Now that is a blister on your palm to write home about. Also great video of your build as always. By the time you finish with all your installs of your creature comforts, it will be the talk of the Cut!!
While I have know idea of how to begin doing anything like what you’re doing I do find it interesting. I can only imagine the many hours of studying to learn about everything to do it yourself. You must be saving many hundreds of pounds doing the labor yourself. Looking forward to seeing what’s next. Susan
Thankyou Susan. Yes the longest part of this boat build has been the studying of not only how to do things but also the rules that are in place. It has certainly been confusing at times. But we took on this project because we wanted to have a go at building something together and doing as much of that build ourselves for as long as it took. Yes if we included our time in the cost the total would hit the roof but for us it was about the challenge and the enjoyment of doing it ourselves. Glad you are still enjoying watching 👍
Thankyou Kevin, Yes it was a good blister. That will teach him not to lean on something he had just heated with a heat gun again. Luckily I suggested a better idea for Grandad to try before he drank too much diesel 🤣. Yes it all worked in the end but have been told we need to change a couple of things to pass the BSS so hopefully if the parts come in time you will get to see that this week 👍
Hi Guys we have watched all your videos with great interest as we have a narrowboat built two years ago and is based on the Shroppie. I am interested as to why you decided on the Mikuni MK50 as opposed to the "usual" Webasto and Eberspacher versions. My Webasto heater packed up at the beginning of Dec last year and I am still awaiting the local dealer to sort the thing out, and I am not impressed. So I am looking for a possible replacement because I know of other folk experiencing similar problems with their Webasto heaters. Is it because of similar comments you may have heard, that made you decide on the Mikuni, or was it just as simple as the cost. Many Thanks
Thankyou Paul. We have been reading, researching and asking advise on heaters for ages now and still don't know if we chose right. I think only time will tell. Yes we ruled out Webasto because we heard many peoples stories of them going wrong and not many positives but that is usually the case when looking at reviews. What swung it for us was cost in the end and we couldn't find many negative reviews for the Mikuni MK50. Someone has said on one of the comments that we wont be able to get parts for it but the company we bought it from has all the parts for sale on their website so hoping that doesn't change. Good luck with yours, hope it gets sorted soon. 👍
@@makinganarrowboatwithnannyandg Thanks both. Unfortunately we didn't have an option on what make of heater we got, it was included in the new build of the boat, and it ran OK but not brilliantly for the first two years except for last Christmas when the filter was found to be dirty. Exactly one year later it failed again and I cleaned the filter but still didn't run. After umpteen visits by the Webasto local agent and a dozen or so stupid ideas on how to fix it (the last being to install a plastic tank, which we have no space for) I am coming to the conclusion, that the agent hasn't a clue and he has charged me £600 so far. So I am probably going to order the Mikuni and at the time of fitting I will check and alter if neccesary the pipewok. I spoke to MV Heating on Monday, found them very helpful and they confirmed that parts are avvailable. Anyway thanks for your reply and I will let you know how I am getting on in a few weeks
Hello from Germany again 😀 What do you think about this idea: While the engine is running, it brings heat into the calorifier. Would it be a good idea to start the circulation pump of the diesel heater to bring the temperature inside the boat? Yes you have a problem with your waranty but I am thinking about doing it on my older narrowboat. I do not think about starting the diesel heater but the pump using an extra switch and relais so it will get the 12V from the starter batery and the dieselheater will be set to off while the engine is running. Thinking about the discussion Reinhard
Thankyou Reinhard, If i have understood your question correctly I don't think that would work?. The diesel heater and engine pipework to the calorifier are independent of each other so the diesel heater pump running would not circulate the water in the engine calorifier pipes as they are 2 separate coils in the calorifier. I may of misunderstood your idea so look forward to your reply 👍
@@makinganarrowboatwithnannyandg Hello Grandad, the two systems are thermal joined together in the calorifier. The cooling system of the engine heats the calorifier with the lower heat exchanger. Then the other system with the upper heat exchanger takes the heat out of the calorifier and brings it to the radiators (and to the diesel heater). So it will work. The thing is that the diesel heater will not use any diesel and it won't become too hot and the vent does not work while I use only the circulation pump. It ist only free heat from the engine to use inside the boat. The question is, if you would use this feature or if you say that you won't need the free heat inside the boat while you are moving the boat. Looking forward to your opinion. Reinhard
I think that you have a bit of a downhill slope on that fuel line to the pump and that's the cause of your fuel starvation. If you'd mounted the pump on a bracket above its current position it would have made it higher and eliminated this. Unless I misunderstood and I probably did, why did you just use manual taps on the T piece that sent the heating water to the hot water tank or radiators and not an electronically controlled three way valve so that you could have controlled whether you ran the heating, hot water or both from the control unit/thermostat? Those heaters are great, my friend has one in her camper van. Poor granddad's hand, I hope that it's soon better.
