Alternative Furnace Option - Diesel Parking Heater

[ManUtdWY]

How would you compare the heater to a full size rv suburban heater as in heat output?
Thinking this heater may enough to help warm the trailer up faster.

My experience is that it is a completely different solution from a full size RV Suburban heater. Those are higher BTU rated and made for quick heat. These diesel air heaters are more of a sustained heat solution. Would it help the furnace heat up the space more? Sure, but probably not really noticeable. I imagine if you put both in your trailer, that your more typical use would be to fire them both up to heat the space and then turn off the furnace and let the diesel heater keep the chill off over the long period if that is what you are after. I intend to install a second one in my trailer to run along side the one I've already installed for the coldest of days.

 

[Haplo]

Hey guys. I just installed one of these in my trailer. So far it seems pretty good. Minus 2 degrees C out, and within a couple hours the trailer is up to 14 degrees. My trailer is not insulated at this time. Any of you sleep in the trailer in the winter time? Wondering if its feasible lol. What with the times these days, money is a bit tighter so if I could save the hotel bill that would be nice haha.

 

[ManUtdWY]

With the long weekend and some in-laws of the in-laws over to the house for Thanksgiving (long story), I found that replacing my prototype heater with something a little more finished was an excuse to spend some time in the shop.

I also decided that if I was going to reinstall the heater with something more finished, that I would install a second heater to supplement with additional heat for those times when it was wanted. I took a few photos of the installation and thought I would share them again here for anyone interested.

I started with the goal of making it as low profile in my trailer as I could. Total depth of the cabinet is 7.5" for the heater and 4.5 for the fuel storage.

I also wanted the heat to be pushed down instead of horizontal. I hoped that this would create better air circulation in the trailer, but mostly so my daughters could stand underneath it when we returned from a ride.

I tried to approach these goals with mounting the heater on a couple of fir strips so the duct could thread down more easily.

 

[ManUtdWY]

After getting the backing in place, I could trim out the side walls on the heater cabinet and place the duct work as desired.

 

[ManUtdWY]

I wanted the fuel tanks to be a little easier to fill. My original installation had the square tank parallel to the floor, but filling the tank when placed against the wall was a little challenging when trying to keep the diesel from spilling, so I had the idea to install them in a diamond shape so the filler was more easily accessible.

 

[ManUtdWY]

Once I mounted the heater unit to the wall of the trailer I could then drill the holes for the exhaust and I chose to wrap the exhaust pipes with ceramic blanket for heat isolation. I then wrapped the exhaust with high temp aluminum tape for added security against back drafting into the trailer. This did a great job at controlling temps around the exhaust and created a great seal.

 

[ManUtdWY]

Once I had the heater unit installed on the wall, I could place the fuel tanks in their position. Because the profile of the fuel cabinet is only 4.5" deep, I could place it low enough to make filling easy, but high enough to ensure my sled didn't snag the cabinet during loading and unloading. There is all kinds of clearance doing it this way. I also read from others that the fuel pumps do a better job at pushing fuel than pulling it, so I installed the pumps at the base of the fuel to make pulling as easy as possible and it is only pushing about 3.5 to 4 feet in elevation. They are doing a great job delivering fuel.

 

[ManUtdWY]

Now the two cabinets are connected with some 1.5" PVC for the fuel line and cables needed to operate the pump and the heater control and all that is left is cleaning up some wiring and putting the face plates on the cabinets.

The two heaters are amazing! This trailer heats up super fast and stays hot. I will end up putting a face covering on the fuel cabinet, but I designed it in such a way that you can still see the top of the tanks for fuel level inspection. I tried to push the heaters as far up and out of the way as I could. I'm glad I did it that way, but there is no question that the 1/2" spacing between the heater and the cabinet is going to trap heat. Using an infrared thermometer I confirmed that the exhaust pipe is about 230 degrees, the duct is about 200 degrees and the heater at the point of connecting to the duct is 170 degrees. The cabinet above the heater only gets to about 110 degrees, but I am concerned that if I enclose that heater cabinet that it won't exchange heat sufficiently and the heater might turn itself off.

