and keeps the boat warm when away. Also check the doors rope seals condition and renew if needed to improve the control of the burn rate.

 

I certainly wouldn't spend 5k on central heating when £600 on materials would do and DIY and have plenty left for solid fuel.

 

James:cheers:

Edited December 10, 2013 by canals are us?

[paulam]

I'm getting some really good ideas here, I think I'm coming up with a better solution.

 

Stilllearning, my mistake, I refer to the stove as 'wood stove' but I can use charcoal too, when combining different fuels I can get a nice fire going on for a fairly good amount of time but I haven't managed yet to get it on the whole night, I should try and use different fuels, I'm not yet mastering the art of making a great, long lasting fire. From what I'm reading in this thread I should be able to get a much better fire.

 

'Mike the Boilerman', it's a small boating-world! I fell in love with my boat the moment I saw it, it has a sort of charm that I didn't find in any other boat. I'll keep your contact details in case something ever fails (hopefully not...).

 

James, you have a lovely boat. I have no clue what's the make of my stove, it's not showing anywhere, even the surveyor couldn't tell me, he told me though that I can't fit a back boiler however, seeing now that there is enough space for a back boiler I'm for sure going for this option first even if I have to replace the stove, I prefer a heating system that uses wood and charcoal bought from sustainable sources. And I am considering hot air as a secondary source of heat, that needs more thinking.

 

Thanks to all!

Paula

[RichardH]

I would have thought a Webasto Thermo Top C or a Mikuni MX40 would be ample if you want the separate system.

[OldGoat]

Hot air? - Well, there's a lot of that from time to time on this forum.

If you're thinking of the variety (Ebersplutter type), then If it were me - I'd pass on that. They are popular in sailing boats and river cruisers where the shapes are awkward - so warm air is distributed by plastic tubes. They are noisy and a poor relation to hot water heaters. I suspect they work the best they can with short pipe runs - you don't get those in NBs.

I've had some success with blowing heat from the chimney using a couple of used aluminium computer fans arranged to run at half speed so not too noisy. Warms the uttermost limits of the main cabin.

 

I'm no authority on keeping a fire in overnight and in any event The Management likes the boat cool at night. Unless you've got some pretty solid logs then you'd have some challenge in keeping the fire in all night.

Coal has much more thermal mass (probably the wrong term) than wood - so will last longer in the stove than wood.

Surely charcoal is much too expensive to use, anyway it has had much of its heat energy used in converting the wood to charcoal.

Get yourself some nice hardwood logs instead.

[Stilllearning]

On the subject of different fuels, it may be worth looking at some threads on this forum, about varieties of coal. Makes of stove and varieties of coal is a whole subject in itself.

Fire making and managing is a skill you will learn, and you may well find yourself looking at trees, wood drifting past your boat, skips sat on the road or in drives, in a whole new way....

Thinking about heating, a couple of hours ago whilst chatting with the guy that runs the engineering side of the boatyard here, he just leaned in to the back of his boat and switched on his gas fired combi boiler. Apparently it is the smallest domestic model and he looked extremely happy/smug about it.

[NMEA]

If you're thinking of the variety (Ebersplutter type), then If it were me - I'd pass on that. They are popular in sailing boats and river cruisers where the shapes are awkward - so warm air is distributed by plastic tubes. They are noisy and a poor relation to hot water heaters. I suspect they work the best they can with short pipe runs - you don't get those in NBs.

I've had some success with blowing heat from the chimney using a couple of used aluminium computer fans arranged to run at half speed so not too noisy. Warms the uttermost limits of the main cabin.

 

Blown air heaters are used on all sorts of boats including commercial, I've even done a few on narrowboats for rapid morning warmth. When properly installed and specified they are very effective and quiet, exhaust properly muted with a marine grade silencer, distributed air toned down with a process air silencer and the fan rate correctly adjusted to match the Aluminium duct lengthwhich should be properly insulated with termo duct thinsulate. There is little to touch them for rapid distrubution of heat and circulation of outside air or a mix of recirculated and fresh which makes the cabin fresh and condensation free. It's what I use on my own boat and most people don't even know it's running either from the outside or aboard, I can easily sleep with it on low to keep the chill off. One advantage they have over wet systems (though I am a fan of wet systems) is they cycle much less which adds to the reliablity, they also have a huge range of sophistocaed control systems. The old Ebersplutters gave it a bad name and many poor installs still do, big minus is they can not produce hot water.

Edited December 10, 2013 by NMEA