Thankyou Tony, Yes your right, there is but it was the only way we could fit it in keeping the pump angle right and the pipe running from the pump to the heater gradually sloping up. Originally the pump was going much nearer to the heater but when we read all the restrictions of length of pipe runs we realised we couldn't do it the way we had planned. If we had put the pump a bit higher the pipe would have to dip down under the isolation switch to get around to the heater. We spent a whole day trying to work out the best way we could fit it in with as less dips as possible and decided on the bit before the pump would be best as it would be the least fall. When the fuel didn't flow through that was the first bit checked and the diesel was flowing through ok there. It was the pump that needed a bit of help purging and Ady did that by taking the whole pump off and submerging the end in a cup of diesel and switching the pump on until it pulled through. Once it was attached back onto the pipe it worked straight away. We have been told in one of the comments that our fuel filter is the wrong one so if the new one comes in time that will be shown on this weeks vlog and we can then also explain what i have just told you. These heaters need to have a bypass so if you only want hot water on you will need to have a towel rail or radiator left on to provide the bypass so the gate valve will never be used. The radiators will be turned off individually leaving one on. Also a 3 port valve would need to be powered continuously to keep it open and although a minimal draw it will still be taking power from the battery bank. 👍Hope i've explained all that ok 😂
@Making a Narrowboat with Nanny and Grandad Thank you for your detailed response. You obviously know what you're doing without my comments, I just like following Grandad's (expertly supervised of course! ) work and I'm afraid that I can't resist putting my tuppence worth in. A valid point regarding the battery drain something us landlubbers dont always appreciate. It really is all coming together now isn't it?
@@tonycamplin8607 hahaha we love everyones tuppence worth. Without it we would have missed and messed up on a few things. Yes we will be glad when all the technical stuff is finished. We thought we would be half way through the woodwork by march but we are still hanging around the engine bay. It's all a learning curve and wont be too much longer 🤞
Another awesome video, Namny n Grandad ..... so in awe of what your doing. The small square of board that you pulled off the wall that was attached with ya chewing gum ..... that wasn't there to screw the switch to thats sat on top of the calorifier was it ???. Love the video's guys ... the explanations and the tactics are really interesting. Can't wait to see it all finished and you out cruising.
Thankyou Gary that is nice of you to say. hahaha yes that bit of board was strange. I was staring at it for ages thinking what is it and why is it there hahaha. It was a bit of board that was cut out for a plug socket to go in somewhere else in the Galley and one of us have rested a piece of butyl on it. Then somehow it has got pushed up onto the wall when we stored lots of stuff in there 🤣. We will probably come across lots of strange things once we are finished.
Cheers Martin, basically for no other reason than we had some gate valves in our box of stuff we had before getting the boat from previous work and as they are not or very rarely ever going to be used or seen it didn't really matter and saved us a few quid on buying anything else👍
Hi, your heater filter won’t pass the boat safety regs , you should have come straight out of the blanked of outlet on your engines Lucus type filter that your pipe passes over the top of for better filtered fuel to the heater and would have saved a bit of space and work , 👍🏻
Hello and thank you for that info. Can you let us know where you found out that as I can't find any information on it. Unfortunately our original plan was to use the big filter already on and have the pump on the starboard wall but once we got the heater we realised it was past the maximum length of the allowed pipe length from the tank to the pump so couldn't use it. The heating kit we have is the marine kit which includes the filter we have used so presumed that was suitable. I am away looking after my mum at the moment so Ady is at the boat and will try and speak to a bss guy over the next couple of days but any info on how you found out would be great. Thank you Hayley
A marine kit for inland waterways is different to a coastal or sea going boat , inland boats can’t have filters that can melt and your short rubber connectors need to show the iso7840 number ( search for webasto 3.5mm fuel hose ) it doesn’t really matter how long the fuel line is because diesel can’t be compressed so once the line is full it will all go at the same rate long or short ,hope this makes sense 👍🏻
Thank you for that. I've just spoke to the company who supplied it and even though we have purchased the inland waterways kit for narrowboats the filter in the kit is as you have said not right. We will get a different one and fit it as soon as. Thanks again for letting us know and will give you a mention in the next vlog if I can work out how to pronounce your name on here lol.
