Heating System


You essentially have three options for heating your van; Gas, Diesel or Wood.

Heating takes a lot of energy and you won’t get enough from a solar system (that you can fit on your roof) to heat your van – especially considering that on cooler weather often you have less sun. So – electric heating is not an option.

 

Gas heaters; these work well in combination with a refillable propane or LPG tank. They are not too expensive ($500 ish) and not to hard to install – ideally this is installed by someone qualified to do so an at minimum checked by a gas engineer.

Diesel heaters: These generally need to be installed by someone who knows what they are doing and cost around $1000 or more – they tap into the fuel line and are a reliable way to heat your van.

You can find Chinese Diesel heaters for about $200/£150 – they require a little Diesel tank to be filled somewhere in the van and tend to be quite noisy (more for those outside your van) but they do work.

Both proper Gas and Diesel heater options takes air from outside, burns fuel and vents the exhaust outside the van. Gas heaters that don’t can be dangerous!

Wood burners: Some care needs to be taken to avoid fire risk & carbon monoxide poisoning but can be a cheap option even if it does take up quite a bit of space.

Diesel heater pros & cons

  • Runs from diesel tank and on that basis you will not really run out of fuel
  • Can be mounted entirely outside of the van so saving space
  • Runs on thermostat
  • Can now find cheap Chinese alternatives (fill separate tank)
  • Uses more electricity to run
  • Needs servicing from time to time
  • Fairly expensive

Gas heater pros & cons

  • Cheap to run if using refillable LPG/Propane (month in winter cost; $15)
  • Fairly easy to install
  • Runs on thermostat
  • Fan can be a little noisy

Wood burner pros and cons

  • Can scavenge to get free fuel
  • Takes up a lot of space
  • Requires storage of wood inside the van (to keep dry)
  • Requires finding/buying wood for burning
  • Takes time to light/get going
  • If in very cold weather, either you need to keep feeding it overnight or wake up to a cold van
  • Can make your everything smell of wood-smoke

My heater

This is the heater I used in both my van conversions;

It is a Heatsource HS2000, 12V, Single Outlet 2KW Gas Heater.

I got it as part of a full installation kit - this was handy as it came with all the fixings necessary and I did not have to think too much when it came to installation!

Why this heater?

I wanted a heater that ran off the LPG gas and had an external flue. This Heatsource 2000 comes with a thermostat so it will cycle on and off overnight.

Installing the heater

The heater is located under the plywood beside the LPG tank. You can just see the ducting for the hot air.

The heater firstly needs to be connected to the 12V – so that goes through my fuse box as normal.

The heater needs two holes going through the bottom of the van.

You cannot put it anywhere – under the van there are structural and functional elements that mean you have to measure in from the edge of the van to work out where it can be placed.

I first drilled a pilot hole to check I was in the right place. I wasn’t, so based on that hole drilled another, marked out the final two holes for the heater inlet and exhaust.

These are the pipes (black inlet, chrome; exhaust) coming from the heater. As you can see you cannot just put it anywhere!

I did not have a hole cutter for metal so you can see my style of hole cutting largely revolves around drilling lots of holes in a circle! I spray foamed these holes once done

After connecting the inlet and exhaust pipes (as per the heater’s manual) attached them under the van – making sure the inlet and outlet were, as instructed, not inside a cavity under the van. I zip tied them in to place – drilling holes where necessary to do so.

The ends are screwed in using clips that came as part of the fixing kit.

 Mark lesson complete