Best temporary heating?

[Franziska]

If you are primarily looking into nighttime heating try an electric heating blanket.

Uses far less power than a space heater and works very well if placed between mattress and yourself.

I'm writing this when actually lying on one :-)

You could even use a timer or thermostat with it.

Also, depending of the size of boat, separate an area off from the rest of the interior and heat up only that area.

Have nice evening,

Franziska

[SY Kelpie]

Originally Posted by hpeer

That is essentially what I posed above from Planar, a 14k BTU suitcase heater, even has a built in fuel tank.

Yup, same idea, the Chinese ones are about $250 and the Russian ones maybe $450? Probably better quality of course, they know a thing or two about cold weather.

The Chinese ones are available as a kit for about $180; for a portable setup you'd need to construct some sort of frame or box for it. They are incredibly good value IMHO, you get a huge amount of instant heat.

[pianopraze]

Originally Posted by Franziska

If you are primarily looking into nighttime heating try an electric heating blanket.

Uses far less power than a space heater and works very well if placed between mattress and yourself.

I'm writing this when actually lying on one :-)

You could even use a timer or thermostat with it.

Also, depending of the size of boat, separate an area off from the rest of the interior and heat up only that area.

Have nice evening,

Franziska

My 2 month old objects.

Makes sleeping hard.

Can't quite explain to him he just needs to grin and bear the cold on his face, he is warm enough under the blankets.

Not sure if the system would allow me to use electric blanket either. It objected to 400w heater.

In the next year or so I will probably buy and install a "SV DELOS" battle born package system with 6 batteries... but until then I'm limping along best I can on these golf cart batteries, I'm significantly depleting them from a small fan, and a few led lights.

[AKA-None]

Originally Posted by pianopraze

I have two kids on board, including a baby born in October...

Need regular heat, not more kids!

Snip snip ???

[pianopraze]

Originally Posted by AKA-None

Snip snip ???

Wife wants more.. but not yet.

[GILow]

Some good ideas have been posted, and I’m still recovering from your exchange with boatie.

For the record,electric blankets use a surprisingly small amount of power. They work out around 60 watts per sleeping “unit”, which translates to only five amps from the battery bank. Just run them for 30 minutes before going to bed (they shouldn’t really be used while you are sleeping) and you are talking two or three amp-hours from the batteries. Multiply that by four “bed units” and you are still talking only maybe 12 amp hours in total.

They totally transformed my experience of winter on the boat. (For the better.)

[NSboatman]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

I like those Dickinson heaters, which have a big advantage in that they are extremely simple, with like one moving part, so totally owner serviceable, a big advantage for those of us who sail in remote areas. Disadvantages however include (a) need floor space which many of us don't have; (b) require whacking a big hole in the deck; (c) soot in the rigging; (d) poor distribution of heat.


Cheaper and much easier to install, and much much easier to find space for, is something like this:



https://heatersus.com/planar/planar-2d-12v-diesel

I have exactly this heater, and while dockhead’s objections/disadvantages are valid- there are mitigating strategies... or maybe just different perspectives.

Yea, it’s a 6” hole in the deck head... but trimmed out well, coming thru the cabin top 2’ off the deck; and sealed well - we’ve had no issues.

Never had soot in the rig yet. We keep it clean and have good pre filters, and turn over the diesel frequently. These units can and frequently do run very clean. It is a bit of a black art to get them to do so- but it is possible. Countless fishing boats in the PNW do so. Some with black soot, but most without. A straight, clean exhaust stack with a barometric damper is step one.

As for poor distribution of heat, we have a water coil in ours, plumbed to a distribution system with 5 rads throughout the boat. With the circulator on, it heats the entire boat beautifully. Yes, you need the circulator to do so, but that’s a lot less power than running a planar or webasto or espar... I’ve run em all. They’re great - don’t get me wrong- but ya better have big batteries to keep em going.

To each their own of course- but I have to say I’m really liking the quiet peace and gentle heat of these Dickinson heaters. The refleks ones are even nicer- heavier stainless, better quality feel.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by NSboatman

I have exactly this heater, and while dockhead’s objections/disadvantages are valid- there are mitigating strategies... or maybe just different perspectives.

Yea, it’s a 6” hole in the deck head... but trimmed out well, coming thru the cabin top 2’ off the deck; and sealed well - we’ve had no issues.

Never had soot in the rig yet. We keep it clean and have good pre filters, and turn over the diesel frequently. These units can and frequently do run very clean. It is a bit of a black art to get them to do so- but it is possible. Countless fishing boats in the PNW do so. Some with black soot, but most without. A straight, clean exhaust stack with a barometric damper is step one.

