After spending a miserable day in the snow and rain installing the heater I’ve since used it on a couple of occasions, it’s a wonderful thing having heat in your van!

As you will have read, on the day I installed the heater I picked possibly the worst day of the year to do it and as such, didn’t do as good a job as I could have. I hadn’t secured the pump as well as it could have been and with the lack of space to get to the combustion pipe work I wasn’t happy that was secure either.

My father in law is an amazing engineer, he also knows his way around cars and has everything you need to remove an engine and gearbox on your driveway, something he has done many times! He very kindly agreed to let me do the work on his drive and also jack up the van to such a degree I had sufficient room to work and it wasn’t going to drop on me, very important that last bit!

Here is a shot of the van jacked up just before work began.

What you can’t see under the van are 2 pairs of axle stands and the jack keeping the van secure.

What you can see is clear skies and sunshine, much better experience!

First job was to drop the fuel tank which is achieved by removing 5 bolts from the straps that hold it in, top tip, do this with a nearly empty fuel tank. Once that was down I could secure all of the combustion pipe work and reroute the fuel lines properly.

One thing you’ll notice with any of these heaters is when they are running you can hear the fuel pump ticking, this happens on the expensive heaters as well as the Chinese ones. The sound is caused by the solenoid in the pump actuating and then vibrating through either the nylon fuel line and / or what the pump is mounted to. You can look on google and there are many discussions in the motor home and boating world on various ways to eradicate the noise.

Webasto recommend installing 2 x 90 degree fuel line connectors either side of the fuel pump as mentioned in this article so I purchased a set. I set about disconnecting the fuel filter and pump, then reassembled using the 90 degree connectors and in the process shorten and secure the fuel lines to the chassis. I also made the install of the pump more secure in the hope that it now won’t fall off and should move around less thus reducing the noise it makes!

That’s what it all now looks like, you can see the fuel connectors in place and the pump secured to the chassis. You can also see the combustion exhaust and muffler. I highly recommend buying some extra pipe work to allow the exhaust gases to vent somewhere near the back of the van. It’s about 4 quid for a 60cm length from eBay, ships from China.

After I had reconnected the fuel lines and pump I had to prime the fuel again, when the heater fired up there was white smoke everywhere which on this occasion is a result of fuel overdosing from priming, however, I also noticed plenty of that white smoke coming into the van despite all the doors and windows being closed.

This presents a serious carbon monoxide risk (death basically) which is why you must vent the exhaust gases away from the underside of your vehicle. I’ve also invested in a carbon monoxide alarm.

Here is a better shot of how much exhaust you have to play with using the supplied exhaust and muffler before I extended the pipe work.

And here is a shot of the extended pipe work in place exiting the drivers side of the van, no more combustion fumes under the chassis…

You also need a joining pipe and a couple of jubilee clips, the joiner i used is from Webasto, about 8 quid from ebay.

I also bought a sticker to put above where the exhaust exits the van as it is quite hot..

When I got home I ran the heater for half an hour to clear any excess fuel and then switched it off. Once the carbon monoxide alarm arrived, I put it in the van, ran the heater for 30 mins or so again with all doors and windows closed and was relieved to find no carbon monoxide present.

The pump is quieter but I would be lying if I said you couldn’t hear it, you can, just not as much.

Lastly I took out the butchered seat base and replaced it with a standard T4 one that hadn’t been butchered, fits over the heater a treat….

My experience with the heater so far has been great, it does what it says on the tin and when it’s cold, which it is frequently in the UK, it’s nice to have a toasty van 🙂