Diesel Heaters

Brakers

Brakers

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Joined
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Location
Southampton
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MH
Chausson 768XLB
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I'm Intermediate
Hi Everyone
As the heading says the question is about diesel heaters for MH.
I’m looking to change my MH in the very near future and with LPG becoming more scarce; I’m looking to fit a diesel heater in my next MH. I’ve been looking at the prices and as most things they range from dirt cheap to very expensive. The MH I’m looking at will be about 7.4metres A class.

Questions
What kw heater will I need to comfortably heat that space?
Which heater do you recommend?
Have you any idea what it will cost to have it fitted?
Do I need a separate tank to supply it?
do they use a lot of diesel per hour?
I also would like one you can control via the internet if that is possible.
Any other advice you think would be helpful.

Many Thanks Tony
 
Get the biggest you can afford, you can always turn it down/off if it gets too warm. You can't turn smaller one up if it doesn't get warm enough. I would say an 8kw would do the job.
Usually the come with a pump to use the main tank or a stand alone tank.
Fitting cost and where... No idea
Depending where its fitted on the van you may need an exhaust extension and silencer.
 
Will there be issues with retro fit?
You will still have to run original van heating when its frosty, to keep all areas warm, underfloor area,garage area, external lockers, fresh/waste tank, water pipe runs, stop boiler freezing etc etc, which the original van heating will have been designed for.
 
You will need a 4Kw Eberspacher Airtronic or a Webasto Air Top if you have deep pockets or you could go the 5Kw Chinese heater route which are very good copies of the Eberspacher Airtronic if you want to save money.

No idea of installation cost as I have installed my own and you may find it difficult to find a professional installer for a Chinese heater.

You can use either a stand alone fuel tank or plumb it into your vehicle diesel tank. I have a stand alone fuel tank and run mine on home heating oil which is way cheaper than diesel, although you can run them on red diesel.

The amount of fuel they use is of course dependant on how much heat you want out of the heater at any given time, but on ours at low heat it uses about 0.1 litres a hour and at full blast it uses about 0.6 litres a hour.

Ours is a Chinese heater and I use an after market controller that can control all aspects of our heater via the internet, but normally they can not be controlled remotely away from your van in there standard form.
 
Two on Tour said:
You will need a 4Kw Eberspacher Airtronic or a Webasto Air Top if you have deep pockets or you could go the 5Kw Chinese heater route which are very good copies of the Eberspacher Airtronic if you want to save money.

No idea of installation cost as I have installed my own and you may find it difficult to find a professional installer for a Chinese heater.

You can use either a stand alone fuel tank or plumb it into your vehicle diesel tank. I have a stand alone fuel tank and run mine on home heating oil which is way cheaper than diesel, although you can run them on red diesel.

The amount of fuel they use is of course dependant on how much heat you want out of the heater at any given time, but on ours at low heat it uses about 0.1 litres a hour and at full blast it uses about 0.6 litres a hour.

Ours is a Chinese heater and I use an after market controller that can control all aspects of our heater via the internet, but normally they can not be controlled remotely away from your van in there standard form.
Click to expand...
Do you have a link to the after market controller?

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You forgot to add the controller is no longer available for UK market: the afterburner comes from Australia and it’s not posted to UK anymore.
He will have to do with the original supplied controller.
 
Raul said:
You forgot to add the controller is no longer available for UK market: the afterburner comes from Australia and it’s not posted to UK anymore.
He will have to do with the original supplied controller.
Click to expand...

No but, he will send to EU countries and most of us have contacts somewhere over there.
 
Using a diesel heat to warmup the van quickly and if outside temp is above freezing, but problems may arise in other areas. We found in the winter with outside temp below freezing our Burstner would dump the water from the boiler when travelling if using the heater in the cab (engine) too high, the habitation (Truma) would then shut down. This allowed the temperature to fall enough to trip the dump valve. The same could apply if using a aftermarket diesel heater.
 
