We Have Heating!

After thinking for a while, I decided to get a blown air heating system installed. It is winter, and I am planning to take Mt.Percy for a longer ride into wintery regions. When repairing some of the things during the cold evenings in recent weeks, I wished that I had a heater installed.

For a while I looked on eBay: Propex gas heaters appear to be very popular. But in recent weeks the prices for used heaters shot up significantly. People were obviously willing to pay more than £ 300 for an old beat-up used system. I decided then instead to get a new heater, which is available for £ 429 at Rainbow Conversions. Interesting enough: their outlet on eBay as grasshopperleisure sells exactly the same thing for £ 499. Indicates a good reason also to look for other shopping sites than eBay, as prices are not always the cheapest there.

Maybe I could have installed this heater myself, but I was wary of drilling holes into the floor of MrPercy, not knowing if I might damage something. So I began considering letting a professional installer setting up the heater. In the meantime, after some research, I realised that the gas bottle I had was Butane. And this gas is unsuitable to be used below 0deg, as it does not produce any gas at this temperature and below. So I would have to get a propane gas cylinder. But then I discovered the Gaslow system: this actually is a refillable gas bottle, which uses standard LPG, which is available on many petrol stations across Europe. I got a quote from a local motorhome dealer, and then decided to spend the money and get this installed. The Gaslow cylinder is yellow. A metal hose goes to a filling terminal, so that the gas can be filled from the outside.

I installed the electrics of the heater myself, because the heater will of course be controlled through the fused panel switch. I mounted the control unit which came with the heater, near the switch board. Small problem there first: the switch appeared to be larger than its hole in the cover. This seemed to prevent that the cover could be removed from the back plate. Eventually, however, it worked, and I was able to connect all the cables properly.

So now MrPercy has a fully functional heater. I tried it out, and it works great! Ready now for the big upcoming trip.