| Author |
Message |
Henry R. Bergman, Jr. (Henryofcj) (63.224.197.10)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, November 16, 2002 - 5:45 pm: | |
Now designing the electrical system of my diesel electric coach. How much cold weather heating performance can I expect from a 50 amp campground hookup alone with no other heating sources?
Anyone full timing in cold climates just using shore power for heating? How does it work? How warm do you stay? How cold of climate can I experience using just induction heating?
I understand it will depend upon many factors the most important being the amount of insulation in the coach and the amount of cold temps the owner is willing to take. Thanks in advance. |
George Myers (12.85.14.96)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, November 16, 2002 - 7:50 pm: | |
We get along very nicely with two electric heaters on a 30-amp shoreline. 50 amps is more than necessary. We let the 1000 watt heater on all the time and have the 1500 on a thermostat. It does not run all the time in temperatures down to freezing. Our coach is very well insulated and we have window blankets on the larger windows.
On the other side, you can not count on always having 50 amps or even a hookup. We went for two years without a furnace, relying on the heaters. During that time we probably had 90 days of cold weather and were never cold. However, there was always the specter of not being able to find a hookup. Hear in the Ohio/Michigan area, most of the RV parks close in October and finding an outlet could be a problem. I am far more relaxed now that the furnace is in. |
DaveD (206.47.206.114)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, November 16, 2002 - 10:05 pm: | |
What style of electric heaters do you have?
DaveD |
TomNPat (68.128.12.88)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, November 17, 2002 - 1:49 am: | |
Henry,
One of the things we use a lot of is our electric blanket on the bed. Doesn't take much juice but makes some low temperature tolerable. We use a 1500 watt oil/radiator type heater, but we quit going to Gallup in the winter. There isn't any 'glow' like a fire.
I'm sure you'll be ok even in Gallup with 50 Amps.
TomNPat |
Jim Ashworth (Jimnh) (172.163.49.137)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, November 17, 2002 - 9:06 am: | |
Using 1500 watt heaters, (which put out 5000 BTU each) you can get an absolute maximum of 8 on a 50 amp outlet if you can truly get 50 amps at 120 volts out of it. Using a general figure of 400 BTU's per degree of temp rise with a bus with factory insulation and some windows covered/removed, with 4 heaters you will get 50 degree rise over outside temp, which will make it good to 20 degrees outside with 70 degrees inside.
Using 3 heaters it would result in a 38 degree rise. With keeping the inside at 70, the lowest outside temp you could keep warm with would be 32 degrees. To get this rise, the heaters would run full time. 4 heaters x 1500 watts x 24 hours=144KWH per day. At $.12 per KWH (which is what I have been charged at campgrounds) it will cost $17.28 per day to keep the coach warm.
At that price, it wouldn't take long to pay for a gas or diesel fired heating system.
Jim |
Earl-8-KY (209.42.182.32)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, November 17, 2002 - 9:42 am: | |
I use two 1500 watt. heaters most of the time. If I am out in cold weather I usually go to a camp ground if one is handy. The cost is not so much if you figure the cost of heat. I have a 36,000 BTU gas furnance which I use for over the road heat. I also use it at Flying J and Wall- Mart. This keeps my bus nice and warm. |
Scott Whitney (66.82.9.17)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, November 17, 2002 - 11:35 am: | |
As much as I dislike the idea of electric heat in general, I am currently in a situation where I am using only electric heat. It is getting down to about 30° for nighttime lows with about 50° daytime highs. I am currently using two 1500W heaters. The bedroom one is only turned on at night. The diningroom/office area unit is on a thermostat: 67° in the day and 63° at night. I also have the livingroom area of the bus divided off by a temporary block foam insulation wall and is like an artic entrance/foyer used only as a tool corral and boot & jacket changing area. (conversion is in-progress) So I have reduced the volume of the coach that I heat to about 3/4.
Using this method, the daytime temp inside the coach is kept at about 65°-75°depending on sunlight conditions. (I have no idea how cold it is at night) I use an electric blanket to preheat the bed, but usually turn it off when I go to bed. (don't like the idea of snoozing for hours on end bathed in an electromagnetic field. . .) BTW, a down comforter does wonders to retain the heat once you start out with some.
Also, I have the windows on the viewless side of the coach covered in block foam too.
This is done on a 30A circuit.
However, the whole system may fail when the nightime lows drop another ten degrees to 20°!!
I maybe be doing a crash-bang installation of my 35,000BTU forced air furnace some brisk winter day. . .
Ask me in two months how it is going!
: ^ )
Scott |
Tom Caffrey (Pvcces) (64.114.233.138)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, November 17, 2002 - 5:33 pm: | |
Henry, 50 amps at 240 volts turns out to be 12 kwh per hour. Since you get 3413 btu per kwh, you can produce nearly 41,000 btu with that much power.
Of course, if you want to use the microwave to heat a cup of coffee, you'll need to turn off at least 10 amps of heater on the leg that the microwave uses or you'll pop a breaker.
In all seriousness, why would you want to be set up that way? If it gets cold out, you'll be praying that nothing in your electrical circuits fry.
To do that, you will need hard wired 230 volt heaters, because portable electric heaters are never to be used as permanent heating. That's how you get house fires.
Since 50 amp circuits, if I understand right, may be 50 amps at 120 volts on each of two legs and may be in phase, you may not even get 240 volts across the hot legs. This means hard wired heaters won't work unless you use the 120 volt kind made for bathrooms.
If you do get the 40,000 btu by running all the heaters at one time, the 12 kwh/hr will run $1.20 per hour at 10 cents kwh, which means in a cold snap, you could spend anything up to $28.80 per day for power.
