After seven weeks the Eberspacher is now working. We’ve been fortunate with the weather, otherwise we may have been a frozen antipodal couple. Originally it was a defective part; but despite the replacement of the component the Eberspacher refused to heat the radiators.
Today Nick (engineer) brought down the laptop and diagnostics software to plug into the heater. However, before he got to that point he asked me whether the Eberspacher would actually start. I confirmed it would… but it wouldn’t heat the system! Nick immediately thought an airlock might be the problem as he could hear the pump running dry (my hearing these days is too poor). Nick knew where the header tank was located and found it dry. After adding three jugs of water and bleeding the system the Eberspacher is once again running correctly.
I then took the opportunity to quiz Nick on the use of the Eberspacher. He informed me it must only be run for 1-2 hours continuously and then rested. His advice was to use it to warm the boat at the beginning of the day whilst the multi-fuel stove was starting up. Apparently running the Eberspacher for any longer than 1-2 hours will result in it coking up and failing. This surprised me, as I had assumed the longer and harder it ran, the less likely the unit to carbon up. I suspect all of this is academic as we intend having a Hurricane heater fitted to Waiouru. Having worked with the Canadians and seen some of their kit I wouldn’t be surprised if the Hurricane will run on water 24/7. 
7 comments :
Hi Tom
Keep a close eye on your Hurricane being installed, I may need some pointers and advice.
Hope you are bith well.
David
David,
I will certainly blog about it so feel free to contact me when installation commences.
Tom
As well as the Hurricane have a look at the Bubble PJ from Harworth Heating as it has good reports as well; http://www.oilstoves.co.uk/shopdetail.php?PJ230VACBH
Robbo
Interesting, but it looks like it needs 230v?
It does. Some benefits with this is that it's more like a house oil boiler so is easily serviced and has standard parts (and about £1K cheaper!). There has been a recent thread on CWDF regarding diesel boilers and this one was recommend. Beware of the Hurricane II, it's picky on the voltage drop and one builder had to install a DC-DC transformer (it was in CWDF about 2 years back).
My boat isn't ready for a boiler yet but the Hurricane and the Bubble are both shortlisted for me.
Just had a look at the Harworth site, there's a tech document for a 12/24volt version here: http://www.oilstoves.co.uk/webdocs/technical/Bubble/Bubble_PJ_24_Volt_Boiler_Installation_Instructions.pdf
so they still may do one...
I've been reading the pdf in your link. It looks like the heater is 24vDC with converters for 12v and 240v.
The only critical limitation for me (thus far) is the height of the unit. It won't fit on the swim.
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