Furnace using too much propane
This all happened last spring, but I never addressed the issue. Our first day/night of camping was chilly. When we got to the camper, the temperature was about 50 degrees. I started the furnace, we we...
Forum Discussion
For years, my heater would run - incessantly - and very little air volume wasn't come out of the registers.
If my wife set the temperature at 65, the heater would run for 20 minutes only to barely raise the temperature from 62 to 65.
Last year, after a catastrophic failure - we decided to redo the inside of the trailer (think RV makeover) and part of the process was to determine what was going on with the heater.
The design of the airflow was to pass down into a plenum under the heater, (located on the passenger side of the 5er) then to a central plenum that ran under the floor from front to back with the registers connected to the plenum.
What I found was the plenum under the heater had both sides not closed. Think of a cube - with the left and right sides opened, not closed.
All the heat that was generated was blowing under the 5er not passing to the plenum in the middle redistributing the heat.
During the redesign, I sealed the plenum off - and with some help from some folks here (Thanks Doug) I was able to utilize the 4" duct connectors and imagineer a solution that works.
The key is to understanding the flow of the air, the volume the heater needs to pass through the ducts without restricting the airflow and causing the heater to hit the high temperature limit safety switch.
Since I've made that change, my heater cycles much shorter (only a few minutes - generally less than 5) and my consumption of propane has been reduced dramatically.
The OP has an issue - consuming that much propane in that short a period of time there is something seriously wrong. I'm wondering if the regulator is freezing up staving the heater of propane and being misdiagnosed as being empty?
I'm at a loss of another explanation - but there's something awry with this situation.
If my wife set the temperature at 65, the heater would run for 20 minutes only to barely raise the temperature from 62 to 65.
Last year, after a catastrophic failure - we decided to redo the inside of the trailer (think RV makeover) and part of the process was to determine what was going on with the heater.
The design of the airflow was to pass down into a plenum under the heater, (located on the passenger side of the 5er) then to a central plenum that ran under the floor from front to back with the registers connected to the plenum.
What I found was the plenum under the heater had both sides not closed. Think of a cube - with the left and right sides opened, not closed.
All the heat that was generated was blowing under the 5er not passing to the plenum in the middle redistributing the heat.
During the redesign, I sealed the plenum off - and with some help from some folks here (Thanks Doug) I was able to utilize the 4" duct connectors and imagineer a solution that works.
The key is to understanding the flow of the air, the volume the heater needs to pass through the ducts without restricting the airflow and causing the heater to hit the high temperature limit safety switch.
Since I've made that change, my heater cycles much shorter (only a few minutes - generally less than 5) and my consumption of propane has been reduced dramatically.
The OP has an issue - consuming that much propane in that short a period of time there is something seriously wrong. I'm wondering if the regulator is freezing up staving the heater of propane and being misdiagnosed as being empty?
I'm at a loss of another explanation - but there's something awry with this situation.