So, I will likely only close off the bottom part of that heater cabinet just to hide the wiring and then either leave the top open or put a hinged door on the top that I can open when running the heater. I may also install a vent fan and enclose it all. I will probably put some ceramic blanket around the duct to help with lowering the heat output in this cabinet in the first place, just not sure yet if that will make the duct too hot and cause other problems.

Final installation pictures to come later this week, but curious if anyone has any other thoughts, comments, or questions before wrapping up this project?

 

[dw8]

That looks awesome. Much cleaner setup than mine. Nice work

 

[moab11]

That is a really nice setup! Two heaters should pump out lots of heat too.

As for enclosing the heater cabinet, you may be ok with how the combustion intake are is drawing the air from around the exhaust piping, and the heating air intake is able to pull from the cabinet. The heater on the right should definitely run cooler since the ambient air needs to flow around the heater first, whereas the left heater has a bit more of a direct shot.

 

[ManUtdWY]

That is a really nice setup! Two heaters should pump out lots of heat too.

As for enclosing the heater cabinet, you may be ok with how the combustion intake are is drawing the air from around the exhaust piping, and the heating air intake is able to pull from the cabinet. The heater on the right should definitely run cooler since the ambient air needs to flow around the heater first, whereas the left heater has a bit more of a direct shot.

Great point about the ambient air. Kinda wish now that I made two intakes on the right side I think I am going to wrap what I can with my excess ceramic blanket and see if I can keep temps down in the cabinet and put a hinged door on it in case I need to open it. Probably won't but can if I need to. Thanks for the compliment and comment!

 

[Timbre]

You did a fantastic install on this!! Should be toasty in your trailer this winter!

 

[skicrave]

Awesome install!

Great info in this thread. Anyone think about building or buying a larger/auxiliary fuel tank to put under the floor? I like the idea of having more diesel available for less frequent fill ups, and that would let me keep the filler outside the trailer for easier access and no chance of spills inside.

Along those lines, anyone think about putting the heater itself under the floor? I would prefer to keep the inside of the box as clean as possible.

 

[moab11]

Awesome install!

Great info in this thread. Anyone think about building or buying a larger/auxiliary fuel tank to put under the floor? I like the idea of having more diesel available for less frequent fill ups, and that would let me keep the filler outside the trailer for easier access and no chance of spills inside.

Along those lines, anyone think about putting the heater itself under the floor? I would prefer to keep the inside of the box as clean as possible.

I saw a video of a guy that had a tank made and mounted it to the outside front of the trailer. I'm sure that you could find an undermount like what come on some of the bigger trailers from logan/trails west/etc
The pump will have no problem as these were originally designed for transport trucks and to draw from the main tank. honestly these things hardly use any fuel, a 10L tank will last all day easily.

As for mounting the heater under the trailer, I would be concerned about road salt corroding everything, plus the ducting would be that much more work to run, etc.

 

[IFlyEm]

I love my 5KW heaters. 1 heater will keep a 8.5x28 trailer with 7 1/2 foot ceilings low 60's. The second heater will bring it up to mid 70's. I run them both off of 1x 7 gallon tank and a 200 Ah AGM battery.

 

[volcano buster]

That's pretty impressive. Can you dictate which heater runs in single mode?

 

[IFlyEm]

That's pretty impressive. Can you dictate which heater runs in single mode?

Whichever one I turn on. They aren't tired together at all.

 

[MT boondocker]

I love my 5KW heaters. 1 heater will keep a 8.5x28 trailer with 7 1/2 foot ceilings low 60's. The second heater will bring it up to mid 70's. I run them both off of 1x 7 gallon tank and a 200 Ah AGM battery.

Curious about what the outside temperature was,starting inside temperature was, and how long it took for the trailer to heat to your posted temperatures?

 

[moab11]

Curious about what the outside temperature was,starting inside temperature was, and how long it took for the trailer to heat to your posted temperatures?

I did a test with my 7x12 and a single 5kw heater. Starting at -20C(trailer sat outside overnight) It took about1.5-2 hours to reach room temp. My floor and ramp aren't insulated, so that doesn't help heating things up.
Overall I'm loving the heater, just have to figure out some venting to get the humidity out after thawing everything out.

 

[800tundra]

Just finished mine. Ran mine outside at minus 22 deg celcius . At ceiling was warm and floor super cold . Gonna. need to do some revisions