Відео

You reckon it's not worth it for you?

Thank you so much for your feedback, I really appreciate it! Yes hopefully they'll make those changes and make it an even better product! I'd really appreciate it if you could take a moment to share the video on your social media - your personal recommendation is the most effective way of helping more people see it, which in turn helps repay my production costs. Cheers!

Splendid thanks so much for your feedback, I really appreciate it! Please take a moment to share the video on your social media - your personal recommendation is worth a thousand attempts on my part to promote it through advertising!

Cheers mate it sounds to be pretty normal thankfully!

I agree,, however they don't instruct the user to do tha. So I was just following their instructions exactly to see how it worked as they instructed, rather than my own ideas.

Thanks very much Jack, I really appreciate your support so I can keep making videos like this! Yeah I hope they make these sorts of improvements, it means we get products that work better, and they get a better rap from customers who use their products and like the fact they listen to feedback! Which blanket did you end up choosing yourself?

You’re welcome and thank you for making these videos, I think they will help many buyers and sellers. I already have a kings blanket, but I am realizing the cheap quality. I’m saving up and I will probably end up buying the Hard Korr.

My pleasure mate, and good choice on the Hard Korr! It's a great product! I just noticed Snowy's doesn't sell these anymore, but Outback Equipment does and they're cheaper than the ones on eBay, so I've just updated the affiliate link in the description if you decide to purchase from Outback Equipment - bit.ly/HardKorrSolarBlanket-OE

Glad you enjoyed it! Thanks for the feedback! 👍👍

Hey great! I'm sure they'll sell really well for you! 👍

Jack you are a gentleman and a scholar, thank you very much! Yeah 70% is pretty good, this is about the time of year I was testing mine, and you'll probably find it heads north of 80% in the warmer months! Good choice, and thanks again!

Yeah you're probably right there Alan, I didn't think of that at the time so may just give that a miss.

Yes that could be true, it would be hard to tell for sure but you could be right.

Cheers, glad you found it helpful! Please take a second to share the series with your friends! 🙂

Thanks mate, glad you enjoyed it! 👍

Haha yeah well in some parts of the country that's worth considering! 😄😄

Thanks mate!

Thanks for asking Jack, but unfortunately no they don't offer rebates to people who give them free publicity! 🙄 If you want to support me you can use the Thanks button but obviously that goes on top of the $721 so I understand if you choose not to. Good choice either way mate it's a great product and it comes with a thick 5m cable now which wasn't included when I tested it.

@@TheMusingGreg No worries. I've slung you a tenner.

Thanks for the question Rosie. 2000W of power from a 12V battery will draw about 170 amps (2000/12= ~170). So hypothetically if you were doing that for a full hour, you'd require a 170 "Amp Hour" (Ah) battery. Therefore, half an hour's use will need half that capacity, i.e. 85Ah, which is about 70% of your current 120Ah battery's capacity. It doesn't leave you a lot of spare capacity for a longer cook if needed or anything else, so it's good you're considering increasing that. If I was in your position, I'd be looking to add another 120X Pro to the system which will take you up to 240Ah of capacity. This would comfortably give you an hour with the induction cooker, plus about 60Ah spare capacity for other things. The extra capacity would also mean you're not having to run the batteries as low each time you use the cooker, which will increase their lifespan considerably - the 120X Pro is rated to 4000 cycles at 100% discharge, but 8000+ cycles at only 50% depth of discharge. So your regular half hour cook would only take about 35% of their capacity rather than 70% of a single battery. So not only would you have more capacity up your sleeve, each battery should last twice as long. Let me know if you need any more info. If you decide to order another battery from iTechWorld, make sure you use coupon code MUSING to save yourself 5% and support my channel at the same time! Hope this helps, Greg

@@TheMusingGreg thank you so much. When you don't have the knowledge it's so good to be able to obtain it from someone who does and put into a simple to understand explanation.

No worries at all, happy to be of assistance!

Cool thanks!

I've never used one sorry, it looks similar to the iTechWorld but with a MPPT regulator and a better price. However XTM isn't generally brilliant, so I wouldn't expect anything better than the iTechWorld and not sure on the quality of the surface treatment. I'd be interested to hear how you find it if you get one though!

I believe that's a direct injected petrol engine in which case you'll probably get some build-up, though not as far as with a diesel. Don't use this product though, it's designed to deal with diesel soot which you won't have. Try liqui Moly petrol intake cleaner, same idea but a petrol formulation. Good luck and be sure to share your results back here! Greetings from Oz!

Fantastic that's great feedback thanks! Which one did you end up deciding on? Please share the series on your social media to help others benefit from it! 🙂👍

@@TheMusingGreg I went with an iTech 300kw solar blanket to charge my camper and the iTech PS1300 PORTABLE LITHIUM POWER STATION 1300W 100AH so I can make a coffee on the road - iTech is what is in my camper so at least i know everything is compatible 🙂

@@SoloSuze Good choices! I hope they work well for you! 👍

I'd be disappointed too! How old is it? Unfortunately they only have a 12-month warranty but if it's still under warranty I'd encourage you to contact iTechWorld

Yeah exactly! It's a funny setup in a van when there's no physical earth!

