Friday, November 28, 2008

Old school




I was able to save and refurbish all the appliances except the water heater in the Globetrotter. I did that because they all worked on pilot lights .I wonder what would still be working after the coach was hit buy lightning this summer.
For the past few days I have been trying to get the heater working .It worked last year but a year is a long time .Today I sprayed some chlorinated hydrocarbon into the inspection hole .The pilot was clean as a whistle .It still was clogged .Out came the air hose and with a few blasts with some low preesure air and I finally remove the obstruction.It lit and is still running now the only problem is that the control knob doesn't appear to be working
I'm going to ask a question.Does the control knob control the height of the flame or does it control the length of the burn? These are the only two controls .There is no thermostat. The wires that may be visible control a manual 12 volt blower fan.TIA for any advice

3 comments:

Frank Yensan said...

Tom, I personally would be very leery of using that heater. I think the heat exchangers rust out in places we cannot see and the risk is not worth the reward. A good catalytic heater is much safer and will not set you back very far. Just my two cents. I am all for old school, but I want to be alive long enough to enjoy school.

crowldawg said...

Frank ,Thanks for the input but the body looks in good shape .I'll run it while I'm in there working and then decide.
Isn't there a danger sleeping with catalytics or do you think that airstreams are porous enough to not worry .I almost bought one last winter from our friends in Vermont but if I remmember corectly thay had some disclaimers about using it without the window open

Frank Yensan said...

Yes, Tom there is a risk of operating anything that burns gas to deplete the oxygen in the environment. There are sensors built in to the heater to shut them off when the oxygen level is too low. I am always leery of old heaters. The problem in the carbon monoxide.