Mahe 36: Heating

[Edmund]

No thread yet on Mahe - Heating, so it's time to start one.

Up on westcoast Norway, were both winter and summer occur every winter and summer, and we rarely see temperatures above 20C, good heating is crucial.

We bought our boat in 2010 without any heating installed, due to what I thought was very expensive options from FP, and I planned to do it all myself. In retrospect, I'm not so sure the savings paid for all the hours spent...

In Port hull I installed a 4kW Eberspacher diesel air heater. Burner in port engine room, air sent forward in a 75mm pipe running through the styrofoam floating chamber (sealed, of course), and further on through the locker bottom, and stairway. Valved outlets in port aft and front cabins, open outlet in port stairway. Control/thermostat on Nav station instrument panel.

Stb hull has a 3kW diesel waterheater, also Eberspacher - see sketch. Burner and flowpump in stb engine room, along with a new Isotemp 40L waterboiler with twin coil and 220V el.heater. Hot water is sent forward in 19mm hoses through the tunnel under the fueltank/fridge.
Heat is delivered from a defroster placed under the fridge with air outlets in port stairway and aft cabin, a toweldryer in the bathroom, and a 1 kW radiator in the port gangway. In addition theres a 150W 220V drying shelf on top of the radiator. Control/thermostat on the wall over the locker, and expansion tank placed up under deck just above the windlass.

In general we are very pleased with the solution.
Air heater supplies heat quickly, but noisy. The the water heater system is more slow, but silent, comfortable and flexible. The stb gangway is now our drying station for damp clothes and shoes, very much appreciated by the crew.
The twin coil/220V boiler allows us to produce both hot water and heating from either shorepower, the Stb engine or from the dieselburner, without mixing engine coolant with the heating water circuit - important to avoid engine failure.

Pictures will follow.

[Edmund]

Pictures.

[Sandero]

Excellent!

[webejammin]

We have been looking at installing a Dickinson 1200 btu propane heater on our Gemini catamaran. Our winter sailing is really nice sence we have 40 deg F and sun most days and just 32 F at nght. Has anyone else used the Dickinson propane heaters ? They look just like the disel heaters but clean burning.

[sailingjoy]

I’ll post this under Heating but the question is really about measurement.
I bought the Mahé 36 of Rabbi. He very professionally installed a D2 Eberspacher diesel air heater that is more than adequate for chilly nights in the Mediterranean. But I’m sailing the boat to the Netherlands and our favourite cruising grounds are England/Scotland/Ireland and then is probably a bit light.
So I am thinking about buying a paraffin heater, a Zibro RC-270. When you use the right fuel it should not smell and it has a CO2 sensor. Of course it will need enough ventilation.

Now my question is: when not used, will it fit under the beds in either of the cabins? Should be simple to find out, but at the moment the boat is in on the hard in Seixal (Lisbon, Portugal) and we are in Rotterdam…
Is there somebody who could measure the height of the entrance to the stowage under the beds?

The heater is 52 cm high, 43 cm wide and 30 cm deep. Could it be placed under the bed without being tilted?

[Cotemar]

It would have to fit through the under bed opening size.
27-7/8 inch wide X 15-1/4 tall
708mm wide X 387 mm Tall

It’s a huge cave under the beds, so if it can fit through the opening you should be good to go.

[sailingjoy]

Oops... I’ll want to keep the heater upright while I put it under the bed, otherwise the paraffin will leak out. And the height is 52 cm, so when you say the opening is 387 mm tall I guess that won’t work. Or do I misunderstand you?

[Cotemar]

Sailingjoy,

The opening is only 38.7 cm tall, so your heater at 52 cm tall will not fit through the opening standing upright.

[sailingjoy]

That's a pity, then I will have to put is somewhere else.
Thanks for the information!

[rabbi]

Originally Posted by sailingjoy

That's a pity, then I will have to put is somewhere else.
Thanks for the information!

I would suggest to wait until you feel a need for another heater.
As you know the individual outlets can be turned on and off as you need. If you just heat the area you are in it should be adequate even in chilly weather.

Heating one or two cabin the d2 will do well even below freezing temperatures, it can easily heat the head as well. Cabins and head don't require much energy to heat them because they are pretty closed off.
The salon is a bit harder to heat, not only because of volume but also because any wind blows right through it. Air enters the anchor locker, blows through the salon and exits at the salon door. Not a problem unless it blows hard while below 10deg Celsius. You could improve that by closing all the gaps to the anchor locker.
But as soon as you also heat the cabins as well it might get chilly in the salon. The heater is simply not sized for that climate.
Luckily you typically heat the salon during the day and the cabins at night. For us with kids going to bed early this was different.

But at night the cabins will be as warm as you want them to be.


If you really want this heater you should be able to store it in the fwd cabin where you can remove the panels under the bed. Or maybe hang out somewhere above the bed.

[sailingjoy]

Thanks Rabbi, it is good to have your real-life experience.
The extra heater would only be to heat the saloon while the Eberspächer warms up the bedroom and the head before we go to bed.
I am not sure yet whether we will need it, but if we do I agree the best place to store it will probably be the forward cabin.

[Dockhead]

If you need more heat, do it right! Don't vent combustion products into the cabin.

