CATALYTIC GAS HEATER

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Boeingdr

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I have a gas catalytic heater fitted to my Moody 29.
Its position is not ideal (beneath the fold down table) but is probably the only place the previous owner could fit it. I suspect that most of the heat energy goes into heating the bottam of the fold down table (this has got pretty hot the 2 times ive tried the heater out).
I no very little about this type of heater and am a little unsure about the idea of a gas heater in a boat.
My questions?
How effective are they?
Do they produce a lot of condensation?
How big is the risk of carbon monoxide emissions?
Anybody that uses one, are they safe to leave on overnight along with a carbon monoxide detector?
Are they safe to use at sea?
As you can see from the questions Im a little wary about using it at the moment?
I fitted an Eber to my last boat but haven't the funds to retrofit blown air heating to this boat at present.
Cheers
 
Gas Engineer Speaks..taking the cautious route.

1) Are they effective?..Yes as far as i know
2) Do they produce lots of condensation?.. Yes they do..products of complete combustion are CO2 and H2O. therefore ventilation is required.
3) How big is the risk of Carbon Monoxide emissions? If working correctly and there is plenty of ventilation the risk is low in theory, but I would still say there is a significant risk factor personally, and there have been CO incidents involving these appliances
4) Are they safe to leave on at night?. I would say no. I'd never leave an unflued gas appliance unattended,catalyst or no catalyst.
5) Are they safe to use at sea? Yes provided they are in good working order.

Do you know the maker,and do you have the instructions. If you don't have them I'd try and get a set if I were you.

Tim
 
they are prettt effective but yes they do produce condesation.how bad this would be depends on how many of your surfaces are shiny.
yes there is a risk of carbon monoxide poisoning ,i would not rely totally on a detector,if you use it fit a cm alarm but more importantantly make sure you have good ventilation,eg hatchs open abit,dorades open etc as there is no guarantee you will hear the alarm going of if the cm gets you.
if it has a thermal cut off switch then it should be as ok as any gas flame appliance is at sea,as you say its positioning does not seem ideal,so i'd be concerned as to whether the table etc could catch light.the real thing is you do need ventilation but this applies to cookers fridges etc,anything with a naked flame,
 
[ QUOTE ]
they are prettt effective but yes they do produce condesation.how bad this would be depends on how many of your surfaces are shiny.


[/ QUOTE ]

I think you mean 'how obvious this would be would depend on how many of your surfaces are shiny'.

Condenstion will appear on any areas that are 'cold' usually in corners, it is more obvious on 'shiny' areas. Personally, as an ex-gas man, I would remove it.

I did remove one on my boat as sson as I bought it. The main reason being, the amount of ventillation that it would require to eliminate any condensation problems, would outweigh most of the heating benefits. I would have to leave the hatch open, and heat rises.

I had one on a caravan., when I owned a caravan, and it worked fine because I had an air vent underneath it which took in air from beneath the floor ( a bit difficult to do on a boat)
 
We have one, but in our case it is not permanently mounted although it could be. Ours only comes out early/late season for those times when we are not connected to shorepower and can use a simple thermostatic fan heater as we do if on our berth, or especially in France with free electrics included in the berth fee! We have an Ebersplutter but don't like the power consumption if not plugged in and it doesn't reach all parts of our boat anyway, notably where we sleep up front.

Our catalytic heater works fine. We DO have plenty of ventilation as normally the main hatch is left open or at worst the hatch is slid shut but washboards are left out. We don't run the catalytic heater overnight but it heats our 41 footer nicely before we go to bed with no electrical power needed. I leave the gas cylinder for ours outside in the cockpit and have a long hose to the stand mounted heater below. Condensation has never proved to be a real problem as we have plenty of ventilation and don't run the heater overnight. According to the manufacturers there is NO carbon monoxide produced, just CO2 and H2O.
 
[ QUOTE ]
CO will poison you.....CO2 will asphyxiate you, the end result is the same!

[/ QUOTE ] Except you only need about 800ppm of CO for a lethal dose whereas you would probably need more than 50,000ppm of CO2 to even loose conciousness.

Allow up to an hour in each case if you want to try the experiment! /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif
 
"According to the manufacturers there is NO carbon monoxide produced, just CO2 and H2O. "

CO2 and H20 are the products of COMPLETE combustion in correctly installed and correctly operated gas appliances, and are in general terms benign. The risk of CO production occurs if the combustion process is disturbed, typically either by
1) lack of sufficient ventilation
2) The appliance becoming faulty.

You can control the first, you cannot control the second, so any gas engineer will tell you not to use such an appliance in any sleeping situation.

Its quite possible to use them safely, but I would not argue with anyone who decided not to have one on board on safety grounds.

As for condensation, well its up to each individual to decide what level is acceptable to them. The question was 'do they give off lots of condensation' and the answer is still..yes

Tim
 
Agree with this. We had one for a year. Only used at the pontoon and never whilst sleeping. Any unflued device will produce condensation (including your cooker). I bought a CO meter which read out ppm. It never read anything other than zero, even right above the heater...but it did have a good air supply. I was happy using it, but understood the risks.
 
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