Bessy765 said:
Using a diesel heat to warmup the van quickly and if outside temp is above freezing, but problems may arise in other areas. We found in the winter with outside temp below freezing our Burstner would dump the water from the boiler when travelling if using the heater in the cab (engine) too high, the habitation (Truma) would then shut down. This allowed the temperature to fall enough to trip the dump valve. The same could apply if using a aftermarket diesel heater.
Click to expand...
That’s not the case if properly set up. I use propex gas on thermostat and diesel heater via remote or controller. It will turn of when I want it to, not by itself. It’s better to have two sources of heat at least. If I run out of gas, I got the diesel, and vice-versa. I had minus 22 deg last winter and no frozen boiler, or water dump.
 
When you state if not properly set up? If you follow what I said was, if the cab heater which for our large A class if very efficient at heating the van when travelling raises the interior temp too high in comparison to the Truma habitation heater which is thermostatically controlled. the sensor for which is above the habitation door the Truma thermostat will detect the temperature has reached the required heat and turn off. doing so could and in our case will allow the temperature in areas that rely on ducted warm air that heats areas that will not be reached by a different heat source to fall. For what ever reason the designers of our van have put the automatic dump valve that protects the boiler from frost damage on the opposite side of the van to where the boiler is. This has a small hot air duct to maintain the temp when the habitation heater is in use. Other than using the Truma heater there is no way to provide any other means of ducting heat to that area. If you have two sources of heat that’s great but they will compete with each other which ever one has the lowest setting will always shut down first. So when the weather is bad and the cab heater is working hard to keep the windscreen from misting up the temp in the van will rise. Admittedly this is the first of our last four vans that the cab heater is capable of such a good heat output.
 
Bessy765 said:
When you state if not properly set up? If you follow what I said was, if the cab heater which for our large A class if very efficient at heating the van when travelling raises the interior temp too high in comparison to the Truma habitation heater which is thermostatically controlled. the sensor for which is above the habitation door the Truma thermostat will detect the temperature has reached the required heat and turn off. doing so could and in our case will allow the temperature in areas that rely on ducted warm air that heats areas that will not be reached by a different heat source to fall. For what ever reason the designers of our van have put the automatic dump valve that protects the boiler from frost damage on the opposite side of the van to where the boiler is. This has a small hot air duct to maintain the temp when the habitation heater is in use. Other than using the Truma heater there is no way to provide any other means of ducting heat to that area. If you have two sources of heat that’s great but they will compete with each other which ever one has the lowest setting will always shut down first. So when the weather is bad and the cab heater is working hard to keep the windscreen from misting up the temp in the van will rise. Admittedly this is the first of our last four vans that the cab heater is capable of such a good heat output.
Click to expand...
I understood perfectly from your first reply. The think is air will stratify, with ceiling being warmest and floor the coldest. Thermostat by the door is best location, but midd point or 1m highest. Being above the door will give you false reading and shut prematurely. Hence you will need to compensate by turn it up few deg, or relocate thermostat allot lower.The actual temperature at midd point in height is the temperature that counts.

Anyways, diesel heater for us is a godsend. Cheap Chinese self installed, less than £150 all in. Having the flexibility to save the gas for cooking if you are low, 5L of diesel or kerosene will last ages. We have a 7m crafter and the diesel heater is installed at the back. Most of the time is on 1,6-1,8hz pulse and it takes 100-120ml per hr. you can’t sleep with it on even on it’s lowest setting 1,5hz, to hot. It can work on thermostat as well, but I prefer pulse setting. It’s a 5 kw and I can program it to turn on at a preset time or off. The gas is thermostat controlled, placed by the door under the lip of the worktop. That way does not take a false ceiling reading.
 
I fitted the Eberspacher to my A class with remote thermostat and it works very well to warm up the interior on a cold morning,
It’s used as a back up heater as the trauma 6 does the most work, not too difficult to fit but would recommend both inlet and exhaust silencer to reduce noise to people outside on the initial start up,
Once running and warm they are Unobtrusive making less noise than the radio/ TV,
On the installation make sure the latest fuel pump mounting is used to reduce the ticking sound being
Audible inside, I’m very pleased with the results and nice to have more than one source of heat when needed,
 
ivorantony said:
Once running and warm they are Unobtrusive making less noise than the radio/ TV,
Click to expand...

Does that mean the sound of your diesel heater is obtrusive unless a tv / radio playing? I ask because I am wondering if I could sleep with one operating.