If you power them off of a diesel light plant, you are going to burn about a gallon per hour producing that much power. That could run to $30 or more per day in fuel if the generator needed to run around the clock.
If you capture the waste heat from the light plant, you might be able to get twice the heat from your fuel and cut the bill to under $20 per day in a cold snap.
If you burn the fuel in a boiler, then your consumption for the same heat could fall to around 1/3 of a gallon per hour, and you could run on batteries for extended periods (12 volts at 15 amps) for the burner and pump and blowers.
This would bring your fuel bill down to the $10 per day range in very cold weather. If you burned propane in a furnace, the number would be more like a half gallon per hour or $15 per day.
This gives you some numbers to work with, since that seems to be what you were asking for. It might be a good idea to figure out how to get some redundancy into the system, since you won't want to be trying to solve that problem if it gets cold out.
Tom Caffrey PD4106-2576
Suncatcher |
Quest (198.29.191.148)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, November 18, 2002 - 10:19 pm: | |
I read an article where the heat units in the airconditioner could warm the cabin up to a point where it is actually too warm. I read this in one of CoryDanes' posts. Sorry, I dont know how big in watts the heat element is, but that is also a form of electric heat.. I know they were intended for warming up a small space, by the manufacturer. Corys' post was the first I read about actually using the heat coil for heating the coach, though I think he mentioned the outside temp was at 30 degrees and the inside temp worked up to over 80 (at night) in a 24' rv minimotorhome with one air con/heat coil. I recall the post saying that he planned to make a thermostat control for the heat coil for control on the two air con heaters for the conversion.
Now thinking that an RV has crap for insulation and supposedly the air con heaters are of little value( I read this in some past posts), his post brings an entirely new light upon this source of heat, perhaps not as a prime heat source but perhaps good for cool climates with electric heater backup (or furnace/wabasto, etc).
I'll have to check out the ratings and see if I can play with Toms numbers and see if it all gels well. Thanks guys
Quest |
FAST FRED (209.26.115.99)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, November 19, 2002 - 6:10 am: | |
One of the biggest hassels of electric heat or the TEC (Total Electric Coach) is there huge consumption will soon cause either coaches to pay a surcharge ( say $20.00) a night or the hassles to a campground of installing electric meters at every location. Then check in will require a trip by the management to read the meter , and another to read it on leaving.
Simpler to just ban Coaches.
Having customers use $25 worth of electric to stay in a $20.00 campsite would seem to be self limiting.
FAST FRED |
Richard Bowyer (Drivingmisslazy) (66.190.119.82)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, November 19, 2002 - 8:52 am: | |
For any body that is even remotely thinking of doing some cold weather travel, then the availability of a back up heat source is mandatory.
For example, I originally lived in Southern California when I bought my bus and then moved to Florida. I had no intention of ever spending time in cold country. Bus heat was the least of my worries.
A few years ago, I decided to visit WV for a couple of weeks. Not really cold, but down in the low 20’s at night. After a few nights, the Webasto decided to not operate (later found to be a dirty fuel filter due to lack of proper maintenance, but who needed a furnace in Florida?). OK, so I still had a genset and heat strips in my A/C units plus four auxiliary electric heating units installed throughout the bus. No problem. That is until the genset decided to quit genning (later found to be a loose electrical connection). Two down, and one to go. I cranked up the 8V92, threw a rug across the front of the radiator and spent the next few days with the engine idling to not only heat the coach, using the coach hot water heating system, but to keep the batteries charged.
The moral of the story is that regardless of what you think, circumstances may change and you will be glad that you installed and auxiliary heating source.
Richard |
Scott Whitney (66.82.9.31)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, November 19, 2002 - 10:31 am: | |
Hi Richard,
Good story.
Case in point - last night my little electronic heater made by Bionaire crapped out on me. It is a fancy space-age looking thing with built-in digital thermostat, back-lit LCD display etc. Now it just blows cold air.
So I pulled out my little WallyWorld special and am using that instead now. Gotta have back-ups. . . Reconsidering installing my 35,000 BTU propane furnace before winter really sets in. I don't like electric heat. . .
Scott |
Henry R. Bergman, Jr. (Henryofcj) (63.224.197.10)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, November 19, 2002 - 8:45 pm: | |
Thanks everone for the great input. Insulating my Crown is going to be a problem and I do not know if I can use the ballpark figure of 400 BTU's per foot of coach.
It did get a little cold here before halloween and the temp gage read 14 degrees on the head of the bed next to my uncovered head. Slept very warm due to......
The electric blanket my landlord loaned me. Quess he felt sorry for me. Right now the game plan is not to be in climates below freezing, but already blew that one.
Havent yet gotten the aux heaters. Do not know what kind yet to get other than induction type. The dedicated system will be some sort of diesel fired hot water type. Thanks again everyone. |
Quest (198.29.191.148)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, November 20, 2002 - 2:01 am: | |
I am a big advocate of heaters that use no electric to run. Vented and have low oxygen sensors. Try West Marine, or any good Marine supply for a heater. I think I saw a diesel fired heater that uses no power to run.
After my RV heater ran the battery down, (the blower is a big pig) the furnace would not fire. So I have since become a big fan og the powerless units. I only look for these types of units now. See whats out there and you might like what is offered. |
FAST FRED (209.26.115.203)
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, November 20, 2002 - 5:10 am: | |
For serious cold weather living , the Dickinson diesel Ranges or heaters can't be beat.
No electric is used , although you do need a gravity fuel tank.
The ranges are the "best' as the stove top is always ready & the oven is too.
For fooks with space problems their Antartic heater takes only one square foot.
ALL REQUIRE a vent thru the roof.
Worked for me for 15+ years , with only an annual end of season cleaning .
FAST FRED |
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