Plumbing Espar Hydronic D5

[Joe917]

Seems like using a plate exchanger for your hot water will require the espar to be running for you to have hot water. If you use a marine hot water tank, you can run the espar once and have hot water for a day or two. A simple reservoir in line before the espar will add enough capacity.

Good spot, I had assumed the flat plate heat exchanger was a hot water tank. Replace it with a Spa Isotemp Marine Hot Water Heater or similar.
To be clear the reservoir is for coolant not hot water.

 

[RadVan]

New guy, butting into this thread.

First post here. Active over on the Sprinter Forum. I am curious if there's been any progress. A couple of us over on the sprinter forum are looking at building a similar setup using a D5 with an IsoTemp Slim hot water heater (15L/ 4 gallon) rectangular hot water heater.

The IsoTemp/D5 seems like a good compromise for small spaces like DIY campervans.

I don't have much to contribute here, but search the sprinter forum for GeorgeRa build thread, he's done extensive research on it and is getting close to finishing the install. Hope that helps. Following this thread.

 

[Caza]

All this seems a little complicated if you have a solid solar setup on your rig. I was set on using a diesel fueled water heater, but after reading through this thread and doing some more research I found this bad Larry
https://www.amazon.com/Bosch-Tronic-3000-4-Gallon-Mini-Tank/dp/B0148O65IE
It’s 1440 watts at 120v. That’s only 12 amps.
Not a continuous 12 amps, far from it. Different tank options but I’m going with the 4 gallon for my MT45 conversion.

Pros over diesel water heater:
- Easy installation (No tapping into the engine cooling system/adding separate heating elements/running all the extra loops and valves)
-Water is kept warm in tank through periodic heating. This ultimately conserves water
-Very reasonable price

 

[S2DM]

I’d be careful about using a unit not rated for mobile/marine use. I’d also recommend against that high a wattage. Drawing 1440 watts off anything but a large lithium array will result in substantial battery efficiency losses due to the Peukert effect.

All things said, the isotemps are probably the best option for mobile use and come in an 800 watt size that allows heating via either hydronic or 120v AC.

I have a 6.4 gallon isotemp, Victron 3k watt inverter, 800ah at 13.4v lithium array and 1350 watts of solar, and even with that, the water heater is my biggest load and I have to be careful. I can run my mini split heat pump all night on heat or cool and only drop to 60%. The duty cycle on the hot water heaters is high and they really consume batteries.

For anything but the largest lithium arrays, I’d recommend hydronic.

All this seems a little complicated if you have a solid solar setup on your rig. I was set on using a diesel fueled water heater, but after reading through this thread and doing some more research I found this bad Larry
https://www.amazon.com/Bosch-Tronic-3000-4-Gallon-Mini-Tank/dp/B0148O65IE
It’s 1440 watts at 120v. That’s only 12 amps.
Not a continuous 12 amps, far from it. Different tank options but I’m going with the 4 gallon for my MT45 conversion.

Pros over diesel water heater:
- Easy installation (No tapping into the engine cooling system/adding separate heating elements/running all the extra loops and valves)
-Water is kept warm in tank through periodic heating. This ultimately conserves water
-Very reasonable price

 

[almaz]

Here is my installation in Unimog Ambulance:
- Hydronic D5WS
- Elgena 15L heat exchanger for hot water supply
- Kalori Silencio 5.5 KW for air heating
- an optional coolant loop under the freshwater tank to prevent freezing