Always tasks to do

As we're stopped for a few days at Forest Lake RV Campground in Advance, NC, we're working on tasks in and around the motorhome. 

We had noticed in the past few days that the heat from the Oasis hydronic heater was not working well in colder weather (down near freezing) when it is set on the electric elements. It worked fine in cold weather back in December, and it works fine with the diesel burner (which we used last week at the FMCA convention in Perry, Georgia). 

On RVs, if there is one way to accomplish a task, there are often at least two ways to accomplish the task, if not more. So for heat, we have 2 heat pump units on the roof that provide air conditioning and heat -- the heat is effective down to about 40F. Below 40F, we use the furnace which is the Oasis hydronic system and also supplies our hot water. If we are plugged in to electric, we generally use the electric elements that heat the water which then provides heat to the rig. There are two electric elements, and we can turn just one or both on -- if we are plugged in to 30A, we will try to heat with one element. If we want hot water or heat more quickly, we turn both elements on - it also recovers more quickly (for example if we both want to take showers, it can be nice to have both elements turned on). If we are not plugged in, or we want hot water more quickly, we use the diesel burner to heat the water.

We had both electric elements turned on, but the furnace never was blowing air out the registers, even though the temperature in the rig was plenty chilly to call for heat. The system won't start blowing air until the water is warm enough to heat the air, so, for some reason the water wasn't getting warm enough. We had the switch set to have both electric elements on, which had worked in mid-20s weather in December, but wasn't working in high-20s and low-30s now, in March. (It still worked fine with the diesel burner, so earlier this week we used the diesel burner to heat the water to warm the rig until the weather was warm enough to use the heat pumps.) Carl did research on the Oasis system, downloading manuals, looking up information online, coming to the conclusion that one of the two electric elements was not working. He verified this by turning off the circuit breaker to each of them one-by-one - when he turned off the circuit breaker for element 1, the energy draw dropped immediately, but when he turned off the circuit breaker for element 2, there was no change to the energy draw - element 2 wasn't working even with its circuit breaker on.

Now, this didn't prove that the element itself is the issue; there is a relay that provides power to the element when the system calls for heat. It could be that the relay is bad -- a cheaper fix than replacing the element. Maybe we could at least test the relay...

On Saturday, Carl opened up the access to the Oasis system:

Talk about putting 50 pounds of potatoes into a 5 pound bag!

Element 2 is back behind this area...

Carl thinks that the relay for element 1 is this front box and that the relay for element 2 may be behind there. Element 1 is back behind this area.

There does not appear to be an easy way to access the relay or the element without taking much of the system apart. We're thinking that it will be better to have a person who knows more about this system do the work than for us to get into it and not be able to complete it. Part of the task involves pumping about 6 gallons of the coolant mixture out of the system before working on it. Obviously, if something did not go well, we could lose our ability to use element 1 and/or the diesel burner on the furnace.

As I mentioned in my previous post about planning, we have a planned stop at the Newmar "mothership" in August, and we've made a request that they would flush the hydronic heating system (requested before we started having any problems, just a desired maintenance item). We're thinking that they may be able to fix it then if we don't get it resolved before August. With the heat pumps on the roof, the single working element, and diesel burner -- in addition to a small electric space heater that helps provide warmth in a small area -- we have alternatives, so we'll be okay. But, we like to have systems working! 

Just part of (motor) home maintenance that comes with being a home owner!