As for poor distribution of heat, we have a water coil in ours, plumbed to a distribution system with 5 rads throughout the boat. With the circulator on, it heats the entire boat beautifully. Yes, you need the circulator to do so, but that’s a lot less power than running a planar or webasto or espar... I’ve run em all. They’re great - don’t get me wrong- but ya better have big batteries to keep em going.

To each their own of course- but I have to say I’m really liking the quiet peace and gentle heat of these Dickinson heaters. The refleks ones are even nicer- heavier stainless, better quality feel.

Well, this is a great setup, of course. If I had space for it in the cabin, and if I didn't already have a Eberspacher hydronic system installed as part of the original build of my boat, I would consider something like this. The other advantages which I didn't mention are silence, and little power draw. Of those DISadvantages of my system, the power is not a big problem in my case, with 450ah (x24v) of golf cart batts, but the noise is unpleasant. The noise is because the system uses fan coils, rather than radiators. No way do I have space for radiators. But if I were building a boat from scratch, I would certainly use radiators.

For the OP, however, I think a simple air based system like that Planar would be optimum. Will be cheaper and much easier to install than anything else. Probably $600 or so all in, if he installs himself. This is the way 90% of boats up here of the sizeof the OP's are set up, where I sail. At these latitudes we need heat year round, so heat is mission critical. Definitely mission critical for the OP with small children on board. If he starts getting them sick, his wife will make him sell the boat, so he'd better solve this fast.

Electric heat from batteries is not a good idea, even with lithium.

[hpeer]

Planar portable

[Franziska]

That's pretty neat. Almost like an electric space heater.
I can see this on Lady Rover. We prefer to sail in warm climates with our cat and rarely need heating. So far I used an electric space heater running of a generator. Noise and not ideal.

Put this in the cockpit, put the warmair hose through a ventcowl or portlight and you can heat without big installation.

Once it's warm again, store it in the lazarette.

Originally Posted by hpeer

Planar portable

[Franziska]

Uups, just saw the price tag, but to use a standard planar unit it should be possible to built something similar DIY for a small price tag on the base of the standard units..

https://planarheaters.com/product/po...-planar-2d-12/

We would only heat one hull or the deck house with it..

Originally Posted by Franziska

That's pretty neat. Almost like an electric space heater.
I can see this on Lady Rover. We prefer to sail in warm climates with our cat and rarely need heating. So far I used an electric space heater running of a generator. Noise and not ideal.

Put this in the cockpit, put the warmair hose through a ventcowl or portlight and you can heat without big installation.

Once it's warm again, store it in the lazarette.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by Franziska

Uups, just saw the price tag, but to use a standard planar unit it should be possible to built something similar DIY for a small price tag on the base of the standard units..

https://planarheaters.com/product/po...-planar-2d-12/

We would only heat one hull or the deck house with it..

It's a pretty slick unit, but it's horrendously expensive, a premium of more than $1200 above the cost of the bare unit. Can't imagine how it is justified compared to just hard installing it in the boat, which would be half the cost and much more convenient to use.

[clockwork orange]

I have one of those "All in one" Chinese diesel heaters that was less than $200 and works great. While it looks like a portable unit it really is not as the exhaust comes out underneath and needs to be heavily insulated as it gets very hot. It could be set up in the cockpit and ducted inside but it is not as simple as it might seem. A permanent install would be better. I'm not sure if the Russian or German versions are worth the extra money as the Chinese ones seem to be identical.

[Bill O]

Originally Posted by Franziska

Uups, just saw the price tag, but to use a standard planar unit it should be possible to built something similar DIY for a small price tag on the base of the standard units..

https://planarheaters.com/product/po...-planar-2d-12/

We would only heat one hull or the deck house with it..

Here is a link to a recent CF thread on diesel fired heaters. https://www.cruisersforum.com/forums...ce-242062.html

Good discussion and video links to hook up the Chinese knockoffs of the Espar heaters. Generally the units are good and very inexpensive (~$150 US) for a 5kw unit (~18,000 btu).

[clockwork orange]

That Planar portable unit looks like a more finished unit when compared to my Chinese one in as much as the exhaust or makeup air were not connected on mine and I actually had to use an Espar part to make the exhaust run horizontal and lag it with exhaust wrap, It does have the fuel tank mounted inside the case though which is nice. I already had the Espar part which is just as well as it costs half as much as the entire Chinese heater but even with that it would be about 1/5 the cost of the Planar. Btw, the portable unit is just the same components that come in the box for a permanent install but they have mounted them in a cabinet.