How to heat a little 26 footer!

Zagato

Zagato

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I would like some heat for those very occasional cold nights aboard. I have a two burner cooker that runs on meths or paraffin - would that do if I kept it well ventilated. It would only be to warm it up and not kept on over night. I only have head room to sit, so it's not a big area or have you any other cheap alternatives?
 
Yes, but you are burning hydrocarbon fuel so it will create condensation, so you do need the hatch open a bit. Put a pottery plant pot over the burner if you want to increase the efficiency.

Dylan Winter (of Keep turning Left fame on U-tube) uses a tin plate with five cheap t-light candles to provide warmth & light in "the Slug", his 19' Mirror offshore.
 
Wear more clothes.

I have an even smaller boat and don't believe there is a really satisfactory solution away from shorepower without an externally exhausted system which will take up too much space and be far too expensive for "occasional nights." Where do you sail anyway? :)

I do use the butane cooker occasionally but even if you can avoid poisoning yourself with CO and don't mind the condensation it will tend to create a nice circulation of warm air above stove height and leave you freezing from the waist down.

Something I have considered but not tried is to heat a slab of steel on the stove (as big as will fit and maybe half an inch thick) and then transfer it to some kind of wire frame on the cabin sole. The heating could be done with plenty of ventilation and I bet 10kg (?) of steel would store a fair bit of heat after 30 mins over both burners.
 
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machurley22 said:
The heating could be done with plenty of ventilation and I bet 10kg (?) of steel would store a fair bit of heat after 30 mins over both burners.
Click to expand...

Steel has a specific heat capacity of about 0.5kJ/kgK, so your 10kg block would have a heat capacity of 5kJ/K. To get the equivalent of a 1kW fan heater running for an hour, you would therefore need the steel to start at 3600/5 = 720K above ambient - ie about 1000C. That's beyond red hot and into lemon / light yellow.
 
Uber - how about either going for some material with a higher heat capacity, or using some form of phase change ?

For the first group, lithium perhaps :eek:, or helium ? Concrete at 0.89 might be a practical choice.


Phase change chemistry is beyond me - apart from understanding how hand warmers work.
 
You could create your own storage heater by having a square biscuit tin and filling it with bricks and heating that up on the stove. I've not tried it, but after its heated up if you put the lid on the biscuit tin it will probably radiate heat for an hour or so. I'm just guessing here...it might not work at all. You can only get out what you put in so it might be expensive as well..:confused: But you can leave it to give out its heat safely without fear of CO..providing it doesn't fall off the stove and burn its way through the bilges and sink the boat:eek:

Other than that you could heat up water, have a hot drink and fill up a hot water bottle with the remainder and stuff it down your shirt front. Hot water bottles are great:D

As a frenchman once allegedly said "Ze English do not av sex lives, zey have ze hot water bottles instead;)"

Tim
 
I have a portable catalytic heater using gas canisters (camping type). It has an oxygen depletion safety valve and switch-off when tilted valve; produces over 1500w which is more than enough. Lorry drivers use them too. cost approx £80; cost of gas canisters is approx £1 each
 
We're are happy with our Origo 5100 Heatpal.

Also used it in the cockpit on chilly nights.

It's a sprit burner inside an aluminium housing.

Price now around £150.

I've never see any secondhand.
 
My oil lamp puts out just enough heat to take the chill off the air. Apart from that I have a very warm sleeping bag (have woken up comfortable despite ice on the outside of it before, in a tent not the boat).

If you're going to burn stuff on board, do watch out for carbon monoxide. You can't see or smell it, and it just slowly puts you to sleep without you noticing.

Pete
 
but the only problem with is the phase change to vapour. Yes, if you had a sealed vessel which you could trust, you could pump heat into it for hours and hours, and it would release heat when need later.

Perhaps an old butane gas bottle filled with water would be a good idea ? But make sure you repaint it a different colour ! :D
 
Zagato said:
I would like some heat for those very occasional cold nights aboard. I have a two burner cooker that runs on meths or paraffin - would that do if I kept it well ventilated. It would only be to warm it up and not kept on over night. I only have head room to sit, so it's not a big area or have you any other cheap alternatives?
Click to expand...

After years of going through similar on a 26, I splashed out on an Eber. Heating a boat properly is streets ahead of trying to botch something, and have never looked back (in spite of the cost).
 
capetown said:
We're are happy with our Origo 5100 Heatpal.

Also used it in the cockpit on chilly nights.

It's a sprit burner inside an aluminium housing.

Price now around £150.

I've never see any secondhand.
Click to expand...

Available from Force4 chandlery @ £125
 
sarabande said:
Uber - how about either going for some material with a higher heat capacity, or using some form of phase change ?
Click to expand...

I bought some cheap (99p for two!) sodium acetate hand warmers at Lidl over Christmas. They work very well, but there isn't much heat in them, really - 55C for an hour, if you're lucky.

I used to use a Tilley Lamp on the Jouster (no reasonable offer refused). That puts out huge amounts of heat, but also huge amounts of water vapour, so it isn't really a long-term option. Now I have the sybaritic luxury of shore power and a 2kW fan heater with a thermostat.

Jumblie lives on a swinging mooring and the medium term plan for her is a small solid-fuel stove. It'll mean a major rethink of the table, though, which currently lives folded up against the bulkhead precisely where th eheater flue will have to go.
 
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