Heater Operation

[Pete D]

Doh!

Off Topic -- I dunno if The Simpsons' writers knew it, but in Russian I understand that word means SH*T...

 

[NJTaco]

Off Topic -- I dunno if The Simpsons' writers knew it, but in Russian I understand that word means SH*T...

Until now I was blissfully ignorant of that...I'll edit my post...

 

[Sam]

Makes it even more funny in my book!

 

[Lighthawk]

Hope you got that figured out, Ben. Your weather sounds a lot colder than the Labor Day tour of Nevada that I just completed. Fortunately, we really didn't need our heat that bad.

I have had a similar experience with my 08 Hawk: no heat with low battery.
I left the fridge on 12V once we parked, and that just sucks down my aux battery worse than anything else.

When I tried to get heat, we could get the fan to go on, and could hear the piezo attempting to click every 30 secs or so, but no flame and no heat. We were barely able to run the pump, so clearly voltage was at low tide.

Next night I turned on the T-stat and absolutely nothing happened! No fan, no heat, no clicking, no joy.
I'm wondering now, did I fry my control board by trying to fire my unit while on low battery?
Doesn't make much sense for the unit to be vulnerable to this frequent possibility, but I'm drawing straws here.

Anyone have any experience with a FWC installed Suburban furnace would stop working?

Andy

 

[MarkBC]

Hope you got that figured out, Ben. Your weather sounds a lot colder than the Labor Day tour of Nevada that I just completed. Fortunately, we really didn't need our heat that bad.
I have had a similar experience with my 08 Hawk: no heat with low battery.
I left the fridge on 12V once we parked, and that just sucks down my aux battery worse than anything else.
When I tried to get heat, we could get the fan to go on, and could hear the piezo attempting to click every 30 secs or so, but no flame and no heat. We were barely able to run the pump, so clearly voltage was at low tide.
Next night I turned on the T-stat and absolutely nothing happened! No fan, no heat, no clicking, no joy.
I'm wondering now, did I fry my control board by trying to fire my unit while on low battery?
Doesn't make much sense for the unit to be vulnerable to this frequent possibility, but I'm drawing straws here.

Anyone have any experience with a FWC installed Suburban furnace would stop working?

Andy


Did your lights still work? That is, was your battery still kickin at all?

 

[Lighthawk]

Yeah, I still had some juice, but was down to the lowest bar on the battery monitor.




Did your lights still work? That is, was your battery still kickin at all?

 

[MarkBC]

Yeah, I still had some juice, but was down to the lowest bar on the battery monitor.


My experience has been that when the battery gets low (usually down to the second-lowest bar -- "fair") the heater fan comes on for some seconds, but the sparker doesn't even try to spark, then the fan shuts itself off. Sometimes I can fool/trick it into sparking and lighting if I go through this more than once -- turn the thermostat up/down several times, and sometimes it will eventually spark and light.
I've never experienced the fan not going on at all, but of course that point has to come when the battery gets low enough. Since the fan is a known bigger-than-average power draw I guess it makes sense that it would fail to start before the lights fail.

So...that's why I added a second Trojan SCS 225 (deep-cycle battery)...and a solar panel.

 

[Stan@FourWheel]

Maybe try this ...

1. make sure you have enough propane and open the propane tank.

2. Plug the camper in to your house, your garage, campsite power, generator, etc. (110/120v). This will eliminate the low power problem or possibility.

3. Then try and start the furnace.

4. If you still don't get any results, take the cover off the thermostat and check to see that the shiny arrow / pointer tab is actually "touching" one of the small silver dots (see attached pictures).

5. If these steps above don't work, let me know. I can give you a couple more things to try after that.


If the furnace doesn't do anything at all, your thermostat might need adjusting or replacement (it is unlikely it will need replacement).


.


.

 

[Lighthawk]

Thanks Stan,

I'll bet that's the issue. I got the furnace to kick on this morning by shorting directly across the t-stat leads. We have had problems with the t-stat cover coming loose on this last trip, so probably knocked off the pointer tab to contact connection that you mentioned. I'll check that out this evening, but at least I know the furnace is not the problem.

BTW, while out in the field, attempting to diagnose the problem, I read up the FWC manuals, but was baffled as to which fuse goes to which appliance. Maybe it says in the manual and I missed it. This morning I happened to look at the back of the cover for the Iota distribution center and there are the fuse labels! I only mention this in hopes it will help someone else out down the road.

Thanks again for your input.

Andy


Maybe try this ...

1. make sure you have enough propane and open the propane tank.

2. Plug the camper in to your house, your garage, campsite power, generator, etc. (110/120v). This will eliminate the low power problem or possibility.

3. Then try and start the furnace.

4. If you still don't get any results, take the cover off the thermostat and check to see that the shiny arrow / pointer tab is actually "touching" one of the small silver dots (see attached pictures).

5. If these steps above don't work, let me know. I can give you a couple more things to try after that.


If the furnace doesn't do anything at all, your thermostat might need adjusting or replacement (it is unlikely it will need replacement).


.


.