Hello David, We purchased our heater from MV heating and they sell all the spare parts on their website. So fingers crossed they will still do so if we ever need them. Someone we know also has the same heater and they told us they had no problem getting a part they needed so i will find out where they got theirs too. Thankyou for that info though we will keep a look out for suppliers 👍
I contacted MV out of curiosity. Background is that last year I searched high and low for spares for my Mikuni heater, which might have cost around £250. I ended up fitting a new Webasto at £2500. MV say that you are not fitting a Mikuni heater but an MV heater. I think you may know better, so any further info might help other boaters.
@@davidward113 🧐😩🤔🥴eh hahahaha what plonkers we are. Just seen your message and checked and you are right. Can't believe we have done that. We researched MX50's for ages and thought they were all Mikuni and MV heating sold them. Flippin ek it's obvious when we look now because it says MV at the beginning. Thankyou for letting us know, I better edit this video quickly. We will add an explanation in this weeks vlog. I suppose the bonus is with this mistake is that we have added a heater that we can get spares for. Thanks again 👍
Been searching a good comprehensive way of installing my Diesel heater and this video is by far the best I've seen! Thanks so much for that!
Cheers 👍
Now that is a blister on your palm to write home about. Also great video of your build as always. By the time you finish with all your installs of your creature comforts, it will be the talk of the Cut!!
Thankyou, It was a good one eh. Yes we are determined to be nice and warm and cosy hahaha.
Great update, great attention to detail also great problem solving as a team.
Thankyou John
Go Nanny Go, you can do it!
🤣🤣🤣
While I have know idea of how to begin doing anything like what you’re doing I do find it interesting. I can only imagine the many hours of studying to learn about everything to do it yourself. You must be saving many hundreds of pounds doing the labor yourself. Looking forward to seeing what’s next. Susan
Thankyou Susan. Yes the longest part of this boat build has been the studying of not only how to do things but also the rules that are in place. It has certainly been confusing at times. But we took on this project because we wanted to have a go at building something together and doing as much of that build ourselves for as long as it took. Yes if we included our time in the cost the total would hit the roof but for us it was about the challenge and the enjoyment of doing it ourselves. Glad you are still enjoying watching 👍
As other people said a lovely blister on your hand another good video hope you purged the diesel okay bet it didn't taste nice looks a good heater
Thankyou Kevin, Yes it was a good blister. That will teach him not to lean on something he had just heated with a heat gun again. Luckily I suggested a better idea for Grandad to try before he drank too much diesel 🤣. Yes it all worked in the end but have been told we need to change a couple of things to pass the BSS so hopefully if the parts come in time you will get to see that this week 👍
All caught up now.
