Squishy.......

Finally sorted the front panel

 

This morphed into a bigger repair than I first thought!

 

Fuel tank removal with engine still in

 

So after much research on here and the samba here’s what I did with my heating ☀️
Here’s a few pics before pics

 

Box of new bits , new tube is also squashed so as to fit like a real one and extra length so easy to do away with the leaky front junction mixer thingy

 

After cutting tube to length and painting with etch primer I discovered it didn’t fit as the fwd pod is also in fact a fangled pipe reducer, so had to chop it down a bit!

 

I then wrapped tube in foil tape, then fibreglass wrap then tape again a couple times, idea being to keep the water / corrosion out then showed it to the fish and weighed it, only adds 4.999999 kg compared to the cardboard one.

 

Worked a better for a while but suddenly had no heat when gaps kept opening up on the joints from heat exchangers ,the original USA spec tubes were wrong angle to mate properly so I bought new UK style ones but then for some reason the pods were too high to operate the pod levers so decided to make up shaped extensions for the original ones in the end.

 

Decided to give new elbows a try , and I liked it

 

Heat riser tubes

 

This was minus 7 ! Defrosted lovely after a bit of Reving

 

I did cheat a bit at home tho

 

was a little concerned the windscreen May crack at the time tho

 

My winter view! I had a booster fan near the front which worked really well until it melted. I need to install another soon but finding a 3" 12v duct fan designed for hot air seems to be impossible.

 

yes probably most Chinese fans made today will melt , also massively restricts the air when van has warmed up and fan is turned off - probably also when there more likely to melt!

apparently this prototype bay fan is what you want as the impeller is metal and the inlet has a lip which also fits the ducting , just close one outlet off.

 

Looks like a right hassle to fit that in TBH. Aim it up the totem pole? Maybe starting from scratch but I have a section cut out of my duct at the front for a duct fan. I did find an ABS plastic one on ebay for £25 the other day which I'm more inclined to try as it would simply slot in the gap I already have. ABS is supposed to be good to 60 C. Of course that's probably just the outer shell...

 

This is what happened to the bilge blower fan. It was ok through one winter and during the second jammed and the motor burnt out.