chinese diesel heater installation

Stevie69p - is your heater loud?
When i have looked on YouTube I don't know if it's the sound on the pc or the recording or the heater that is loud

Jon

No louder than a fan heater, and hardly noticeable when running on the lower settings. I usually run flat out for around 15 minutes then bring it back down from there. I run mine in pump frequency mode rather than temp mode, as once set it doesn't fluctuate up and down.
 
Mine is set for temperature mode. It initially runs up to full power then once the setpoint is reached it slowly backs off to idle and occasionally revs up a bit to maintain temperature. Not a nuisance at all.

The noise level is very low - just a fan running in the background. The tick tick pump is in a floor locker - I don't hear this at all unless I lift open the access hatch.
 
Many thanks for the the advice so far.
Sandy I have looked at all 3 of his heater videos which to be fair he has done very well and shows that anyone can do it with a bit of thought.
Stevie69p and superheat6k thanks again for your continued replies.

Hopefully my insurance company comes back with a good outcome then I am going to order one and hopefully with pictures document it on this thread.

jon

jon
 
Many thanks for the the advice so far.
Sandy I have looked at all 3 of his heater videos which to be fair he has done very well and shows that anyone can do it with a bit of thought.
Stevie69p and superheat6k thanks again for your continued replies.

Hopefully my insurance company comes back with a good outcome then I am going to order one and hopefully with pictures document it on this thread.

jon

jon
I asked my insurers (Y Yachts) and they weren't concerned in the slightest. Not a surprise really when you consider the other myriad risks an insurer takes on for any boat being insured.

Besides I still have yet to hear of one incident of an installed Chinaspacher catching fire and that is not only for boats, but not least the many thousands being installed on motor vehicles.
 
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One thing I did find on youtube yesterday was this video of a chap that installed a chinese heater which is worth bearing in mind - it may have been a error on his lcd control programming or it could be a fault - however I think a isolation switch between the battery and the heater is a must.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nhmn4D-v20I

jon
 
I am of a view everything should be switchable and as far as is sensible separately fused or via a circuit breaker. Mine is fed via a 25a circuit breaker.

I have also installed a safety circuit with an overheat klixon glued to the top of outlet end of the casing. This wired to a hold on relay inserted in the feed to the tick tick pump. Should the casing ever reach 100oC the klixon will open turning the relay off, thus immediately stopping the fuel supply. Testing this the heater went into pump fail E-04 alarm within a few seconds. 100oC is way below the temperature that would be reached before the unit would catch fire, but is at least 20oC above the hottest temperature I could measure after a long period running at full power.

Boadicea%206%20Night%20heater%20external%20safety.jpg
 
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One thing I did find on youtube yesterday was this video of a chap that installed a chinese heater which is worth bearing in mind - it may have been a error on his lcd control programming or it could be a fault - however I think a isolation switch between the battery and the heater is a must.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nhmn4D-v20I

jon

There is a (slight) danger that the isolator might be switched off while the heater is on. This would mean that the heater wouldn't go through its correct shutdown procedure. I fitted an isolator, but it's something to bear in mind.
 
Thank You superheat6K - good idea cheap as chips solution do you have the part number/manufacture of the dpdt relay as I can only find miniature relays.

NormanS - Thank you for your reply - I understand what you're saying that it wouldn't go through its correct shutdown procedure but if the unit is going to be of concern heat/fire wise then I would be isolating to prevent risk of fire/damage to the boat or anything in the are i.e wiring looms etc. if it meant the unit would be permanently damaged then for the sake of the cost of a new unit its not the end of the world as opposed to your pride and joy smouldering away.

Jon
 
Anyone have any recommendations (or otherwise) as to which of the myriad of suppliers is best, or most reliable, to buy a chinese heater from ?

If I were in the market for one, I'd buy it from Amazon, simply because their returns/refunds policy is so straightforward. eBay would be the last place I'd look, simply because trying to complain to eBay or PayPal is like wading through treacle.
 
Well as a slight update I have had the go ahead from the insurance company and once installed they require photographs of the install.
So after I have been to my boat in just under 2 weeks and done a practical survey of what is the best positioning and if its practicable then I will be ordering a heater.
Jon
 
Well as a slight update I have had the go ahead from the insurance company and once installed they require photographs of the install.
So after I have been to my boat in just under 2 weeks and done a practical survey of what is the best positioning and if its practicable then I will be ordering a heater.
Jon
I found the email from my insurers re the heater. They said it had to be professionally installed (whatever that means) and New.

I wonder if that clause has any validity - as you can buy a secondhand hand Eber or indeed any other bit of critical boat kit, why should insurers be able to dictate New. The boat isn't new.

I wonder if they are over stepping the mark here - now wanting photos. Now how many of these heaters have actually caught fire, oh yes zero !
 
Sorry for the name confusion..to me 'kerosene' is a foreign word for paraffin, and in the UK, I have always known central heating oil as..central heating oil.
They should all be great in a diesel heater though. And if you have a friend whose house is actually heated by the stuff, with a huge tank in the garden, central heating oil costs pennies. ( I have a drip feed heater on board, going all winter so I can't bear paying tax on it..)

There are two types of "Central Heating Oil", depending on the setup of one's burner; Marked Gas Oil (MGO) which is another name for Red Diesel (Green in Ireland), and Kerosene, which is basically what we used to know as Paraffin.
Interestingly, when, in 1945, the RAF wished to fly captured Messerschmitt 262s from Germany to Farnborough, they could not get a supply of the necessary kerosene locally, so they filled the tanks with good quality diesel and the engines ran adequately on it.
 
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