The current 25-30F temps are ideal to test heaters. For the next few days I will be posting my real life testing of heaters and heat producing devices. I'm getting my notes together tonight and will start the in depth detailed findings on each. The test will include - Olympian 8100 cat, Dicikenson 9000 direct vent yacht heater, Delonghi 1500 watt oil filled heater,Pelonis 1500 watt HC-461 5 disc furnace,Aladdin Mod. C kerosene table lamp, Den Haan mini-trawler kerosene lamp and a solar convective loop window homemade unit. Some require propane, others kerosene, 110 VAC and sunshine.Hopefully this may help some members at some future time. Currently I have the Dickinson and the Aladdin going. 28F outside 79F inside yup. 9:15PM. So please bear with me as I will be getting pics and info together. Tim
glad to know you are testing....i will be anxiously waiting for your results...it was below 20 here in eugene, or. before 7pm!! the two you have going now seem to be working great..see if the others match up!
Hi, my vote is for the oil filled heater. I have one in my house that I am useing right now. Works great. Would like to find smaller version for trailer. Plus's: vertually noiseless, very little noise [no fan motor] while warming up, and with no exposed gas or heating elements. I feel much safer running one of these all night while I'm sleeping. Still need to use factory installed furnace to keep tanks from freezeing in real cold weather in which I haven't been in yet.
Hi, my vote is for the oil filled heater. I have one in my house that I am useing right now. Works great. Would like to find smaller version for trailer. Plus's: vertually noiseless, very little noise [no fan motor] while warming up, and with no exposed gas or heating elements. I feel much safer running one of these all night while I'm sleeping. Still need to use factory installed furnace to keep tanks from freezeing in real cold weather in which I haven't been in yet.
KENWOOD makes an oil-filled elec. heater but in a much smaller size. I have two of them sitting around the house (bathrooms) and the real beauty of it is they also have a 24 hour timer. Set them to come on whenever you wish to have the heat. Makes the bathrooms very warm when we get up in the a.m. We're thinking of using one of them on our 25' International. We found ours at a local discount store. Don't know where they might be found today - ours are a year or two old. But very efficient. Top to bottom probably measures 18" - 24". Much smaller than the standard oil filled heater.
1.I have tried dickenson.com and the site does not seem to go beyond the home page. Is there another website for information on the Dickenson heaters?
2. I saw a plan by Jim Phypers to use the hot water heater with a heater core and fan to heat a 25' trailer. The site is RV Hydronic Heating System. Says it uses 50% less propane and electricity anybody have any experience with this kind of system?
dickinsonmarine.com is the web Marshall, I used to subscribe to "Home Power" good magazine and thanks for the article, looks like something to try. On some of the experimental planes I fly we use a water cooled Rotax 912 powerplant and pretty much have the same system for heat as your article. Automotive heater core plumbed into the water line with a small 12 VDC fan. Robertsunrus- yes the oil filled is nice when you have 110VAC available- it's on the list! Well I'm getting my things together will start with a post showing test equipment used and go from there. Tim
1.I have tried dickenson.com and the site does not seem to go beyond the home page. Is there another website for information on the Dickenson heaters?
2. I saw a plan by Jim Phypers to use the hot water heater with a heater core and fan to heat a 25' trailer. The site is RV Hydronic Heating System. Says it uses 50% less propane and electricity anybody have any experience with this kind of system?
In a simplistic way, this is the same principle that the Twin Temp and Aqua-Hot use for their systems. The Aqua-hot is a diesel fired system that instantaneously heats water for domestic use, but circulates boiler grade anti freeze to several heat exchangers with 12VDC pumps (similar to the heater cores) and uses silent computer fans to circulate the heat from the exchanger.
The Twin Temp works in the same way, but is propane fired. I use the RV-500 water heater from Precision Temp in my 16CCD and it is no problem running it off the pump and water tank while boondocking. It saves a great deal of energy as it's only on when there is a demand for hot water.
__________________ Lew Farber -Certified Master RV Tech (currently on Forums sabbatical) WBCCI #1456/VAC (assoc) #1456 AIR # 10325 CHARTER MEMBER: FOUR CORNERS UNIT
1986 32' Excella, lotta windows, 2'x91/2' vista, 24"x42" rear, 7-20"x30",16"x18" door, 16"x20" side,6"x16" and 3-6"x30". For the test the complete 9 1/2 feet of vista view window, the rear window and 4 of the 20"x30" windows are covered with Reflectix bubble insulation at a cost of approx $25. This stuff is wicked nice. If you are gonna do one thing to winterize make this your first. Just trim it with shears to fit, the curved windows are fitted inside the others the insulation is placed by opening the windows and pressing the stuff between the screen and the window. Then close the window. Takes less than 5 minutes. Put it in at nite and remove in daytime to benefit from sun heating thru windows. The test eguipment is pretty straight forward, an inside outside thermometer that records hi and lo temps and a multimeter with thermo couple probe. pictured on the reflectix bubble wrap insulation.
Here are a few lamps I used when I lived aboard my sailboat in Newport Beach decades ago. If you notice some older AS had propane mantle lamps in them, these are still available Paulin is one brand. Google time. Here are my findings on the Aladdin lamp.The lamp height is 22", burns kerosene, I use Kleen Strip heater Kerosene that I get at Lowes.I've had this lamp for 30 years, geez I'm sounding old, It burns without pressure and has a round wick and a mantle. Puts out about the light of a 60 watt bulb. silent, no smell and quite pleasant as lighting in general. Now sit down for this part. Temp measured one inch above the chiminey opening is 800 F!! yes eight hundred. When sitting on the dinnette the temp directly above measured at the ceiling is 140F. yowza. O.K. On to the Den Haan. A beautiful piece, round wick burns liguid paraffin wax, has a distinct odor, some like it some do not. Temp measured at top of bail 103F. Not a real heater for a cold nite but I just had to include it. Karma is welcome BTW!
Oh I forgot to mention, many folks remark about kerosene smell. That smell is not present with the Aladdin until you blow it out. SO take it outside to extinguish, leave it for 10 minutes then bring it inside. Tim
Here's by favorite for when the sun is shining. My homemade solar convective loop collector. 40F outside 135F being pumped inside. Typically on a sunny cold day this will keep the AS comfortable mid 70's. Even have to open the windows at times. Thats when it is really nice kinda like a sun room. It cost about $100 to build glass was expensive, maybe you can find a used piece. It takes about 1/2 hour to mount on the AS, weighs 30 lbs. About 6 hours to build, once constructed it provides Silent, Free heat. BUT the sun has to be shining and needs to be in a south facing window for optimum results. I got the idea many years ago from Mother Earth News, they're still around too. That's about it for today, tomorrow I will post on the electric heaters. Hope a few are finding this useful! Tim
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Hi, my vote is for the oil filled heater. I have one in my house that I am useing right now. Works great. Would like to find smaller version for trailer. Plus's: vertually noiseless, very little noise [no fan motor] while warming up, and with no exposed gas or heating elements. I feel much safer running one of these all night while I'm sleeping. Still need to use factory installed furnace to keep tanks from freezeing in real cold weather in which I haven't been in yet.
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