So, I’ve read some people that they’ve converted their propane furnaces to diesel heaters in their permanent icehouses / iceshacks and love it and one said he’d never go back to propane. I don’t know anything about propane or diesel heating sources so I’m wondering what peoples thoughts are.
Diesel is cheaper than propane and they have less problems apparently.
So, if this is the case, why haven’t icehouse manufactures turned to diesel heaters instead of propane furnaces?
I would rather have a suburban lp furnace instead of a cheap Chinese $150 heater for my main source.
I wouldn’t say the diesel heaters have less problems. I joined a diesel heaters group on Facebook and they have just as many problems with the electronics and other parts on them. Check out the group on there and You will learn everything you wanna know about them.
They can be a pain in the butt. The heater in my box was almost 2k and it still has as many issues as anything else. When it runs its awesome when it’s down its spendy
Simple answer is perception and mass production. Most people assume lp heaters are the only option and campers have used them for decades. Most companies engineer and manufacturer for the lp demand before giving thought to other fuel sources
Why not wood fire stove like the olden days. Woods free
Dad always had a pot of water on top to keep the air moist.
Why not wood fire stove like the olden days. Woods free
Dad always had a pot of water on top to keep the air moist.
I wouldn’t mind a wood stove but I think it’s the fact that they take up more room vs tucking a furnace under a cabinet 
Woods free? Who cuts it, splits it, stores it til its dry? That all comes at a cost.
Pretty tough to beat the reliability of a simple direct vent LP heater, no electrical required, simple gas valve, pilot light keeps things dry during the off season. I do have some bias because my plumbing/HVAC background, but they are a simple and as reliable as one can get.
Woods free? Who cuts it, splits it, stores it til its dry? That all comes at a cost.
this can be applied to many other “free” things many people want out there
IMO there are issues with diesel, specifically gelling to make a heater reliable enough large scale. Diesel isn’t as widely useful as propane. You can heat, cook or run a fridge with propane. You can’t do that with diesel. I’m sure there are EPA regulations that may come into play also.
Woods free
About as free as those stimmy checks some of us got lol
Pretty tough to beat the reliability of a simple direct vent LP heater, no electrical required, simple gas valve, pilot light keeps things dry during the off season. I do have some bias because my plumbing/HVAC background, but they are a simple and as reliable as one can get.
Interesting.
My friend’s 2017 Ice Castle has to have the generator running for the furnace to blow out hot air, otherwise it’s cold air.
You’re saying that’s not right?
<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>mnice wrote:</div>
Pretty tough to beat the reliability of a simple direct vent LP heater, no electrical required, simple gas valve, pilot light keeps things dry during the off season. I do have some bias because my plumbing/HVAC background, but they are a simple and as reliable as one can get.Interesting.
My friend’s 2017 Ice Castle has to have the generator running for the furnace to blow out hot air, otherwise it’s cold air.
You’re saying that’s not right?
If he had it set up it would run off batteries as well
The heaters I’m talking about are not forced air furnaces. They are direct vented, no fans at all. Empire is a popular brand.
<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>mnice wrote:</div>
Pretty tough to beat the reliability of a simple direct vent LP heater, no electrical required, simple gas valve, pilot light keeps things dry during the off season. I do have some bias because my plumbing/HVAC background, but they are a simple and as reliable as one can get.Interesting.
My friend’s 2017 Ice Castle has to have the generator running for the furnace to blow out hot air, otherwise it’s cold air.
You’re saying that’s not right?
He’s talking about a different style heater entirely like a HouseWarmer brand or Empire.
They don’t use any power, they just use convection. The down side is they don’t really move air, so the ceiling gets hot and the floor stays colder. They also aren’t very efficient (75%?) so you go through more propane. The upside is they’re extremely reliable/simple.
As for your buddy’s problem, it sounds like his battery is junk.
We’ve used computer fans in the shack to circulate heat around. Works well enough for stocking feet.
In response to the OP’s question:
I’m one of those guys that’s in love with my diesel heater. I have several hundred hours on mine already without the slightest problem, even running in -33 degrees (when propane becomes unreliable).
I installed it with the intent to use it as a backup/supplement, but it soon changed into my primary. I only run propane to get a cold shack up to temp faster (while also running the diesel).
Diesel is SOOOOOOO much more convenient. That’s far and away the best part. I have the tank mounted outside on the same side as my fill door for my diesel truck.
Filling my diesel heater tank for a trip takes 30 seconds and I can pay at the pump. Unscrew the cap, pump in a few gallons, and done.
