diesel heater battery?

[scottkostric]

Hi I have a Diesel heater but it is hooked up to my starter battery so i i have it on it only runs for 1 hour and thats it for the night i know the battery is good as i can leave it for 3 weeks and it still starts fine . so what should i do get it wired to my leisure battery or is there a leisure battery that will start the van ??

Thanks Scott

 

[Deleted member 207]

Its not a good idea for anything to be connected to the starter battery (other than the starter).

Its not that difficult to change/extend/shorten the wire(s) over to the leisure battery.

It can be a problem if the heater uses a chassis earth and your leisure battery does not have a chassis earth, in that case you need to run an earth cable back to your leisure battery from the heater mounting bolts.

 

[Firefox]

Most leisure batteries will start the van. But the cables may not be designed for starter currents. You might have to connect jump cables direct to your leisure battery.

A far better solution would be to connect your heater to the leisure battery.

 

[NicknClair]

Hello,
Most regular Diesel air heaters take 10-12 amps when lighting, then an average of 1-2 amps when running. If the heater only cycles for exactly 1 hour, then as previously explained, it is likely that you have a timer model and the settings/use can be altered to run longer. However as also explained, I would still run it from a leisure battery as the last thing you want to to is get yourself stranded and no way of starting the engine (as a Wild Camper stopping in the middle of nowhere, this could be a problem :-0 ).
If you can let me know what controller you have, I can see what manuals I have on PDf and send them over, but get the power of the heater put to the leisure battery if I were you.

Kind Regards

Nick

 

[Nosha]

My advice is to re-wire it to the leisure battery and have no worries about starting or freezing after the initial 1hr as others have suggested.

 

[scottkostric]

thanks for all the info sorry i have not been online sooner i dont have it at home yet. i will have a look to see which controller it is later on

 

[scottkostric]

the controller i have is this one eberspacher 7 day timer on eBay (end time 23-Jan-11 20:49:52 GMT)

I agree that it needs to be moved to the leisure battery .

I have only ever used the heater on the 1 hour setting but after the first hour the fan goes but i dont get any hot air so perhaps it cant get enough power to get the heating started ?

Scott

 

[NicknClair]

As it is the 7 day timer, you should be able to get a longer running cycle from the system. More than likely it's the power letting you down, certainly if you are working with a single leisure battery.
Here's a link to what I believe is the correct book;

http://www.eberspacher.com/downloads/technical-documents/SFX95.pdf

Good luck