Next project was to figure out how to get some nice dry heat into the bus for camping and demisting the windscreen. A couple of my mates who have boats install Eberspachers derv heaters. After a couple of days trolling round ebay and the such, i found this gem.
24volt 2.2kw of heat and uses 210ml of diesel per hour on full chat. In order to run this in the bus I needed to change 12Volts to 24Volts but at 11amps after looking at making an oscillating circuit in order to up the voltage via transformer I came across a switch mode 12v to 24v @ 15amps box on ebay for only £54 delivered. It weighs absolutely nothing and runs on 10v to 15v regardless. After taking about a month to arrive from China :roll: i plugged the lot in and gave it a test. WHAT A BIT OF KIT.
Drilled a couple of holes and test mounted it inside the cab.
I found a 3lt go kart fuel tank on ebay for £15 and had some pipe laying round. In all this cost me about £300 including the heater, pump, tank, voltage converter, and hose clips. Working out how much it will cost to run and the easiness of obtaining fuel compared to a Propex unit is remarkable.
It you run it on red derv at 89p a lt it costs 18p per hour on full bore (2.2kw) compared to a Propex unit which i worked out at 55p per hour and the hassle of trying to get a gas tank when travelling.
The next job was to cut the belly pans off and see what the floor looked like.
Not too bad for 43 years old. I will be blasting this and repainting before the summer.
Next job was engine out to fix the nasty oil leak
Turned out to be a lose oil cooler. So i started stripping the complete lot down ready for a good clean and new tin bits.
While the engine was out i took my time and installed Dynamat to the engine roof. This should make it a lot nicer on long trips
Another sunday project was to make a fire for shows in the summer. Ive got loads of old propane tanks laying around so i thought i would cut one up. I won't bore you but here is the nearly finished project