Hi all My bus is a Westy Berlin with underslung LPG tank supplying gas to the cooker hob. i want to tee into this to connect a propex heater to save the bother of a separate gas tank. Anyone else done this? The gas from the regulator goes through a rubber flexible hose under the bus to a connector in the floor under the cupboard/sink/hob. It then goes via a flexible metal tube up to the hob unit. I am a bit concerned that the fittings will be weird American ones so don't want to knacker anything I can't replace. Current plan is to fit the propex under the rear seat on the sloping section (loads of access underneath and not so many things to hit with the drill), also to take the gas supply through the floor in 8mm copper and then connect to 8mm LPG low pressure hose to run under the bus to the original rubber tank to cooker flex hose. I thought I would cut the original flex hose and insert a y piece to do the connection. Have any of you tried this? I am kind of hoping that the ID of the original flex hose fits a standard size of Y connector. If not then I may have knackered my cooker connection (which would be a pain). Any better ideas would be very welcome. Cheers Phil
I can't tell you if your plan is sound though if you've got a rubber gas pipe, you need to change this from time to time - it should have an expiry date on it; well it would if it was UK or German. If it was me I'd run the gas inside and distribute it from a manifold tap. My German spec Berlin has a 3 way tap under the sink, though the gas bottle is inside. When I fitted a fridge I just connected in to one of the spare outlets on the 3 way. I've since had to get adapters and this place is pretty good: http://www.socal.co.uk/toolbox.html?limit=all . They do lots of adaptors for boats.
I have fitted my propex but not finished connecting or wiring. Hopefully I will get chance to finish it on Sunday. I will report back with pictures if I do. Views of your gas man welcome too!
I decided to let a gas man do it. On reflection, any problem could get serious as Myrtle is stored in a garage that is built into my house, below my daughters bedroom. I have fully installed the Propex myself other than the gas and its booked in to Towtal in Stoke for the gas work next Monday by complete coincidence. Needless to say we are camping this weekend and could have really used some heating given the weather (at the No Direction Home festival near Mansfield). Never mind eh! I dropped past Towtal for them to have a look when I booked the job three weeks ago and they intend to replace the original flexible tube under the bus with copper and the tee off that for the propex with a couple of isolator valves in line for cooker and heater. I will stick some pictures up when its done.
I now have a lovely toasty warm van. The chaps at Towtal did the gas connection for me, I fitted the rest. They replaced the flexible tube from the gas regulator on the bottle with copper. Ran it under the bus and into the cupboard under the sink. Two gas taps, one to the cooker, the other back under the bus to the heater which is fitted on the sloppy bit under the rear seat. Photos below. For info they charged me for 4 hours labour at £38+vat per hour, total bill was £290 which was more than I was expecting but it is now all working nicely.
This may now increase the rate at which I burn gas but I am not too worried. I filled the tank last week after more than 6 months cooking use. It cost £2.17 to brim it at 72p per litre for auto gas. Beats calor gas bottles.
After using my propex in anger earlier this year I was really surprised how little gas they use A couple of points on the photos Why they did not go over the top of the chassis rails With charging you that much i would expect them to have a pipe bender some of those bend look rough
I'm thinking of fitting a leisure lpg tank from Gassure: http://www.gasure.co.uk/gasfit.htm What size is your tank? Really like the idea of just filling up at an lpg pump. No hauling out bottles etc.. I'm reluctant to say but others might look at this for guidance. I think the price was a bit steep for what amounts to 5 connections and clips. 4 hours seems a long time for that job. I would definitely get them to re-route that pipe hanging under the chassis. That's dangerous. They should really use copper p clips or even better, stainless with rubber inserts (cheap of ebay), the plastic ones will loosen up over time. As an example Gassure charge £130 to mount and hook up a tank. Cheers s
I know what you mean re bends and going under the chassis rail. I may end up modding it myself at some point as replacing that length of copper would be pretty easy If you know of good tradesfolk who do this sort of work then do add them into the post. I struggled to find someone to do the job in my area. I investigated the Gas sure website and contacted a number of folk who were listed as competent on LPG for vehicles but non showed much interest. Towtal would do it and originally said I would be roughly £200 but hard to judge before they did the work. I suspect that I was tucked up a little but I do have a warm van at least.
To be honest I think connecting up gas pipe safely is no big deal. If you feel confident in say replacing brake pipe then gas pipe is no problem. You can see that so called qualified fitters don't necessarily guarantee a good job! Follow the instructions on this link to make good connections: http://www.thomson-caravans.co.uk/advice/diyprojects/gascompressionfitting.htm Make sure the pipe is routed so that it wont get damaged or rub up against anything and make sure it's rigid. Compression joints are not mechanically strong so the pipework must be secure. I'd use stainless pclips with rubber inserts to support the pipework. Cheap of eBay. Check everything with gas detection spray (re-check once a year to be safe) cheers s