👍👍👍
Hi Guys we have watched all your videos with great interest as we have a narrowboat built two years ago and is based on the Shroppie. I am interested as to why you decided on the Mikuni MK50 as opposed to the "usual" Webasto and Eberspacher versions. My Webasto heater packed up at the beginning of Dec last year and I am still awaiting the local dealer to sort the thing out, and I am not impressed. So I am looking for a possible replacement because I know of other folk experiencing similar problems with their Webasto heaters. Is it because of similar comments you may have heard, that made you decide on the Mikuni, or was it just as simple as the cost. Many Thanks
Thankyou Paul. We have been reading, researching and asking advise on heaters for ages now and still don't know if we chose right. I think only time will tell. Yes we ruled out Webasto because we heard many peoples stories of them going wrong and not many positives but that is usually the case when looking at reviews. What swung it for us was cost in the end and we couldn't find many negative reviews for the Mikuni MK50. Someone has said on one of the comments that we wont be able to get parts for it but the company we bought it from has all the parts for sale on their website so hoping that doesn't change. Good luck with yours, hope it gets sorted soon. 👍
@@makinganarrowboatwithnannyandg Thanks both. Unfortunately we didn't have an option on what make of heater we got, it was included in the new build of the boat, and it ran OK but not brilliantly for the first two years except for last Christmas when the filter was found to be dirty. Exactly one year later it failed again and I cleaned the filter but still didn't run. After umpteen visits by the Webasto local agent and a dozen or so stupid ideas on how to fix it (the last being to install a plastic tank, which we have no space for) I am coming to the conclusion, that the agent hasn't a clue and he has charged me £600 so far. So I am probably going to order the Mikuni and at the time of fitting I will check and alter if neccesary the pipewok. I spoke to MV Heating on Monday, found them very helpful and they confirmed that parts are avvailable. Anyway thanks for your reply and I will let you know how I am getting on in a few weeks
Hello from Germany again 😀
What do you think about this idea: While the engine is running, it brings heat into the calorifier. Would it be a good idea to start the circulation pump of the diesel heater to bring the temperature inside the boat? Yes you have a problem with your waranty but I am thinking about doing it on my older narrowboat. I do not think about starting the diesel heater but the pump using an extra switch and relais so it will get the 12V from the starter batery and the dieselheater will be set to off while the engine is running.
Thinking about the discussion
Reinhard
Thankyou Reinhard, If i have understood your question correctly I don't think that would work?. The diesel heater and engine pipework to the calorifier are independent of each other so the diesel heater pump running would not circulate the water in the engine calorifier pipes as they are 2 separate coils in the calorifier. I may of misunderstood your idea so look forward to your reply 👍
@@makinganarrowboatwithnannyandg Hello Grandad,
the two systems are thermal joined together in the calorifier. The cooling system of the engine heats the calorifier with the lower heat exchanger. Then the other system with the upper heat exchanger takes the heat out of the calorifier and brings it to the radiators (and to the diesel heater).
So it will work. The thing is that the diesel heater will not use any diesel and it won't become too hot and the vent does not work while I use only the circulation pump. It ist only free heat from the engine to use inside the boat.
The question is, if you would use this feature or if you say that you won't need the free heat inside the boat while you are moving the boat.
Looking forward to your opinion.
Reinhard
I think that you have a bit of a downhill slope on that fuel line to the pump and that's the cause of your fuel starvation. If you'd mounted the pump on a bracket above its current position it would have made it higher and eliminated this. Unless I misunderstood and I probably did, why did you just use manual taps on the T piece that sent the heating water to the hot water tank or radiators and not an electronically controlled three way valve so that you could have controlled whether you ran the heating, hot water or both from the control unit/thermostat?
Those heaters are great, my friend has one in her camper van. Poor granddad's hand, I hope that it's soon better.
Thankyou Tony, Yes your right, there is but it was the only way we could fit it in keeping the pump angle right and the pipe running from the pump to the heater gradually sloping up. Originally the pump was going much nearer to the heater but when we read all the restrictions of length of pipe runs we realised we couldn't do it the way we had planned. If we had put the pump a bit higher the pipe would have to dip down under the isolation switch to get around to the heater. We spent a whole day trying to work out the best way we could fit it in with as less dips as possible and decided on the bit before the pump would be best as it would be the least fall. When the fuel didn't flow through that was the first bit checked and the diesel was flowing through ok there. It was the pump that needed a bit of help purging and Ady did that by taking the whole pump off and submerging the end in a cup of diesel and switching the pump on until it pulled through. Once it was attached back onto the pipe it worked straight away. We have been told in one of the comments that our fuel filter is the wrong one so if the new one comes in time that will be shown on this weeks vlog and we can then also explain what i have just told you. These heaters need to have a bypass so if you only want hot water on you will need to have a towel rail or radiator left on to provide the bypass so the gate valve will never be used. The radiators will be turned off individually leaving one on. Also a 3 port valve would need to be powered continuously to keep it open and although a minimal draw it will still be taking power from the battery bank. 👍Hope i've explained all that ok 😂
@Making a Narrowboat with Nanny and Grandad Thank you for your detailed response. You obviously know what you're doing without my comments, I just like following Grandad's (expertly supervised of course! ) work and I'm afraid that I can't resist putting my tuppence worth in. A valid point regarding the battery drain something us landlubbers dont always appreciate. It really is all coming together now isn't it?
