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Topic: Aqua hot Rebuild (Read 4648 times) previous topic - next topic

Re: Aqua hot Rebuild

Reply #20 –
John Cerillo at heatmyrv.com sells a replacement tank which he designed for this unit for $2900. You can send him the unit and let him do the job for an additional fee. His design concerns me because his fresh water coil is inside the tank of antifreeze. If there is a breach in the tubing I wonder if the antifreeze could get into the fresh water. Maybe he uses double wall copper, I don't know. Or maybe the antifreeze he uses is the kind used for winterizing, I don't know. Don't rule it out, check it out.
Roger Berke is also in the business at rvhydronicheaterrepair.com
Also found Rudy Legett in Houston on this forum. He does turnkey jobs and is a mobile tech.
I would love to use PEX but a little research scares me off of it because it might not produce enough hot water.

Re: Aqua hot Rebuild

Reply #21 –
Quote from: Bob and Julie –
1. what about just the boiler?
2. Anyone price that out?
3.  Can you just buy that item ?
Bob,
1. Are you talking about just the heat exchanger or are you talking about both the heat exchanger and the can/tank that is surrounding it?
2. If just the heat exchanger  ~$1000
3. The heat exchanger  for that age unit should be a Webasto DBW2010 #123-084
The volume tank that  is surrounding it is just sheet steel that has been rolled and welded together then the heat exchanger is welded in to one end of this tank. This is the part that is harder to make and put together than it sounds. Other than just the heat exchanger you have 4 pipe penetrations, at least 1 electric heating element, 3 or 4 thermostats, and some mounting brackets that have to be fitted into one end along with the exhaust and fill neck that has to be installed into the round part. Building a volume tank isn't a DIY job for most.

If you are talking about the whole assembly that Cman has covered that.

Mike

Re: Aqua hot Rebuild

Reply #22 –
Quote from: Hawkeye –
John Cerillo at heatmyrv.com sells a replacement tank which he designed for this unit for $2900. You can send him the unit and let him do the job for an additional fee. His design concerns me because his fresh water coil is inside the tank of antifreeze. If there is a breach in the tubing I wonder if the antifreeze could get into the fresh water. Maybe he uses double wall copper, I don't know. Or maybe the antifreeze he uses is the kind used for winterizing, I don't know. Don't rule it out, check it out.
Roger Berke is also in the business at rvhydronicheaterrepair.com
Also found Rudy Legett in Houston on this forum. He does turnkey jobs and is a mobile tech.
I would love to use PEX but a little research scares me off of it because it might not produce enough hot water.
That model is like the new AH's and takes the pink non toxic coolant. John is the one who quoted 10K for a rebuilt boiler in 2014 for my Monaco at the time. It was leaking coolant out the exhaust.

Re: Aqua hot Rebuild

Reply #23 –
Mike,
It was my understanding of what John Cerillo told me was that the tank with the heat exchangers built in - all of them on the inside is now $2900 for a DIY replacement.

Btw... I had a leaking fuel pump previously. It was simply a seal on the pump shaft. None were available from anybody I checked with. Vehicle Systems, Roger Berke, John Cerillo, Bus services. Found one @ 123bearing.com and repaired it for about $10 instead of buying a new pump for $350.

Re: Aqua hot Rebuild

Reply #24 –
With our 6 years of full timing,  the only real issue we had was with our Aqua Hot system.  It would decide to produce cold air on some of the coldest days.  We finally found a shop in Lafayette, TN that worked on the old wabasto systems.  The unit was removed and moved into his shop as he had a test bench and ran the unit through its paces.  I learned much from watching him, asking questions and yes, he fixed our system with no more problems.

Re: Aqua hot Rebuild

Reply #25 –
Seems Aqua hot is a pretty expensive item. Not sure why. Nothing in it that I have seen so far leads me to believe that it is anywhere near worth those kind of pricing.
Good to know that parts are available for them thought.
I just replaced the fuel atomizer when replacing the fuel lines. I found that the last person to service it did not tighten the back nut all the way down, so there was a gap on that side. Hot air and fuel could have worked its way past that seal to the inside of the aqua hot where there are a lot of wires and hose with diesel fuel and water. That could have been a disaster.
Also found that the aqua hot was not installed correctly at the factory according to the aqua hot service guide on mine. It shows that the fuel lines, water lines etc should come out the side for the connections to be made, but were not. The knock offs were never removed. So getting the cover back on is difficult as well as a danger to the hose from the metal sides rubbing on them.

Re: Aqua hot Rebuild

Reply #26 –
Very Impressive. Bookmarking. Thank you for sharing.

Re: Aqua hot Rebuild

Reply #27 –
Hawkeye, just saw your question, sorry. Yes my leak is a fresh water leak. When I was dewinterizing, I put water to the system and had water coming out of the coach from around the aqua hot exhaust pipe. When I opened it up and looked inside while turning on the water, I could see water coming from around the copper coils.

Larry

Re: Aqua hot Rebuild

Reply #28 –
Bob,  If the back J-bolt is not properly tighten and the burner is not seated, the leaking combustion air (which would not have any fuel to burn in it) causes black smoke.  This gets the combustion chamber and burn chamber dirty fast.  Changing the nozzle (fuel atomizer) does not address the soot build up in those areas.

With the burner out, remove the combustion chamber and wire brush it and the U-channels in the burn chamber.  A shop vac helps but the loose soot can be allowed to fall down the exhaust hole to be blown out the exhaust pipe.

The cover is to make things look pretty.  Newell leaves it off to make service easier as the cover has nothing to do with the operation of the heater.  I agree it is a pain to get off and on.

If you have any questions, you are welcome to contact me.  All the best.

Re: Aqua hot Rebuild

Reply #30 –
Quote from: Bob and Julie –
Seems Aqua hot is a pretty expensive item. Not sure why.
That's easy to answer. We are coach owners and are therefore considered Bill Gates rich and an obscene amount must be obtained for the simplest item that has a nomenclature that includes the words "Motor Home" in it.

Re: Aqua hot Rebuild

Reply #31 –
I've been using that nozzle with no problems. Three years in my Monaco and three years in the Foretravel.

Re: Aqua hot Rebuild

Reply #32 –
Quote from: ohsonew –
This is the exact thing that I have to do this winter. Just inspected mine tonight from a discovered leak a couple of weeks ago. Does it improve the heat transfer to put mastic on while wrapping the copper so there is some mastic inside the coils? Also, I was wondering if sharkbite fittings would be able to handle the heat through the copper lines as well as the general heating of the aqua hot box?

Great write ups from those going before. I truly appreciate the information being delivered. Helps take the fear factor out of it.

Thanks,
Larry

Larry, regarding the placement of the mastic, it should be applied to the tank first and foremost. I started with a flexible 1.5" wide putty knife, then switched to a gallon Ziplock bag filled with mastic. Cut a 3/8" hole on one corner and applied the mastic by squeezing the bag.  My helper (my wife) applied it to the tank and on top of the tubing, working our way up with each round of tubing, mashing the tubing into it and pulling tight. It squeezes out between wraps, but I scraped off the excess and used a rubber hammer to get the gaps out from between the wraps. When done, we covered it completely with the mastic. Might be overkill, I don't know. I saw Matthews pictures of when his was opened up and you don't see mastic anywhere except a little between the wraps.

We had to stop after our first 50 ft coil so I used "sticks" cut to fit and mashed into place to hold the wraps tight against each other. Two days later, we got back on it and it had dried and hardened so we continued with the other 2 50 ft coils. I think the method of reversing the curve of the coil worked best. I could push it into the tank and down against the previous wrap better.