Guest Joe90 Posted December 7, 2014 Share Posted December 7, 2014 colin - 2014-12-07 2:22 PM If I was in OP's position I would proboly do the same, which is why I suggested it. If the van is insulated and one relatively small part is a cold pocket, then it makes sense to me to heat that part. His cold pocket was apparently caused by himself, in not using the vans own heating system that apparently has a blow air heating outlet under his mattress, obviously designed in to eliminate condensation under the mattress. His post did come across as wanting first and foremost to capitalise on being on hookup, and saving his gas........at least he has some ideas as yours and others have suggested, and solutions elegant or otherwise now......... ;-) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
colin Posted December 7, 2014 Share Posted December 7, 2014 Will85 - 2014-12-07 2:45 PM But why heat the garage at all, I see no reason, its a waste of energy. Its like living in a house with 4 outside walls, one of which has a garage attached to it. Do you insulate 3 walls and windows only and heat the garage. Of course not ! A garage in a motorhome is an integral part of the whole, it's not tacked on the side like a garage on a house, I don't know how well it's insulated, do you? It makes perfect sense to me to add a couple of watts (which is all it takes) to heat it and the contents, else any warm moist air 'leaking' into the garage will condesate out and cause damp problems. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
George Collings Posted December 7, 2014 Share Posted December 7, 2014 Move the cold surface a little further from the mattress. Try a woolen blanket underneath. The damp air will condense on its lower surface and then dry out either as the day goes by or by puting the blanket somewhere to air. The oil heater puts an equivelent amount of water into the atmosphere as a a product of combustion. In this case it probaly made no diference as it was not in the garage but oil heaters and motorcaravans don't mix well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Joe90 Posted December 7, 2014 Share Posted December 7, 2014 Blimey, it's like "One flew over the cuckoos nest" :D :D be careful where you store the Parafin as well. :D :D :D and keep a spare wick :-S Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
George Collings Posted December 7, 2014 Share Posted December 7, 2014 Move the cold surface a little further from the mattress. Try a woolen blanket underneath. The damp air will condense on its lower surface and then dry out either as the day goes by or by puting the blanket somewhere to air. The oil heater puts an equivelent amount of water into the atmosphere as a a product of combustion. In this case it probaly made no diference as it was not in the garage but oil heaters and motorcaravans don't mix well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
colin Posted December 7, 2014 Share Posted December 7, 2014 O.K. just done a bit more research and some 'back of a fag packet' calcs, heating the garage will add approx 3% to the total needed to heat van. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charles Chodkowski Posted December 7, 2014 Author Share Posted December 7, 2014 I have no intention of using a ELTEX type greenhouse parafin heater in the garage, but perhaps a log burner with a suitable flue might be ok, I could also heat the mince pies on top! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brian Kirby Posted December 7, 2014 Share Posted December 7, 2014 I think there may be a bit of cross purposes here and there. Charles' oil heater, I'm fairly sure, is actually an oil filled radiator. It is electric, and no combustion will be involved, so no airborne moisture. When on EHU no gas is consumed heating Charles' motorhome, because he relies on electric heating. I took Charles to be seeking to maximise his take from the EHU on an un-metered camp site supply, on the basis that once having accepted the cost of the EHU, any electricity consumed comes at zero additional cost. This skews all calculations to favour installing as much electric heating as possible, irrespective of the amount, or location, of insulation present. So, if the tubular heater runs at zero cost to Charles, his only outlay is the purchase and installation of said heater. Then, if he gets the right heater, and can install it in the right place, he can also consign his condensation problem to history at the expense of the camp site owner. Whether that makes economic sense only Charles can judge, when he compares the "cost" of condensation with the cost of avoiding it. He could instead try insulating the garage from the hab cell, but that, too, would have some cost, and I'm less convinced that it would prove as reliable as heating the garage. If he does this he would be well advised, IMO, to put the insulation below, and not above, the ply separation, or to use a closed cell insulant, so the he doesn't merely transfer the condensation from the mattress to the insulation itself. Placing the insulation below the ply assumes the ply will act as a sufficient vapour barrier. Were he to run his blown air system instead of using electric heating, he would incur the full cost of gas to run the heater, in addition to the cost of the EHU. Charles knows this, which is why he uses a fan heater, or oil filled rad, instead. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
colin Posted December 7, 2014 Share Posted December 7, 2014 Charles Chodkowski - 2014-12-07 7:43 PM I have no intention of using a ELTEX type greenhouse parafin heater in the garage, but perhaps a log burner with a suitable flue might be ok, I could also heat the mince pies on top! You have got 'oil-fired' in OP, I took that as meaning 'oil-filled', George must have taken it literally. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Will86 Posted December 8, 2014 Share Posted December 8, 2014 colin - 2014-12-07 4:01 PM A garage in a motorhome is an integral part of the whole, it's not tacked on the side like a garage on a house, I don't know how well it's insulated, do you? It makes perfect sense to me to add a couple of watts (which is all it takes) to heat it and the contents, else any warm moist air 'leaking' into the garage will condesate out and cause damp problems. No I don't know how well a garage is insulated but think of the manufacturers costs. A length of warm air ducting is far cheaper than insulating a space that's only used for storage. Its all about costs ... to the manufacturer and not the user. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
laimeduck Posted December 8, 2014 Share Posted December 8, 2014 I have only just read all this. It's really quite simple. I have a garage with main bed on top. When we have EHU I use fan heater in the living area & at night have an oil filled radiator in the garage. That is turned on low before we go to bed, so we have a pleasant temperature at night & no condensation. We have a Truma blown warm air system for when we are not on EHU, and there is a pipe which runs round the garage, which heats this area. We don't often use this as we tend to stay on sites with EHU, so I installed mains electric sockets & the oil filled rad specifically to do the job. I use our Benimar all winter and as an extra bedroom at home and have no condensation problems. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest peter Posted December 8, 2014 Share Posted December 8, 2014 Put a sheet of 25mm Kingspan under the mattress, or a Dessicant dehumidifier in the garage, which will remove all the moisture and introduce some warmth as well. We use one in cab area ln the winter, and get hardly any condensation on the screen. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Colin Leake Posted December 8, 2014 Share Posted December 8, 2014 In our AutoTrail the Truma Combe boiler was located in the garage under the fixed transverse rear bed. In cold weather we had the stat set low overnight on an electric setting of one or two depending on the weather. In warm weather we had the heating turned off but the water heating turned on also on electric. The result was that the garage was always warm and we had no problems with damp on the underside of the mattress. Said mattress was a pocket spring type (and ruddy heavy) rather than foam which may or may not have had some effect on the problem. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flicka Posted December 8, 2014 Share Posted December 8, 2014 Colin Leake - 2014-12-08 7:07 PM In our AutoTrail the Truma Combe boiler was located in the garage under the fixed transverse rear bed. In cold weather we had the stat set low overnight on an electric setting of one or two depending on the weather. In warm weather we had the heating turned off but the water heating turned on also on electric. The result was that the garage was always warm and we had no problems with damp on the underside of the mattress. Said mattress was a pocket spring type (and ruddy heavy) rather than foam which may or may not have had some effect on the problem. Fully agree with Colin here, our boiler is similarly mounted under twin rear beds, garage is always warm when that is operating & have never experienced condensation problems. On previous Autocruise, there was a door linking garage to habitation area & we always kept that open for the same reason. It's all about equalising the air temperature throughout the van & eliminating cold spots. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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