Heating your van and water in winter?

[barryd]

Yes, indeed. The electric elements in these heaters have very short lives and cost four figures to replace, because of how they are built into the unit.

If it is only for when you hooked up at home, I would suggest an oil filled radiator heater rather than a convector heater. Leave the bathroom door open and put the heater just outside it.

If you plan to take it on the road, a convector heater is lighter.

Blooming crazy! As we left this morning I stuck it back onto Electric 2 higher power for an hour and it was fine so hopefully it was just a blip. We had it on most of the time on our summer trip come late September and all of October as it was just fantastic. Michelle loved how the bathroom was always cosy and constant piping hot water but it seems to me that these Truma units are not fit for purpose for long term use from what I have now read. Moving forward as long as it is always reliable on gas for heating the water and occasional gas heating then that will do for me and ill just try and use the convector heater as much as possible for space heating in future for long term off season park ups on hookup. I want to keep this van at least ten to fifteen years so all the systems in it need to be reliable and if they are not they need chucking and replacing with something that is.

Most of our touring will be April to October though and I hope later this year we will be more worried about keeping cool than warm. Its official though. I no longer like winter touring. Pah!

 

[Pudsey Bear]

Blooming crazy! As we left this morning I stuck it back onto Electric 2 higher power for an hour and it was fine so hopefully it was just a blip. We had it on most of the time on our summer trip come late September and all of October as it was just fantastic. Michelle loved how the bathroom was always cosy and constant piping hot water but it seems to me that these Truma units are not fit for purpose for long term use from what I have now read. Moving forward as long as it is always reliable on gas for heating the water and occasional gas heating then that will do for me and ill just try and use the convector heater as much as possible for space heating in future for long term off season park ups on hookup. I want to keep this van at least ten to fifteen years so all the systems in it need to be reliable and if they are not they need chucking and replacing with something that is.

Most of our touring will be April to October though and I hope later this year we will be more worried about keeping cool than warm. Its official though. I no longer like winter touring. Pah!

If you're always (mostly) going to be on EHU I'd not bother with the onboard stuff at all Barry, we bought a small ceramic fan heater for the van but never used it so brought it into the house, only about a foot high, and maybe 8x8 it has a safety switch so goes off if it gets knocked over used very little electric, we gave it to a charity shop last year as we didn't need it here, I'm sure there will be something to heat the water too, maybe a calorifier might work, but never seen one, but certainly somethign which easily replaceble would be the way forward.

 

[barryd]

If you're always (mostly) going to be on EHU I'd not bother with the onboard stuff at all Barry, we bought a small ceramic fan heater for the van but never used it so brought it into the house, only about a foot high, and maybe 8x8 it has a safety switch so goes off if it gets knocked over used very little electric, we gave it to a charity shop last year as we didn't need it here, I'm sure there will be something to heat the water too, maybe a calorifier might work, but never seen one, but certainly somethign which easily replaceble would be the way forward.

Its how we did things in the old van I suppose as you describe. On hookup when it was cold we just used a 2kw convector heater which was fine and only put the hot water on as and when we needed it for showers. I assumed as I now had a luxury modern motorhome we would just use the lovely modern constant heat and hot water Truma system and just have it on all the time. Im not so sure now thats a good idea. Thing is when its sub zero outside you have to leave something on when you go out for the day even if its just on low otherwise you come back to a freezing van. As said though. I am not too worried about it as most of our use will be in the warmer months and off grid. I can't wait for that to be honest. Out on the bike, jumping in lakes. I know a lot of people enjoy winter touring and it kind of used to be a bit of an adventure but Im not that keen anymore. We only just got out of where we were staying this morning. Five miles of narrow minor roads which thankfully only had a few small hills in them and they were lethal. Today was the only window I think we would have had to escape! Bollox to that.

 

[Pudsey Bear]

This is the problem when you get to your age mate.

 

[trevskoda]

only put the hot water on as and when we needed it for showers.

Try a car wash for two.

 

[barryd]

This is the problem when you get to your age mate.

True dat. There isn't much a spaz like me can do this time of year. Too cold and icy for biking, swimming is right out! My days of hiking up Cat Bells are long gone. I can just about shuffle to the hot counter in Booths and that's it!

 

[Pudsey Bear]

I can shuffle a bit too.

 

[JQB]

I love my new van and tomorrow will be the first winter trip. We were away all summer in it right into November and in the back end we were on hookup all the time as we will be over Christmas and New Year (I know not very well ard wild camper stuff but there you go).

So all through October and November I pretty much had the water set at 40 degrees all the time and the Truma blown air heating on most of the time. Generally on a low setting on eco when we were out. I suspect it will be the same over Christmas and New year but I did start wondering with us spending so much time away in it if the Truma units were designed for constant use. Would it make sense perhaps to just use a convector heater for space heating? We carry one anyway and a fan heater back up just in case. My thinking is you can replace a convector heater for twenty quid but I bet the Truma system will be a heck of a lot more if it fails. Just interested in peoples thoughts.

Constant use? Mine's packed up on any setting, three red flashes pause three red flashed and so on.