Burned by Espar

[Zeta]

Sooooo, I'm camping at Page Springs in Oregon where it got down in the mid 20's overnight. I thought I would be smart and run the Espar water heater to warm the engine so it would start easier. I ran it for over 30 min, and sure enough the oil temp rose to nearly 140F. It wouldn't start!

Cue freakout.

Calm. I noticed however the oil temp went down the more I cranked. Turns out the glowplugs don't operate if it's over 131F, so it thought the engine was warm, but only the oil around the sensor was, so no glowplugs even though it needed them to start. Yikes.

Started instantly this morning...

Z

[daveb]

Do you have a clue why it did that? I can run mine for 2 hours with no problems. Maybe the Espar didn't cycle off. Could the Espar heat sensor not shut down the unit and it just continued to run causing an overheat issue?

[Jeffrey]

Just run the furnace next time.

[Ford_6L_E350]

Originally Posted by Jeffrey

Just run the furnace next time.

The furnace won't warm the engine.

Mike

[daveb]

Originally Posted by Ford_6L_E350

The furnace won't warm the engine.

Mike

Well it might if you pull the dog house off

[Zeta]

I think running the Espar for only 30 min made the engine computer think the engine was over 131F, when it was, mostly, cold and needed the glowplugs activated. It acted like a diesel engine with faulty glowplugs, but finally started.

Running the Espar for two hours would warm the engine much more fully.

Z

[daveb]

I've run my Hydronic several times in that kind of weather and have never had that happen. So you think the short time did it? I've done similar times in upper 20's with no problems.

[dparkwy]

Your preheating depends on how your hydronic system is plumbed. Mine is currently plumbed so that it doesn't actually heat the entire engine just the heater core. If my hydronic system has been preheating for a while, the temp gauge will indicate somewhere in the 'warm' range but then will drop down as the engine is started.

I would ideally like to re-plumb mine so that it actually pre-heats the entire engine. Badgertrek did this with good results. http://www.badgertrek.com/sportsmobile/appliances.shtml

Would be interesting to know if Badgertrek has experienced the same problems as Z

[Gnarvan]

Where is the temp sensor probe on a 6.0 located?

[Tapatio]

I fired up the Hydronic today and let it run until it turned itself off. Scangauge showed 155f EWT, 133f EOT. Engine started. No idea what that means but there you go.