Why not a simple Refleks heater, with a window in it so you can watch the cheery flame? Or a Dickinson? For a single space like the main salon on a catamaran, that ought to be a good choice.

[rabbi]

Originally Posted by sailingjoy

Thanks Rabbi, it is good to have your real-life experience.
The extra heater would only be to heat the saloon while the Eberspächer warms up the bedroom and the head before we go to bed.
I am not sure yet whether we will need it, but if we do I agree the best place to store it will probably be the forward cabin.

I tend to agree that I would not want any combustion inside the boat.

Heating really isn't much of an issue if you start the heater early in the evening. Its only a problem if you let the night cold crawl into the boat and try to heat it up again.

Easter holiday 2015 we spent two weeks in ~5-8 deg celsius and it was cozy and comfortable inside. Just got boring for the kids after a week of rain...


I would certainly just turn back to the Med. I prefer barefeet vs boots

[sailingjoy]

This is an update to my question in post #5. In the meantime I have found that my Eberspächer D2 (max 2200 W) is indeed too light for the present conditions. Perfect for the Mediterranean but, as Rabbi said, the heater is simply not sized for a Dutch winter. Last week I had to spend 4 days/nights on board and the heater did not get the temperature in the saloon above 15 degrees C, which took a long time.
As a backup I used a cheap Foetsie 129 paraffin heater (€50) which was adequate for a few days but not a real solution. It stands in the way, it makes the boat really damp and as Dockhead and Rabbi rightly said, it is a combustion product which you do not want in the saloon.
So I drop the idea of a paraffin heater and decided to do it right: either upgrade the Eberspächer D2 to for example a D4 or add a second heater. Or rather, I will have somebody else do it because I can’t do it myself…

Now my question is: where do I install it if I decide to add a second heater. The present heater is installed between the anchor locker and the back of the saloon seat.
What are the other options? Other Mahé owners with diesel air heaters, where have you installed the heater?

[rabbi]

Hi Jan Jaap,

happy new year!


Its howling 50+kn with a ton of rain here at just a few degrees above freezing. Sitting at the fireplace with the warm laptop on my knees I question the sanity of any person wanting to sail dutch winters , but I'll add a few comments anyway.


I guess the existing D2 is OK for the cabins & head at night, and you just need more power for the salon?


You could just replace the Eberspächer D2 with a D4 or D5 and keep everything else in place.
This is easy and cheap, but it may not work as well as you hope because the existing instalation has long air ducts of relatively small diameter. These are OK for the small D2 but the D4/D5 units require a much larger (2-3x) airflow which may cause a pressure drop that is too high. In that case the heater could overheat & shut down from time to time when run on full throttle, so no heat when you need it most.
One solution is to add additional outlets with short ducting into the salon but that may be tricky as there is little room around the existing installation spot and you may end up relocating the heater.
Once you start relocating its no longer quick, cheap & easy so this route is probably not worth going.


I would add a second heater behind the salon bench on the port side, with short ducting of larger diameter and outlets only into the salon.
You could reuse the fuel feed line, and follow the existing approach for air intake & exhaust with little additional effort. Air ducting should be into the salon from under the settee so you get warm feet.
Alternatively the heater could be located in the outside locker, and only the air ducts going into the salon.


Adding a second D2 unit would probably do, but to be on the safe side I'd choose a D4 or D5. The difference between internet prices for D2 and D4 units is just 200 Euro so not worth the risk.

Using this aproach the original D2 is used for heating the cabins at night and the salon in mild weather, while the new D5 is for the salon. If you combine both you have over 7.5kW of heating power, and you should be OK for the worst weather, but the electric demands may require a battery upgrade.

Based on current internet prices I would probably end up around 1400 Euro for a D4 with all installation parts (ducts, exhaust, silencers, throughulls, outlets, etc).
No clue what a marine industry professional will charge you, as they typically not only charge a fortune for their work but also charge at least list prices for the parts.



I would not place a forced air heater into the engine compartments for various reasons: One is the ticking noise of the pump at night near my head, another the complexity of feeding fresh outside air, and finally its hard / impossible to run large air ducts into the salon.
You could add a water based heating system but I never looked into this as I prefer forced air.

Originally Posted by sailingjoy

This is an update to my question in post #5. In the meantime I have found that my Eberspächer D2 (max 2200 W) is indeed too light for the present conditions. Perfect for the Mediterranean but, as Rabbi said, the heater is simply not sized for a Dutch winter. Last week I had to spend 4 days/nights on board and the heater did not get the temperature in the saloon above 15 degrees C, which took a long time.
As a backup I used a cheap Foetsie 129 paraffin heater (€50) which was adequate for a few days but not a real solution. It stands in the way, it makes the boat really damp and as Dockhead and Rabbi rightly said, it is a combustion product which you do not want in the saloon.
So I drop the idea of a paraffin heater and decided to do it right: either upgrade the Eberspächer D2 to for example a D4 or add a second heater. Or rather, I will have somebody else do it because I can’t do it myself…

Now my question is: where do I install it if I decide to add a second heater. The present heater is installed between the anchor locker and the back of the saloon seat.
What are the other options? Other Mahé owners with diesel air heaters, where have you installed the heater?