heater question- 84' Newport 30 MKIII

[jc.fuego]

I'm new to cruisers forum so apologies if I'm not asking this in the right place. I've been googling and poking around the forum for answers but I'm coming up short...

I am looking for a liveaboard to eventually take off-grid. Non-electric heaters are an important criteria for me. I asked a seller about the heating situation on their MKIII. They said, "It has a built in heater that runs off the engine (I believe), but we never used it, so don't know how well it works. It used to have a propane heater installed, but we removed it for child safety."

Q1: Is a built-in heater a thing?
Q2: Anyone know ballpark estimates of having a diesel heater professionally installed?

Thanks guys

[jc.fuego]

Edit:
I contacted a marine service company near me. For a 30' sailboat, they said their smallest diesel heater would do and the parts are $3,350. They recommend doubling the cost of the parts for labor alone, so ~$7k. For a professional install it would run about $10k.
For self-installation, the rep said it wouldn't be too difficult on the smaller units since it's a bit easier to route the ducts, as long as you can vent the exhaust through a through-hull.

[SV DINGO]

Hi,

i bought a steel yacht in Tasmania / Australia , we are just a couple of days from the Soputh pole so is pretty fresh here.
The yacht had a cute little coal heater , totally useless so i went online , bought a 200.oo AUD chionese Diesel electric heater. Installed it with the help of a local person , Cost about 100.00 AUD.
I use it daily , it is the most essential item here otherwise you could not live on board.

Just for redundancy i bought a second heater and parts and i keep them tucked away in case. would take 1 hour to swap over if the current one dies.

check out the car/boat diesel electric heaters on Ebay.

Good luck

[FAST FRED]

For off grid living a non electric system will give best results

dickinsonmarine.com
Dickinson Marine // Quality Marine Products Since 1932 ..

Look at the Dickinson line of gear. Their Pacific range with a gravity feed tank is a common choice for NYC type cold. 20F at night 30F days.41 ft boat

Use the H type smoke head.