Monday 24 December 2012

A Lagging We Will Go.......

John Bland,one of my correspondents,commented on the fact that he found the front of the van cooler than the rear of the van.

He pointed out something I did not realise,that there is a heating pipe which passes out from the Whale heater,through the floor to the exterior along the underside of the van and back in again to supply the front vent under the TV.

I had seen this pipe before and not realised what it was.

The pipe is normal grey ribbed plastic pipe which can obviously lose heat along its length as John pointed out.

I was pondering this the other day when up at the storage and decided to visit B&Q/Homebase etc. to see what I could come up with in the insulation line.

The pipe is about 12cm in circumference so the pre-formed polystyrene pipe lagging is too small ( or they just didn't have any bigger sizes in stock ).

Whilst looking in Homebase I came across this stuff :-

ThermaWrap Insulation

which looks just the job.

Bought a couple of rolls ( just over £8 for the two ) and will attempt to apply it after Christmas.

Will post how it went,hopefully with a few photos.

Ian

6 comments:

  1. Ian
    The black pipe i think is a sleeve over the the heater ducting acting as an insulation/extra support,the ducting is not very strong as i have found to my cost in a prevous van ,the same is in the rear seat locker
    John B

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  2. John,

    I think we may be at cross purposes with the pipes.

    The ones in the rear locker have indeed a black "cardboardy" sleeve over the ducting but this is a grey plastic affair ( a bit like wide waste pipe )that is held onto the floor underneath the van with zip-ties.

    I presumed that this was the heating pipe from front to rear we were discussing.

    If not I can't see what else it could be.

    I presumed this was the heating pipe we were discussing.

    Don't want to lag the wrong one.

    Ian

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    Replies
    1. Ian
      Have braved the elements and have checked the pipe under our van, and the black heating pipe is the same material as inside except it is fitted into each elbow and held on by the same zip-ties, where as inside it is just to stop the brown card type ducting being crushed?,if youri is grey plastic then maybe something has been left of our van which could acount the heat loss

      John

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  3. John,

    If it ever stops raining I will go up to storage this weekend or next week and double check and possibly take some pictures then we can see if we are talking about the same thing.

    One of the pains of having the van in storage five miles away.

    Will keep you posted.

    Ian

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    Replies
    1. Ian
      Our van is in storage also (4miles)we are not allowed to keep at home, good in one way as it does not advertise when we are away, also keeps insurance lower

      John

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  4. John,

    Been up to the van today and we were definitely at cross purposes regarding the heating pipe !!

    The pipe I was referring to runs through the offside wheel arch and is grey plastic in colour ( no idea what it is for now I know it isn't a heating pipe ) ,your pipe ( the correct one )as you well know,runs under the van and as you say is black in colour like the interior heating pipes.

    I lagged this pipe and will be putting a posting and some pics on the blog shortly.

    Ian

    ReplyDelete