Getting propane filled always seems to take 20+ minutes and multiple trips into the store, not to mention having to uninstall and reinstall the tanks and cover. The worst is getting turned away because “propane filler Timmy” didn’t show up to work that shift.
Diesel also has far more BTU’s per gallon compared to LP (more heat for less money). It’s nearly half the cost to run compared to filling 30lb tanks.
As for the future, I don’t ever see shack manufacturers going strictly to diesel cab heaters, but I’m sure you could always ask for them to put one in. I’d still always have a propane heater too (never go without a backup heat source).
They’re easy to install and are very small, light, and inexpensive ($125-$175). I have mine mounted in a small cabinet above the wheel well. The fuel pump is outside and is barely noticeable. With the radio or TV on you don’t even hear it. The heater/blower inside the shack is a lot quieter than my forced air propane furnace.
I’ll NEVER own a shack without one again. I even plan on buying another one to put in my enclosed trailer to thaw machines and portables out.
<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>mnice wrote:</div>
Pretty tough to beat the reliability of a simple direct vent LP heater, no electrical required, simple gas valve, pilot light keeps things dry during the off season. I do have some bias because my plumbing/HVAC background, but they are a simple and as reliable as one can get.Interesting.
My friend’s 2017 Ice Castle has to have the generator running for the furnace to blow out hot air, otherwise it’s cold air.
You’re saying that’s not right?
Your friend has obviously not addressed the battery issues discussed in the thread from a couple weeks ago….
Where did you run your exhaust line b-man?
Here’s a couple pics Coletrain.
I installed the heater as least intrusive as possible in case I didn’t like it. I didn’t cut any big holes in the walls or cabinets for venting/heating, just the holes needed for the exhaust/intake through the wheel well. I figured if I hated the heater I could patch everything back up with minimal effort and be virtually unnoticeable.
For the heat itself, I just hang the supplied tube out the cabinet door with a tee on it to force air to the front and back of the shack.
The downside to my install is that the exhaust/intake hoses get a lot of salt on them, but again it was the least intrusive. I’m not sure if I’ll get a year or five years out of the exterior pipes, but they’re super cheap and easy to replace when the time comes.
If I knew I would love the heater so much, I would have mounted it on an exterior wall so the exterior piping wasn’t in the wheel well (most models can be mounted on their side, with the glow plug UP), ran interior duct work, and mounted the controller.
In the pic there’s lots of other stuff not related to the heater in that cabinet (coax wires, livewell plumbing, spare fuel line, etc). The only thing for the heater is the controller with a few feet of black wiring.
The pipes you see outside are connected directly to the bottom of the heater (and not seen in the interior pic)
PXL_20220130_222525408-scaled.jpg
PXL_20220130_222449099-scaled.jpg
PXL_20220202_234544504.MP_-scaled.jpg
Thanks for the pics. Do you ever have any problems with the diesel gelling up or anything with it outside?
Thanks for the pics. Do you ever have any problems with the diesel gelling up or anything with it outside?
Not once
I run winterized #2 diesel and toss a splash of treatment in if it’s going to be well below zero (the same thing I do for my truck)
If you have a place that sells off-road diesel near you it’s even better (no road taxes, so it’s roughly $.30 less per gallon). That’s why the fuel in my tank is red/dyed in the pic.
You can also run #1 diesel or kerosene in them, but both cost more than winterized #2
B-man – You might be the first I’ve seen to do this. VERY interesting and I always like the idea of having multiple methods of heat if needed (and I am not a fan of just running a buddy heater in the wheelhouse). Kind of wish I would of known guys did this to their wheelhouses before I just picked up my new house. I’ve seen them on overlander builds and never thought about it.
Do you have any issues with the air intake and exhaust so close together?
Looks like yours is one of the Chinese knockoffs?
No problems with the intake and exhaust by each other.
The exhaust is under positive pressure, so it’s blowing straight out and away from the shack. The intake is under negative pressure, so it’s sucking air from right at the hole. That air is for combustion, and not introduced into the shack.
You’ll notice a muffler on the exhaust too. It makes a big difference keeping noise down outside.
Yes it’s a knock off. You could buy 10 of them for the same price as a German made one.
I attached a picture of how they work, the bottom wording is missing, but the exhaust and fresh air for combustion are the holes on the bottom.
There is an internal combustion chamber surrounded by a heat exchanger. It looks like an air cooled motorcycle head but without a piston.
When you first turn the unit on, a glow plug starts to heat up and the fan motor begins to cycle. It pulls and pushes the shack’s breathing air over the heat exchanger, and another one is inside the combustion chamber to circulate combustion gasses (in and out from outside the shack).
