On these early spring days here in the PNW (actual summer, with temperatures in the 70s, doesn’t arrive here until the second week of July) the cabin is mighty cold when I get up. With outside temperatures in the very low 50s and when there is a wind blowing, the cabin temperature is not much higher than the outside. We sleep comfortably under our (nearly) year-round comforter, but once out from under it... wow.
So it is my job to rise earlier than Jane and light the Dickinson heater. This only takes a couple of minutes and pretty soon it is pumping out heat. The fan installed behind the grill above the heater disperses the heat throughout the saloon and keeps the overhead from over heating. In an hour or so, the cabin is nice and cozy, and just the place for Jane to sit in her seat with a latte and enjoy the view out the windows.
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4 comments:
Bob, is this the diesel version or solid fuel? We have the Cozy Cabin Heater, which is propane, the cost of which soared until COVID hit. I would like to go diesel or solid fuel, preferably solid but Donna likes the ease and cleanliness of the propane heater. She is concerned that a diesel heater would make the cabin smell.
Kevin
Hi Kevin -
It is diesel.
If you have a diesel engine, then you already have diesel on the boat. We feed our heater From the main tanks with a small electric fuel pump purchased from NAPA. The heater exhausts outside the boat, so there is no smell from that inside. And there is no smell from the fuel (unless you have a leak, of course). But if you don’t have diesel on the boat, then you’d need to install a tank or something... It uses very little fuel - something like 0.05 gal/hr, if I remember the previous owner’s figures correctly. If this is an issue, I’ll try to fined his write-up...
For propane, you’d need a tank too, and I don’t think the little 1 lb cylinders would suit, either from a capacity standpoint, or from the standpoint of plumbing them in. I assume you’d be using a 20 lb tank - a BBQ tank. And they have their own complexities in stowage.
Contact me via email if you’d like to discuss this in more depth.
Bob
Just stumbled across your blog. Looking forward to reading past entries and loving the photos. You really are living the dream. Greetings from England, UK.
Thanks for the kind words Vincent!
bob
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