I've just watched this on YouTube. It is lengthy but David, the producer has done a lot of research and come to some interesting conclusions.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GlI1420g3N8
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[QUOTE="Buckman, post:
However if that had been the case of a £1 per kwh, we would have turned off the boiler during the day and used gas for the ALDE heating system. At about £0.70 a litre for gas, it probably would be the cheaper option.
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Definitely don't modify any element that burns gas unless you are gas safe and propane qualified. I would be very concerned about impacting the flow of air to the burner resulting in deadly CO emissions.I have often thought about insulating my Truma Combi boiler as it seems to radiate a lot of heat, but as it all goes into the caravan anyway it would be a pretty pointless exercise.
Or would it?
I can assure you that by law gas fueled space and water heaters have to be a minimum of 70% efficient at converting the calorific value of the fuels to useful heat, and most are better than that.On the gas vs electric debate, I would love to know the losses using gas compared to electric on the various caravan heating systems. I very much doubt the gas systems are designed around economy and they are probably very inefficient.
Caravan energy use from practical experience of a daughter with Covid isolating in our caravan over Christmas / new year in 2021 / 2022. I put a plug-in energy meter in the garage and connected the van to that, the caravan used on averaged about 24 kWH each day. This kept the van nicely warm. Heating, no cooking, the occasional cup of tea …. Just for the caravan. According to Octopus our house averages 6kWh a day, consumption In most months. So the caravan uses 4 x as much electricity as the house (we use gas heating) over this period.
24 kWh per day at current rates for domestic electricity is about £8 a day. In the video mentioned at the start of this post a question asked was asked about “ how much per day does it cost to leave the heating on for 24 hours to keep the chill off in my camper van”. The answer was £8.
the van was a 2013 swift challenger SE with a fixed bed and Alde heating system.
perhaps the estimate of 8 to 10 kWh per day, by site owners, is in the summer? Friends visited us with a camper van last summer in July. Our electricity use was about 10 kWh higher than normal for one day according to my Octopus graphs
Beg to differ with you on the efficiency point.On the gas vs electric debate, I would love to know the losses using gas compared to electric on the various caravan heating systems. I very much doubt the gas systems are designed around economy and they are probably very inefficient.
Beg to differ with you on the efficiency point.
On gas our van warms up in half the time it takes on electric.
Our blown air system heated up more quickly on gas than electric. But it isn’t efficiency it was because the gas energy input was significantly higher than the electric input. What are the relative power inputs on your system. I suspect the gas is higher than electric.Beg to differ with you on the efficiency point.
On gas our van warms up in half the time it takes on electric.
There may be different versions - but my Alde will run at 5.5 kw on Propane (6.4 kw on Butane) and 3.15 kw on electric - that's why gas heats up faster.When using gas I think it is rated at 3200kw, but when using electric switched to 3000kw it is only 2800kw with the ALDE system? Explains why gas heats up the system quicker. This what i was told by ALDE.
You are correct. Age meant I could not remember the exact figures. LOL! The Alde 3020 Compact HE boiler has two 230 V electric heating elements, outputting 1050W and 2100W, or 3150W combined,and drawing 5A, 9A, and 14A respectively.There may be different versions - but my Alde will run at 5.5 kw on Propane (6.4 kw on Butane) and 3.15 kw on electric - that's why gas heats up faster.
This is a hot topic on the Safefill Users Facebook group at the moment - latest report from there is that rumours that Morrisons are about to stop LPG are just that, unfounded rumours.At the moment there does not seem to be any steady decline in the number of places where one can refill a bottle and many farmers seem to use LPG for whatever reason. So far we have not encountered any issues and just recently an LPG station opened up not too far from our residence.
However by the time there are no LPG stations, we will probably too old to caravan or using a caravan will be unaffordable however by that time we would have recoup our outlay.
I have read that BQ are changing over from selling Calor to selling Flogas. A leisure outlet near to us changed to Flogas and Gaslight last summer. But B&Q current website needs a good work over 😂This is a hot topic on the Safefill Users Facebook group at the moment - latest report from there is that rumours that Morrisons are about to stop LPG are just that, unfounded rumours.
As I commented in that group, given how Calor have just given a rude gesture to the whole leisure sector, and Safefill appear to be selling cylinders as fast as they can import them, I think retailers will find LPG becoming more sellable in the future. Certainly if I owned a caravan shop or site I'd be investigating getting an LPG filling point.