I’m a qualified electrician mate & that makes absolutely no sense to me!🤔😂

You mean my comment, or having to have an RCD?

No mate, we just use whatever diesel we've got here in Australia and when you're out back you just have to take whatever is available. We don't actually have low sulphur diesel here anyway even in the cities. I think the small amount of oil vapour that's got through the catch can has helped the soot to not get too dry, so it's probably actually beneficial having a small amount of leakage as it were.

Glad you enjoyed the video! Oven cleaner works fairly well for dissolving the grease, but I wouldn't want it through my combustion chamber so it's only really useful if you remove the whole manifold. Unfortunately it's a fairly specific set of criteria the product has to be able to satisfy which makes it expensive to manufacture, so dedicated products probably really are the best.

Thanks for sharing!

Haha that's a very good question, who knows with the UA-cam algorithm! Maybe you have a different term over there for demineralised water but I'm sure it would be available perhaps under a different name. As far is opening the battery mate you can use whatever works, but those slots are designed for a coin and I reckon a quarter would probably fit! 👍

That's very interesting. I found the exhaust soot was very hard and baked onto the inside of the manifold with the catch can on,, not soft and loose like you found.

That's interesting mate. I agree re the power output, but I didn't have those other issues with the 200W unit I returned, nor on the 300W unit I replaced it with. However as mentioned in the video the handle started to come away on the 200W watt unit and it's just started doing that on the 300W unit as well. How long did it take for the problem to start? Did you report it to iTechWorld and if so what was their response?

Yeah it seems so! Cheers!

Hi mate, I checked with Allspark and this was their response: "The blanket hasn't really got an "IP" rating per se. The panels are obviously waterproof being the sunpower cells with ETFE laminate. But the outer casing is a heavy duty canvas which gives it a fair amount of protection against the elements but means its not 100% "waterproof". Leaving it out overnight in the rain wouldn't be best practice but it won't affect the panel long term so long as it is dried out properly."

Yeah excellent question, I went through this myself with my install. The official way to do it is to earth the inverter to the chassis and that's what a sparky will sign off on. But in practice this doesn't add a lot of protection since the chassis is floating relative to earth anyway and there's no earth stake and (possibly) no neutral-earth bond in the inverter (but don't quote me on that one). So it takes a compliance box but doesn't necessarily add much safety-wise. Some people just leave the whole thing floating with no earth - if you touch the active you'll only get a shock if there's some path from elsewhere on your body back to the neutral or earth, and given most things in a van aren't connected to the chassis there's little way to complete that circuit. It may be a bit different on a van with a metal body or if you're touching the sink, but it's quite a different situation to a typical domestic supply on the ground.

@@TheMusingGreg wouldn't the RCD on the Inverter save you if there was an earth leakage? I plan on buying the same inverter as yours with all the protection. Cheers

That I'm not sure! An RCD will trip if there's an imbalance between active and neutral, that much is simple. But that imbalance can only happen when the current's got some alternative way of getting back to the supply other than the neutral. If the inverter's not earthed, then as I see it there's no reason for current to go to earth because it doesn't lead back to the inverter. As such you SHOULDN'T get a shock just from touching the active when standing on the wooden floor of the van, just like you don't get a shock to earth if you're wearing thick rubber-soled boots. You might if the inverter earth was connected to the sink or something, and you touched active while touching the sink with your other hand; then you'd probably get a shock and the RCD might save you. But if the supply was floating and there's no earth I can't see you'd be able to get a shock anyway so wouldn't need the RCD! I feel a lot of this confusion, in my mind at least, is because electrical safety systems are designed for land supplies where earth is unavoidably part of the circuit, so systems are in place to prevent you getting a shock through current going to earth. But it doesn't seem to make logical sense when everything around you is floating. This may be a different story if you're installing this into a vehicle where everything around you is metal. When you buy the inverter don't forget to go via itechworld.com.au/musing or use coupon code MUSING in checkout as you'll save 5% and help the channel out at the same time!

That's a good question Steve! I'll do some work and possibly some measurements and come back to you.

Hey Russell, glad it was helpful. Yes I pre-drilled the holes before cutting the hitch. I have since sold that van so can't confirm the screws used but they were fairly thin and long, I reckon they were M3 or M4 at the largest and probably about 40mm long. I would say pre-drill small say 2mm, cut the coupling leaving as much material below the cut and possible, then measure what's left and work out how large you can do. I drilled the hole in the handle out to clearance and had a smaller hole in the main part of the coupling so the screws cut a thread into the main part of the coupling and left the rest of the handle spinning on the screws. Either that or fit a DO -35 coupling!

Any suggestions for the water gargler?