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Lucky said:
How noisey are diesel heaters and their fans?
Click to expand...
We have a Webasto DualTop which does both hot water and heating. It isn't silent but certainly doesn't stop us sleeping. Where they are fitted is an important factor. Ours is at the bottom of the wardrobe with a removable panel above it. We don't always run it on deisel as if on ehu you can select 1Kw or 2Kw electric heating which is very quiet.
 
DBK said:
We have a Webasto DualTop which does both hot water and heating. It isn't silent but certainly doesn't stop us sleeping. Where they are fitted is an important factor. Ours is at the bottom of the wardrobe with a removable panel above it. We don't always run it on deisel as if on ehu you can select 1Kw or 2Kw electric heating which is very quiet.
Click to expand...
As DBK has said it depends on the placement of the unit, mine is between the double floors and to the front on the motor home so very quiet to us sleeping in the rear,
But it’s never been on when we sleep preferring to turn the trauma down low, when I get up in the morning to make the tea and toast for my better half I hit the button for an hour heating,
When we get up it’s nice and warm without using much gas for the trauma,
 
Ditcha said:
If it's a new moho spec one of these instead of gas.

www.truma.com

Combi D 6 E - Inform now

Truma Combi D 6 E is a diesel heater with hot water system and additional heating elements. Find out more about the heater for larger motor homes.
www.truma.com www.truma.com
Click to expand...

In 2016 only the Truma Combi 6D was available as an option on ours, so no chance of running it off the EHU. Next time ... (y)

The Truma D seems to use more diesel than the previous Eberspacher (no boiler with that one to heat water) but is a lot quieter especially on startup. The Eberspacher sounded like a jet engine despite the fitted silencer.
 
I have a 4kw Eberspacher spare removed from a prison van. I will accept a good bottle of Malt for it!
 
I have used 2.2Kw blown air D2 Airtronic Eberspachers in a LWB Volkswagen for years now and find the later ones with a fully controllable thermostat in the habitation area excellent. For a larger van I think a D4 would probably be good.
As mentioned above PF Jones (https://www.pfjones.co.uk/eberspacher-heaters-eberspacher-parts.html) can supply many versions. They also supply Planar heaters which are almost identical to Eberspacher (https://www.pfjones.co.uk/autoterm-heating-systems/planar-air-heaters.html)
Another supplier in the Midlands is Bowers of Stoke on Trent who supply both Eberspacher (https://www.bowerspartsonline.co.uk/brands/eberspacher) and Webasto (https://www.bowerspartsonline.co.uk/brands/webasto). I have used Bowers as a supplier for my heaters.

Chinese heater info can be found here https://www.facebook.com/groups/265862240781579

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quite a bit of info calling 8kw being B*****ks this fella give a good test showing some are only 4 or 5s badged as 8s
if you want to get to the juicy but and skip all of his detailed tests then skip to 13m30 ish
 
Last edited:
Sorry to hijack old tread… got a ten flash error on our dual top. Need to remove 3 fuses to reset. Any ideas where I may start looking for them? Cheers
 
Tombola said:
quite a bit of info calling 8kw being B*****ks this fella give a good test showing some are only 4 or 5s badged as 8s
if you want to get to the juicy but and skip all of his detailed tests then skip to 13m30 ish
Click to expand...

John McK, the diesel heater guru 👍
Everything you need to know if you want to fit your own.
 
Lenny HB said:
Unless you really want a diesel heater I think you are over worrying, I doubt if there will be any problems getting LPG in our lifetime.
Click to expand...
It’s already quite hard to get , fewer and fewer garages have it now! I’m in london and nearest garage that sells it (when they have it) is 16 miles away! I too am becoming concerned and thinking of alternative heating methods hence coming across this thread! I hope you are well Lenny
 
I fitted a Chinese diesel heater to my VW T6.1 just before Christmas in -12 degrees I fitted it beneath my van on a stainless steel bracket bolted to the chassis, I installed the pump with a proper cover clamped to it, I cut a hole for the heating hose under the drivers seat and ran the hose under the drivers seat with a T piece and fitted a heater outlet duct to the front passenger side of the seat box and ran a rear duct to the back of the seat box to heat the rear of my van. I dropped the diesel tank to fit the fuel delivery pipe and fitted the controller under the rear window in my van and on the second attempt with the remote control the heater fired up lovely.
Total cost was under £200.

John.

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