Cheap Heat for RV's

[leemedic]

Not sure if this has been posted here before, but was just wondering if anyone has added on the "Cheap Heat" electric heater system to their current gas furnace?

If so, your thoughts?

http://www.rvcomfortsystems.com/#

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6GbPGp9eZ1U

[BB_TX]

Not familiar with it. But CheapHeat is a misnomer. It is electric heat no matter how you look at it and someone pays the full costs. The only relationship to "cheap" is that if electric is included in your RV site fee then the park is paying for the electric instead of you. If you pay electric as a separate fee, then you pay.

[leemedic]

Originally Posted by BB_TX

Not familiar with it. But CheapHeat is a misnomer. It is electric heat no matter how you look at it and someone pays the full costs. The only relationship to "cheap" is that if electric is included in your RV site fee then the park is paying for the electric instead of you. If you pay electric as a separate fee, then you pay.

I am thinking it is "Cheap Heat" for the RVer. Reason I posted this is because we went to Texas last December and January. I spent a lot of money buying gas for our furnace just to keep us warm. It was in the teens every night. It was very cold. We are looking at going West next spring, for several months.

[rmthelen]

Not familiar with the cheap heat system but it looks like a resistance coil which are not the most efficient electric heating system. We use an Eden Pure infrared heater and it does a great job for us, not sure if it would be adequate in temps in the teens but works well into the 30's. We use the furnace only as a supplement to the Eden Pure.
I prefer electric to propane as it is delivered right to my unit and I have to get the propane myself....

[mlh]

It’s cheap for you if you are you are using someone else’s electricity. We use a Mr Buddy heater. All infrared heaters are 100% efficient. We hooked it up with a quick disconnect.
Lynwood

[BB_TX]

Looking thru their web site, apparently it does use a lot of power for full heat. It is stated that it has a high and low setting. And that the high setting will trip the breaker if on 30 amp park power. I assume that means while simultaneously running other normal RV loads as I can't imagine the CheapHeat would draw enough power to trip a 30 amp breaker by itself.

[mazboy]

that is why we love our fireplace....

[leemedic]

Originally Posted by mazboy

that is why we love our fireplace....

We love our fireplace also, and it provides heat, and I also want to ensure heat is provided to the waterlines below the floor and walls. Temps in the teens will freeze lines. My understanding is the current furnace provides heat to those areas also.

[GAinaMontana]

We have never camped when the temps were too cold for the fireplace and a $20 ceramic heater in the bedroom to keep us warm. If I was worried about the basement, I think I would manually set the furnace fan on low and the thermostat temp very low and let the furnace fan circulate air in the basement from the living area. No way I could justify the time and expense for this mod.

[DQDick]

True, but if you're paying for electicity seperate from your park rent you might be better off using the fireplace and/or an electric heater and then using the furnace on gas at night if the temp is cold enough to freeze the pipes. For savings you would have to figure the cost of the furnace and installation against the cost of gas verses electric. Since we own our winter lot we have a home size propane tank on the lot and use from that in the winter. Others that rent get a 100# tank and use from it.

[jcurtis934]

Looks a lot like the electric coils that were in my air handler when we had a house. Sucked power like going out of style.

[skypilot]

As was stated above - you need to run the furnace to heat the basement area to keep the water and tanks from freezing. Cheap heat goes in the plenium of the furnace as I recall and then the heater fan distributes that head just as if you were burning propane. Cost of electricity is a concern of course but I expect its cost will be quite a bit less than having to have the bottom panels removed and a broken water line (with all of its associated insulation damage) repaired. I agree that during the daytime when O/S temps are above freezing, use of the fireplace or small electrical heaters is nice. But at night, or if daytime temps are 32 f or below, run the furnace.



Just my .02.

[jloftice]

Yes, we had the electric heat system installed by our dealer 4 years ago. It works like a champ and keeps you from running to get lp tanks filled all the time. Only down side to me is it doesn't produce the BTU's the gas system does so in extremely cold situations you'd have to use LP. I've never had to do so however. I find the trailer feels warmer because since it doesn't put out as many btu's is has to run a bit more putting in a little less heat but it just runs more. Overall I've been very happy with it.

[Mark7]

All electric heat is 100% efficient. (There is nothing going up a chimney or out a vent). It does't matter how it is delivered... fan forced, baseboard, radiant, infrared, etc. The only exception is heat pump systems which in some cases can double or triple efficiency, but lose efficiency the colder it gets outside.

The unit pictured could easily be a 4000-5000 watt unit (40+ amps at 120 volt) so it would not be a good choice to run at that voltage. Anything over 3000 watts should be run at 240 Volts, which is provided if you have a 50 amp service, but not very practical since it would use up most of your capacity.

Around my part of the country electric heat is the most expensive way to heat, unless it is subsidized or is controllable with some sort of load shedding equipment that can be controlled by the supplier.

That being said, if you have electricity included in your site fee, I guess you might as well take advantage of it! We often run the fireplace and /or a small 1500 watt ceramic heater in those situations, but we don't often stay in the trailer for extended periods of time when it starts getting below 50˚!

[awheeler]

We purchased a little heater:
Duraflame Infrared Quartz Electric Fireplace Stove Heater, Black - DFI-470-06
Sold by: Electric Fireplaces Direct Outlet



It weights very little and does a heck of a job.

[TLightning]

We use two Lasko towers from Wal Mart. Two heat settings, auto on/off, swivel, light weight and you can move them from room to room.

[richfaa]

One of our goals when we started travel in 2006 was to stay out of cold weather and we have.We have not seen snow or cold weather since 2006. We did see a unusual cold spell in Florida near Disney world in I think 2008/2009 where it got into the mid 20's a few nights and we used several tanks of propane that month. Our furnace rarely runs as the fireplace will keep the RV warm in moderately chilly weather. We normally use maybe 2 tanks of propane during the Florida winter for cooking.We use electric for everything else.

[Rondo]

The electric adaptor/coil is great IF you are not paying for the electricity. Electric coil heating is not the most efficient heating of all time. A lot of wasted electrical energy for the small of amount of heat you get out of it. This system might be OK If you are not paying for the electricity as I stated earlier. For those of us that pay for the electricity while 'snowbirding" it is not the way to go. We are in AZ and where we go it does get cool and sometimes cold but the propane is our best way to go. I may use the electric side of the water heater to get the water warm but will turn it off and rely on the propane to finish the job also but mainly use the propane for the furnace. We do use the fireplace to take the chill off in the mornings sometimes and a small ceramic heater to supplement the heat at times in the evenings before bed but very little use at night. We let the propane furnace do it's job of heating us and the underbelly most of the time when it gets cold.

[Arkware]

This past December, we found ourselves in Colorado Springs, CO over Christmas and New Years. Temps at night were dropping into single digits. To help offset the propane usage we placed an electric heater in the basement and used the fireplace. A heated water hose of course is a must in those conditions.
One tank of propane would last about 2 to 3 days.
This kept us from any frozen pipes while several folks around us had issues.

I have looked at the 'cheap heat' system in the past and thought it "sounded" like a good option. But I could spend a bunch of money if I got ALL the good options out there for my rig.

[DebNJim B]

We winter in N. GA where the temps often drop into the 20's overnight. With our last SOB we had a Duraflame from Walmart that also doubled as an end table but that rig lost heat pretty fast. With our new Montana with four season package and insulated glass we can hold the heat longer. We only use LP now so the basement gets heated also. We run the fireplace most all the time to supplement. We also have a 100# LP tank that requires filling much less often. I felt the Cheap Heat was just not worth the investment.