@@TheMusingGreg use the catch can. Adapt the inlet with plastic tube to bottom inside the wster and the outlet free flow out. The water will catch impurities. Or use a water filter container (no filter) same comcept the water is your filter. Dump water as necessary.

That's just going to do exactly the same as what the catch can already does which is separate out the oil and return clean air back to the intake. It's just using a different method. How would the water gargler provide any benefit over the existing catch can ?

@@TheMusingGreg the results are cleaner plus some water vapors for the valves and intake

Ah ok fair enough 👍

You make a good point about Kings, Bob. And as I said at the end Kings is probably good for weekenders, which as you say is what many travellers are. People just have to understand their limitations.

You might have something there. Most of my driving has been highway use towing a caravan. I'll see if I get more build-up now I'm doing less of that

@@TheMusingGreg also the more frequent you change your oil the better. The chief engineer of the Nissan Gtr said if you want the car to last a lifetime do it every 2-5000km. And if you do it that frequently you only need change the filter every second oil change. And you don’t need to buy expensive oil when doing it that frequently. As the saying goes “oil is cheap, engines are expensive”

Yep good points!

Yeah the Redarc was pricey for sure! Thankfully they've discontinued that model, and the new one is basically what I asked for - half the price and improved the performance. While it's still 3-4x the price of the Kings it's much easier to recommend now. Check it out: ua-cam.com/video/pPy_5Lm-Mo0/v-deo.html

@@TheMusingGreg thanks for reply, I checked out your other reviews and those price points make it more worthy of spending some extra dollars.

Good job mate, hope it's helped you make the right decision for your needs! 👍

Can you clarify what you mean? Which side of the EGR valve is connected to the exhaust pipe after the DPF? I don't quite follow how it works as you described

​@@TheMusingGregit shoul be conected after DPF filter but manufactures connect directly to exhaust manifold and that cloging intake manifold.

Oh right I get you. Yeah I can't see why that wouldn't work, although I don't have a DPF so couldn't be done for me.

Glad it was helpful! Yes stay tuned, more is in the works!

Glad it was helpful! Please share with your friends!

Thanks for the questions. 1) For the first question on battery size, it depends HOW LONG you want to be able to run the hairdryer and aircon; but work on about 100Ah battery capacity per hour of airconditioner run time [Here's why: Most airconditioners draw around 6A at 240V when they're running, which is about 1500W (240Vx6A). So running continuously for an hour at full power (which they don't tend to do mind you), a 12V battery would need a capacity of about 125Ah (1500W/12V). Allowing for some compressor off-time within that hour, 100Ah would get you around an hour of run time]. 2) For the second question regarding charging, you'd need to charge the battery from either 1) a 240V lead plugged into the power inlet such as at a caravan park (presuming your van has a 240V battery charger included which most in the last 25 years would have); 2) the 12V input from your vehicle if you have an Anderson plug fitted, or 3) a solar panel either on the roof of the van or a portable one. However if you're going to put a lithium battery into your van to run power-hungry appliances like an air conditioner, you'll need to be able to push enough current into the battery in a day's driving to fully charge it, which will require a high-current DC-DC charger. These are fairly general answers as there are many variables as to what will be the best solution for you. A caravan auto electrician would be able to give specific advice for your van and power needs once they have all the information needed, but hopefully this points you in the right direction. Cheers, Greg

😄😄 Glad you found it helpful! And yeah you're so right, there always had to be something to tweak or test!

Great to hear! They certainly do a good job at separating out oil and air. Doesn't fix the manifold gunk but if that's not the priority it's a good product.

My pleasure, glad it was helpful!

Hey thanks very much for the tip Jack, I really appreciate it! Unfortunately pretty well all solar blankets or panels will struggle to produce much more than about 80% of their rating in the real world because of how how the testing standards work. They are tested under absolutely ideal lab conditions and don't allow for real world losses through the cabling and regulator. That's why real world testing like I do is so important for consumers. You might like to look at the Allspark review I posted ua-cam.com/video/L8mzNTfVS1Y/v-deo.html as that one gave about 80% of its rated capacity. I'm at a caravan show in Perth at the moment and they've got it on special here for $750, which is a brilliant buy. No adjustable legs, but it still works really well and has got Sunpower cells which help with the higher power output.

You mean "so you expected that product to perform as advertised"? 🤔 Most people would think that's not unreasonable but that's what I wanted to test Catastrophic yes if it came off in big chunks, but this product dissolves so it comes off in small concentrations in the solution which is not catastrophic. Unfortunately it just doesn't get enough off and you'd need many many cans to actually end up with a clean manifold.

No worries hope it helps! You're likely right as to the cause of the swirl flap issue if you're checked the actuator is working and you have vacuum. That said if it's old gunk this product still may not remove enough to get it working. I would recommend spraying a good amount of the product in and then turning the engine off for a while to give it time to soak into the carbon, and then see if you can carefully move the swirl flap actuator by hand to get it moving. Good luck!