Boat heating wish list

[GILow]

OK, just found some figures buried in Webasto's web site.

They claim an hourly diesel consumption of 0.61 litres a full power for my unit.

So producing the full 5 (actually, 5.2) kW, that will cost me 91 cents per hour in diesel.

Using electricity at the same 5 kW RATE will cost me at least $2 per hour.

It's a no brainer.

But once I get my head in the right space, I will have a look to see how I can use their figures to calculate the efficiency of the boiler. At a guess, it should come out around 80% from those figures.

[Wotname]

What's the price and efficiency of a beanie and jumper

[GILow]

Originally Posted by Wotname

What's the price and efficiency of a beanie and jumper

Polar fleece mate, get with the times.

[GILow]

OK, I crunched the numbers from Webasto, and based on their figures the boilers run at 83% thermal conversion efficiency, which is not bad.

[bcboomer]

[QUOTE=wingssail;2915910]

After two years in PNW however we removed the Espar due to maintenance issues. Glow Pugs burned out with regularity and other problems. 15 repairs in 21 months.

Same area, same experience. This time it needs a $260 blower plus $220 labour to install.

I switched out for a Planar hydronic. Simple changeover and much better service. (and cheaper )

It's quieter, burns clean and can be dismantled with simple tools.
If I were headed offshore I'd take a second one as a swappable back up.

[Wotname]

Originally Posted by GILow

Polar fleece mate, get with the times.

Sooo yesterday!
Mankets are the go today and real men only wear it in greasy merino - jus saying.

Everyone likes wearing the Manket – supermanket

[h_story]

Originally Posted by GILow

Hi all,

Sophisticated electronic control systems are very much my forte, so if you think of something that would require complex management, that may be possible, even simple.

Over to the brains trust.

Matt

Well it's not high tech but it is hot tech. And if you are single.. a boat a bottle of wine and cozy fire on a cold night? Talk about home field advantage, it's just not fair..

[keithw88]

Originally Posted by Wotname

Sooo yesterday!
Mankets are the go today and real men only wear it in greasy merino - jus saying.

Everyone likes wearing the Manket – supermanket

I needed that fashion update, I would have looked very old this upcoming SH winter without this vital accessory.
However, even more vital is the need to emphasise that NO GOOD MAN will every wear polar fleeces ever again. Unless they promise never to wash them or to fall into the water. We really do need to stop micro-plastic pieces getting into our beloved oceans.
Greasy merino is totally morally acceptable.
K

[El Pinguino]

Originally Posted by GILow

Oooh... sobering update.

My man on the ground (where I plan to live) just reported -5 degrees Celsius this morning.

So you aren't going to Hobart then ?

Latest Capital City Observations Hobart

[Wotname]

Originally Posted by El Pinguino

So you aren't going to Hobart then ?

Latest Capital City Observations Hobart

He might nip up there if his heating isn't up to scratch; quite balmy in Hobart ATM.

[Wotname]

Originally Posted by keithw88

I needed that fashion update, I would have looked very old this upcoming SH winter without this vital accessory.
However, even more vital is the need to emphasise that NO GOOD MAN will every wear polar fleeces ever again. Unless they promise never to wash them or to fall into the water. We really do need to stop micro-plastic pieces getting into our beloved oceans.
Greasy merino is totally morally acceptable.
K

Actually you make a good point!

[Ivanvet]

Hi,
We installed a hydronic diesel heater (Webasto DBW 2010) last winter on our Beneteau 473, and we are pretty happy with it. A few lessons that I learned were:

- We did use PEX tubing, and if I did it again, I would use hose instead. Running stiff PEX tubes throughout the boat was by far the hardest part of the installation.

- We also designed the system in parallel (as depicted on the Eberspacher website (instead of the siple run from the Webasto) to help with efficiency and such. This has given us a lot of trouble, because of the differences in pressures/flows within the loops (even after installing regulator/flow valves). To the point that we cut and splice the system again and converted into a single (series) run. This is way more simple and we don't have any issues anymore.

- We didn't install a summer/winter valve or anything for the engine, but this fall I'll plan on adding this. My goal is to add a heat exchanger for the engine, so when we are motoring, the fans can blow hot air below.

- Costs: We spent about $10K putting this system together. We live in Boston and during the worst of the winter we were using 50 US gallons of diesel in 3-4weeks. There were a couple of nights that we didn't have power and were running the diesel heater from the batteries. The circulating/fuel pump are power hungry, so keep this in mind as well. We run the numbers, and if the boiler doesn't break (which happens), we will break even in 4-5 years, compared with the expenses of running the boat with electric.

The question is whether you want to deal with the added complexity (and weight, loss of space, etc...) of this system.
For us, it works out because we are planning on staying here for another 5 years, and then we'll probably go north and across the pond to northern Europe.

Good luck!

Ivan
S/V Balú

[GILow]

Thanks Ivan, great contribution.

A couple of interesting points in there. Like you, I will be using PEX tube and I am not particularly looking forward to running it through the boat but fortunately I’ve got an easy path. I looked at rubber hose but it really put the price up.

So far, with a LOT of DIY and using things like recycled van heaters the cost is coming out under AU$2K for a system that also supplies my hot water so I am pretty happy with the cost. Based on the figures I posted earlier the payback in energy costs should be pretty quick.

Thank you for the caution about parallel vs series approach. I THINK with just three heaters I’ll be able to balance a parallel setup but if not it should be relatively easy to convert to series given the simplicity of the pipe layout.

I note that a few people have had problems with the Espar heaters. So far my readings about the Webasto have been mostly positive though there was some mention of avoiding short run times to prevent soot buildup.

Fingers crossed, I think this system will be good.

[GILow]

Originally Posted by El Pinguino

So you aren't going to Hobart then ?



Latest Capital City Observations Hobart

No way mate. That place is far too hot for me.

[GILow]

Originally Posted by Wotname

Sooo yesterday!

Mankets are the go today and real men only wear it in greasy merino - jus saying.



Everyone likes wearing the Manket – supermanket

I DARE you to wear one.