Hurri-Hot in the back of the bus?

[Iheartbus]

i have a hurri-hot heater attached under one of the bus seats waaaay in the back. There is also a hose under some sheet metal that travels the length of the bus to get to it. Is this something I need to keep? I mean it would be neat to keep the hoses and whatnot and have a heater that reaches the bedroom in the back, but I don't think this thing works unless the engine is on?

[Robin97396]

You're right. That's a coolant heater. Most of us remove them to more easily facilitate the build process. Some reinstall the heaters in a more convenient location, like the passenger area, if you're willing to give up that much space.

One of the popular heating methods right now is using a diesel fueled coolant heater. These coolant heaters were designed to keep an engine block warm during extreme cold weather conditions, but plumbed right they work well at heating coolant that can be used in the hydronic heater you're currently questioning as well as through hydronic floor heat. Both methods of hydronic heating are being used with very acceptable results during the winters.

Many of us take out our rear heaters and simply save them for later just in case there is a way we can use them more efficiently. The heaters usually need to be taken apart and cleaned up to work well anyway.

There's a lot of information on this site about pretty much any heating method you can think of.

[Iheartbus]

Oh ok, so it probably doesn't even work then anyways? So is my coolant traveling back there and then back to the engine just because? So weird, such a strange design.
I know there is a plug in at the back of the bus to cool the block, there is a heater that the seller said was in a "grid" or something that heats the block for me in the winter, so do I even need this thing? Will removing the hoses cause coolant to flood the inside of the bus?

[Robin97396]

The hydronic forced air heater probably does work when the bus is warmed up.

Yes your coolant travels all the way to the rear heater and back to the engine. There are valves on the engine so you can stop the flow of hot water through the heating system during the summer.

You can lose several gallons of coolant while disconnecting the coolant lines from the heater. It's good to do this while the coolant is not hot. If you have the bus parked with the back end higher than the front end you'll lose less coolant. Most of us simply remove the lines from the heater and reconnect the hoses directly together to loop the hoses which reseals the coolant system. You can also remove the heater hoses completely, but you will likely lose a significant amount of coolant. You can recapture most of the coolant in a bucket to refill your radiator with, but will likely need a bit of additional water. This is all part of learning how to work on your bus.

It's odd that you block heater is located in the rear of the bus, or perhaps it's just the plug located at the rear of the bus. I've never seen that setup. In your case removing the hoses might eliminate your ability to use the block heater. That electric block heater could also be used for hydronic floor heating. Most of us like to reuse what we've got.

[Crozz]

Like Robin mentioned many people keep their heaters or regret not using them. There are plenty of folks who however do not keep them. Personally I yanked those things out as soon as I could and im glad that I did. While prepping the floor I saw signs of rust which meant they leak.

Why spend so many hours and money on nice interiors to have something that could leak toxic sticky liquid all over the inside? Not mentioning any steam or similar over heating issues.

[Robin97396]

Hey, I resemble that remark.

Of course you're going to see rust under the heaters. They washed the puke mats off with a hose to get the kid's stickyness off. That's why the floors are rusty in most buses even if they don't leak. Occasionally I am tempted to wash my floor with a hose but that's not how we clean the floor in the rolling house, is it?

The idea with retaining the heaters is to repurpose them somehow, like so many other things on a bus. Avid skiers tend to reinstall them in the passenger areas. With a coolant block heater you could use the heater for a convection heater. Nobody likes the big black bus heater that takes up space awkwardly. I've seen some clever changes done to bus heaters to make them nicer looking. The standard hydronic bus heaters have worked for probably in the neighborhood of 20 years in each of our buses. They are worth virtually nothing to sell, but they're very expensive to buy if you do change your mind and find a use for them in the future.

Last year I didn't like the idea of a diesel powered engine block heater. More and more I'm leaning toward the hydronic floor heat systems and a hydronic block heater could make a cost effective alternative heat source based on the one fuel theory. I figure if these buses have been running for 20 years with hydronic bus heaters in them, they're probably pretty safe heating systems. Then again I plan on updating all the old rubber, like heater hoses, so I don't have to worry. I don't know when they were changed last, so I'd rather just start with a clean slate on items like that. Most of us put in a new air filter even though we didn't need it yet. It's about catching up deferred maintenance to prevent issues like blowing coolant all over.

There's an amazing number of opinions here and it's fun to hear them all.

Crozz; I thought you were intending to get a hydronic block heater to use as a heat source?

[cadillackid]

I kept all the heaters in both my busses.. and when i was rolling wheels on the freeway at -5 degrees outside I had every darn one of them plus the "dash A/C, heat unit" I added turned on as high as they would go... and I was able to be sort of warm...
-Christopher

[caleylemieux]

we just removed the two hurri-hot under seat heaters and connected the two hoses underneath the bus. Im worried because the just seems too easy? Also, how do we secure the hoses (now one hose) to the bus? it is just kind of hanging there. And what to do with the electrical wire that was left, could that be repurposed?

Originally Posted by Robin97396

The hydronic forced air heater probably does work when the bus is warmed up.

Yes your coolant travels all the way to the rear heater and back to the engine. There are valves on the engine so you can stop the flow of hot water through the heating system during the summer.

You can lose several gallons of coolant while disconnecting the coolant lines from the heater. It's good to do this while the coolant is not hot. If you have the bus parked with the back end higher than the front end you'll lose less coolant. Most of us simply remove the lines from the heater and reconnect the hoses directly together to loop the hoses which reseals the coolant system. You can also remove the heater hoses completely, but you will likely lose a significant amount of coolant. You can recapture most of the coolant in a bucket to refill your radiator with, but will likely need a bit of additional water. This is all part of learning how to work on your bus.

It's odd that you block heater is located in the rear of the bus, or perhaps it's just the plug located at the rear of the bus. I've never seen that setup. In your case removing the hoses might eliminate your ability to use the block heater. That electric block heater could also be used for hydronic floor heating. Most of us like to reuse what we've got.

[brokedown]

I removed all the excess wire from my bus. it's a pretty simple wiring diagram to begin with and even more simple after pulling 300 ft of speaker wire, dome lights, and interlock switch wires out! But it's unnecessary to do.

The hose can probably be held up by a Good, Strong Zip Tie.