@@tonycamplin8607 hahaha we love everyones tuppence worth. Without it we would have missed and messed up on a few things. Yes we will be glad when all the technical stuff is finished. We thought we would be half way through the woodwork by march but we are still hanging around the engine bay. It's all a learning curve and wont be too much longer 🤞
Another awesome video, Namny n Grandad ..... so in awe of what your doing.
The small square of board that you pulled off the wall that was attached with ya chewing gum ..... that wasn't there to screw the switch to thats sat on top of the calorifier was it ???.
Love the video's guys ... the explanations and the tactics are really interesting.
Can't wait to see it all finished and you out cruising.
Thankyou Gary that is nice of you to say. hahaha yes that bit of board was strange. I was staring at it for ages thinking what is it and why is it there hahaha. It was a bit of board that was cut out for a plug socket to go in somewhere else in the Galley and one of us have rested a piece of butyl on it. Then somehow it has got pushed up onto the wall when we stored lots of stuff in there 🤣. We will probably come across lots of strange things once we are finished.
A question, what made you use gate valves and not lever ball valves in the heating system please?
Cheers Martin, basically for no other reason than we had some gate valves in our box of stuff we had before getting the boat from previous work and as they are not or very rarely ever going to be used or seen it didn't really matter and saved us a few quid on buying anything else👍
@@makinganarrowboatwithnannyandg understand thanks 🙏
Hi, your heater filter won’t pass the boat safety regs , you should have come straight out of the blanked of outlet on your engines Lucus type filter that your pipe passes over the top of for better filtered fuel to the heater and would have saved a bit of space and work , 👍🏻
Hello and thank you for that info. Can you let us know where you found out that as I can't find any information on it. Unfortunately our original plan was to use the big filter already on and have the pump on the starboard wall but once we got the heater we realised it was past the maximum length of the allowed pipe length from the tank to the pump so couldn't use it. The heating kit we have is the marine kit which includes the filter we have used so presumed that was suitable. I am away looking after my mum at the moment so Ady is at the boat and will try and speak to a bss guy over the next couple of days but any info on how you found out would be great. Thank you Hayley
A marine kit for inland waterways is different to a coastal or sea going boat , inland boats can’t have filters that can melt and your short rubber connectors need to show the iso7840 number ( search for webasto 3.5mm fuel hose ) it doesn’t really matter how long the fuel line is because diesel can’t be compressed so once the line is full it will all go at the same rate long or short ,hope this makes sense 👍🏻
Thank you for that. I've just spoke to the company who supplied it and even though we have purchased the inland waterways kit for narrowboats the filter in the kit is as you have said not right. We will get a different one and fit it as soon as. Thanks again for letting us know and will give you a mention in the next vlog if I can work out how to pronounce your name on here lol.
💙👊😎💙👊😎
Thankyou 👍👍👍
Sorry you installed a Mikuni heater. Spares no longer available, best steered clear of. Unless you know better.....
Hello David, We purchased our heater from MV heating and they sell all the spare parts on their website. So fingers crossed they will still do so if we ever need them. Someone we know also has the same heater and they told us they had no problem getting a part they needed so i will find out where they got theirs too. Thankyou for that info though we will keep a look out for suppliers 👍
I contacted MV out of curiosity. Background is that last year I searched high and low for spares for my Mikuni heater, which might have cost around £250. I ended up fitting a new Webasto at £2500. MV say that you are not fitting a Mikuni heater but an MV heater. I think you may know better, so any further info might help other boaters.
@@davidward113 🧐😩🤔🥴eh hahahaha what plonkers we are. Just seen your message and checked and you are right. Can't believe we have done that. We researched MX50's for ages and thought they were all Mikuni and MV heating sold them. Flippin ek it's obvious when we look now because it says MV at the beginning. Thankyou for letting us know, I better edit this video quickly. We will add an explanation in this weeks vlog. I suppose the bonus is with this mistake is that we have added a heater that we can get spares for. Thanks again 👍