Picture how you heat your truck. The engine has an intake under the hood, and an exhaust out the tail pipe. Inside your truck is a heater core (heat exchanger) with a fan. When you hit the recirculating button the same air in the cab is sent back over the heater core again to be reheated. Both systems are a closed loop, but you’re taking the heat from the engine (in this case the combustion chamber of the heater), without having exhaust gasses introduced or without using breathing air for combustion.
Next the “dosing” (fuel) pump activates and combustion starts to occur. It automatically adds more fuel and more air as the unit heats up. Once the heater itself is warmed up (takes a minute or two), the glow plug shuts off.
Now the unit is up and running. There is a perpetual blow torch going on inside without the glow plug. From here you dial the unit up or down for the desired amount of heat.
The hotter you want it, the faster the fan moves and the faster the dosing pump cycles. For less heat, the opposite happens.
Picture it like the heater in your truck or car, but with the fan control and temp control on the same knob.
They are meant to run continuous, which is also the most efficient way of heating. The heater uses around 10amps at start up with the glow plug on, then drops to .5 – 2.5 amps depending on your heat setting (which is directly correlated to fan speed).
By running continuous, you don’t get temp swings in the shack like with a standard RV furnace, which is running either 100% and pulling 6-10 amps (depending on size) or completely off. You just simply turn the digital control up or down to run at the desired setting.
When the shack starts out cold, I run both the diesel heater and my propane heater. I set the propane thermostat to 68 degrees.
The propane heater will run until it touches 68 and then begin cycle on and off, while the diesel heater keeps on running. Once the propane heater stops cycling, you know the shack and everything in it is up past 68 degrees.
From there I start to dial the diesel heater down, just like you would in your truck after you’ve been driving down the road for awhile and the cab is warmed up.
It might sound complicated but it’s very simple to do.
Once the shack is warm, if you turn the diesel heater down too low your propane heater will kick back on (and you know that you need to turn the diesel back up a little).
Screenshot_20220203-0901492.png
Do you need to do anything about the exhaust pipe? Insulate it or is it cool enough to run right out? Thanks
Do you need to do anything about the exhaust pipe? Insulate it or is it cool enough to run right out? Thanks
I removed a couple inches of spray foam around the exhaust and wrapped it in header tape where it goes through the wheel well for added protection. The exhaust tube gets hot, especially right where it exits the heater.
You do the same for a forced air propane exhaust. It can’t be touching anything combustible.
How big is your shack? Does that little heater pump out enough heat to maintain temps without the propane furnace kicking on?
OK!
You have grabbed my attention.
Couple questions –
1) Model #’s? I googled “airtronic” not very clear there.
2) What is the vessel used for the tank?
I’m thinking and correct me if ‘m wrong but would this work good at heating a small garage or most importantly heating me 10 x 16 boat house?
How big is your shack? Does that little heater pump out enough heat to maintain temps without the propane furnace kicking on?
It’s a biggen with a lot of area to heat (8×27 with 2′ vee and a slide out). On average it costs just $6 for 24 hours to heat with diesel (more info on that in a bit)
Once the shack and everything in it is warmed up, the diesel does the rest. I’ve had it in -33 temps running at 85% or so throttle without the propane kicking on (granted it was relatively calm, the shack banked up, and hole sleeves in). But even then it’s pretty impressive what it can do for such a large area. My shack is sprayfoamed but I have a ton of windows, the slide out, and a toyhauler door too.
A 5kw heater is equivalent to 17,000 BTU’s when running full bore. That’s a lot of heat for such a tiny package.
It all depends on the day (outside temps and wind), but most of the time I’m running it at 60-70%, and as mentioned before it’s continuous and even heat.
On average I go through 1.5-1.75 gallons of diesel in 24 hours to heat my shack in the winter. Which as said earlier, equals $6 for 24 hours, or $0.25 an hour.
Compare that to running my Little Buddy Heater (the little round one) in my Otter Cottage, which burns through a $4 one pounder in 5 hours…..or $0.80 an hour
It costs roughly three times more money to heat my little one man portable on one pounders compared to my Ice Castle on diesel!!! LOL
^^^^READ THAT AGAIN ^^^^
The convenience and efficiency of diesel is incredible.
Also worth noting if you’re shopping, the heater I bought was marketed as an 8kv, but I found out after buying it that it’s really only a 5kw heater with a 8kw sticker on it. Either way it does the job and then some.
PXL_20220125_170701433-scaled.jpg
You must be logged in to reply to this topic.
