Hi Rudy,
OK. So at the end of the days travel we have hot water. Nice feature.
Is the hot water in the fresh water circuit in the same circuit as the hot water that circulates thru the AH?
Does the AH need to be on, in the salon, for example, to heat the salon with the small finned AH radiators while driving?
best, paul
When I drive in the winter I just turn the furnace on at the control panel for all three zones. The engine heat is 180 and not the 220 that the AH heats to but it is plenty warm for driving.
You do not have to do anything else as you are using engine heat to heat the inside of the coach. You do want to watch your engine temps though but I rarely will get below 176 even with all the zones firing.
We wondered if the AH actually heated the coach while driving. Thermostat set at 68 in the LR and the LR never seemed to get/stay warm. Then we discovered that with the dash heat on the LR thermostat wasn't often calling for heat. So when we are driving and we want the LR to be warmed by the AH we set the thermostat to 74° or 75° or higher and we get heat. Nice. Bathroom and BR aren't influenced by dash heat. We might turn on the bath but usually not the BR. The heat is there, why not use it if you want. Roger
The engine heats the AH coolant anytime it is running.
AH coolant can be circulated to the fan coils based on thermostats calling for heat. All hot water comes from hot AH coolant.
Engine heating is normally not enough capacity for a shower but good for hand washing. Engine heating capacity will heat the interior and utility basement down to 50 or maybe 45 degrees F.
For heating needs greater than that, turn on the diesel burner which is fine while driving. So traveling in freezing weather, diesel burner on, thermostats set to your liking and away you go.
Rudy - I hesitate to disagree, and it obviously depends on AH model and personal expectation, but we find engine heating after a 2-4 hour drive in moderate weather provides more than ample hot water for both our showers and any other needs for the evening/morning when we're moving from one location to the next. In our coach we don't need to run the AquaHot unless we're staying more than one night.
You sure you do not have some 110v heating input? Seems an extreme amount of btu's stored in a small volume at 185 degrees or so. But maybe your unit has a bigger internal tank and/or better insulated?
Insulated lines would also increase efficiency. Interesting....
Nope. just cruising down the road for the day, stopping in time for happy hour. No problem doing the dishes at night, after breakfast, or each taking a reasonable shower in the morning.
Michelle,
No disagreement here. There are those that can and those that can not. But unlimited hot water is only specified by running the diesel burner. Even better if one can shower on electric only or while running the engine. Good for you all.
Just for my info files about what is possible does your overnight use involve any space heating?
Me personally I would turn off the inverter overnight to see if the results repeated themselves.
Almost think a vacuum insulated tank would be required to last overnight.
But then again have not tested ours that same way.
Testament to the design of the Aqua Hot in general.
No heating. If we need heat it *might* be heat pump. Inverter is in a completely different bay than the AH and is not actively "inverting".
We've had the coach 11 years and it has always been like this - plenty of hot water after we drive.
I guess it depends on your expectations and demands. We have pretty much the same experiences as Michelle. Driving 4-5 hrs and we are easily good overnight. Four months this winter past and we ran the AH on diesel maybe five times. Roger
Yup - we run it on diesel at least once a month because we "should" and to keep fresh fuel in the lines, but we have gone months and never
needed more than electric for our hot water needs (these months being between April and November when nighttime temperatures don't dip below the mid 40's or so).
I can keep the coach warm when driving even in the 20s and I too can take a shower as well after stopping but when it is cold out I do turn on the diesel side. This past winter we were traveling in jan and had to turn on the diesel side as it was a high of 5 degrees it that is the exception and not required down to about 20 degrees. This has been overt wo coaches and ten years with AH.
We get pretty much the same results as Steve and Michelle with our unit. Of course, ambient tempatures has a lot to do with that.