Olympian wave catalytic heaters

We've used an Olympian Wave 6 for the last 7 years in two RVs. Wonderful way to heat without all of the noise and battery draw of the furnace.

My S/O is a worrywart and won't even leave a toaster or space heater plugged in when not is use, so we don't use it unless we're awake and need it. That said, the CO alarm has never gone off while it was in use.

I find it amusing that so many RVers worry about "oxygen depletion". I've yet to find a RV that didn't leak cold air from one place or many places, and we've been RVing for 48 years.

As always, the bottom line is:
READ AND FOLLOW THE INSTRUCTIONS!
Pay particular attention to the safety warnings. Pay close attention to the instructions about ventilation. If you have a screen in the window, you need to allow for a larger opening to compensate for the area taken up by the screen (most people don't know that, or don't believe it).
Save your life. Read and follow the instructions!

MrWizard wrote:
mr buddy is a "Blue Flame" heater with a ceramic core
not the same thing, but very popular,
and safe when used correctly

Really? Sure looks like catalyst action to my eyes. Only blue flame you ever see is on initial light off before the grid (catalyst?) heats up. After that, nothing but red hot glow. I may have, ahem, assumed it was catalytic due to that...

Back in the early 80's when fuel prices spiked I was a young man. I was living in what a young man can afford. A drafty un-insulated house with no wind break to stop the wind. To offset the cost of the expense propane I had a unvented Kerosene heater. In those days you could still find Kerosene and it was a cheaper fuel.

Talk about a stinky way to heat your house. You could taste the kerosene in your mouth after a few hours of running this thing.

Used to sleep with it on. Didn't have any choice. Could not afford propane on what a 20 year old makes in his first job.

A lot of us did things like this. It's funny we are not dead. I would never do it again, nor would I recommend anyone else do it either. I do sometimes wonder if the gasses from this thing may have effected me in some ways.

These days I'm doing better off financially . If I see a young person starting out as I once did and they are struggling and doing unsafe type things like this I try to help them out. I'd hate to see some kid go though the stuff that we did back in the day.

I like having multiple methods of keeping warm, especially here in Texas where an ice storm can leave you stuck for a few days:

1: First resort is the rig's furnace. The furnace fan guzzles battery like it is going out of style (10 amp-hours or so), but all combustion gases go outside. If the weather is in the teens to 20s, this does a decent job at keeping things warm, all things considered.

2: Second heater I use often is a Vornado fan forced space heater.

3: I have a Big Buddy heater and a box of 1 pound propane bottles. I have not had to use it yet, but if all else fails, it is better than nothing.

4: Lots of blankets and sleeping bags. I can sleep in weather in the 20s, and be decently warm, although the thermal shock of getting out of bed isn't great for the health.

Ideally, I like having the furnace get the rig to about 60 degrees at night, not so warm that it is too hot to sleep with blankets, but not so cold that it causes one to get sick due to the temperature change when getting out of bed.

As a safety precaution, I have three CO meters. The one from the factory, another as backup mounted on the other end of the rig, and one that displays PPM.

mr buddy is a "Blue Flame" heater with a ceramic core
not the same thing, but very popular,
and safe when used correctly

i have a small 5000 btu 'blue flame' heater, that uses butane canisters, the same ones the portable camping/picnic stoves use, that so many people use at food fairs

we use it when we want to take the chill off, outside or inside, when the wave 8000 is too much even on low

Mr Heater Buddy works same way (catalytic). Works great for awake time boondock heating in our popup, but I've never slept with it on. Blankets don't use LP up.... ;)

kofire wrote:
If there were problems with it the Internet would be full of horror stories. That however is not the case.

Exactly.

Thousands of RVers use these heaters without problems. Go to Quartzsite, AZ in January and you'll find them.

Occasionally there will be an instance of death but when you read carefully, it's not because of one the heaters made for RV use. They use regular space heaters. There's a difference.

MrWizard wrote:
i've used one for years, in two different RV's
and but a new wave 8000btu in this one in 2014
it sets in the kitchen with a window cracked open and the kitchen ceiling vent cracked open

the platinum cat and the wave
are both Catalytic heaters both use a platinum coated mat 'oxidation surface'
the difference is the plat cat has an external vent tube,
IDK if thats exhaust or fresh air for the heating process

Wave used to be Olympic before Camco bought the brand and changed the name

thats why you will the reference to OLY Cat in some posts
aka Olympic Catalytic heater

Olympian

If there were problems with it the Internet would be full of horror stories. That however is not the case. A blue flame will produce little to no CO. It can as previously stated use up the oxygen. Crack a window and possibly a ceiling vent. Put an extra CO detector near it and where you sleep.
I've used heater buddy's for yrs without issue. They have an O2 sensor on them.