Warm air heater making fumes

[Guest]

After working perfectly for three years my Ardic deisel heater now pumps blue smoke with the warm air after running for 5 minutes. Recently I had a fuel air lock which is now cured and I changed the glow plug which I burnt out trying multiple startups with no fuel! Any suggestions on curing the blue smoke, I have run it for two hours now to try to "burn off" but improvement.

 

[Guest]

Hmm Doesn't look good.. Incomplete combustion I would have thought maybe a problem with lack of air or something wrong with the catalytic converter? First thing I would check is the air supply.. clean/remove the air filter for a trial. Does the fan need lubrication? What about you supply voltage is it down?

Some thoughts anyway.. Bob

 

[Guest]

I have an ' Eberspacher' version which is doing something very similar. I stripped it down, de-coked the combustion chamber ( which had lots of carbon in it). It dramatically improved the situation. However, running at full power, gradually you can smell combustion products, and even on low power, after say 2 hours, there is a diesel taint in the air- this worries me obviously.

I am convinced there is a leakage path, between the fresh cabin input and the combustion chamber. Even if there was very bad combustion, there is no way spent exhaust gasses SHOULD get into the cabin air system. Whether there is a leak in the double skin of the combustion chamber/heat exchanger- or a leak in the exhaust outlet, such that it is finding it's way into the cabin air input, I have yet to determine.

I think MY next step is to connect a separate piece of ducting directy to the cabin air fan input, and drag in clean air from outside, and see if it still gets polluted. If it does, then clearly there is a leak in the heat exchanger. If it cures it, then there must be exhaust fumes getting into the air intake, which hopefully is an easier fix. Hope this helps.

 

[Guest]

We have exactly the same problem with our Ardic the exhaust and the air intake are very well separated and the whole unit has been subjected to a full service by Aqua-Marine who are the approved service agent. They were very helpful but we still can't use the system, perhaps it does mean a new heat exchanger?

 

[Guest]

Thanks for the help everyone, I have now talked to Kreuger who are the agents around Lymington - they are extremely helpful and I have now decided to take it into their depot for a service anyway - will keep you posted if an answer becomes clear. The incomplete combustion sounds likely, after flooding it with deisel and firing up this cause huge clouds of smoke which may have blocked the filter - it became blue tinged after this point.

 

[Guest]

Your message has prompted me to address this issue again, I have emailed Aqua-Marine asking about failure of heat exchangers and will also keep you notified of developments.

 

[Guest]

The more I think about this, the more I am convinced that the burning circuit and the warm air circuit must be ( have to be ) totally isolated from each other, while removing the kit for service I double checked there was no possibility of exhaust/air intake leakage on any of the external pipework so I conclude there must be a pinhole leak internally somehow -perhaps an expert will enlighten us all.

 

[Guest]

Don't know if this is any help but I had a similar problem with an Eberspacher. I thought I had a leak in the unir but it turned out to be the ducting. The ducting I had, as part of it's manufacturing process, lubricating oils along it's length. When the oils got hot they smoked , thus giving the appearance of a leaky unit. The cure was to leave the unit on for as long as possible, with half the ducting outlets blocked, to burn off the oils.