Furnace help

Great news! I reached out to my friend who used to own it and she directed me to the strage compartment and I found it! She also told me she never used the furnace in the entire 6 years she had it. She just used a space heater. But when I turned it on it seems fine. A little noisy but I can see the flame and smells like any other heater that hasn't been turned on in a while. No gas smell. I just bought a new gas detector and carbone monoxide detector as well.

Originally posted by StephenH Originally posted by offgrid OTOH a baffle redirecting the air out firm under the bed is not needed. If it was then it would have been put there at the factory. The gap between the floor and the bed is huge and allows for plenty of air convection into the room. Just don't fill it up under there with stuff and you will be fine. Here is where I would disagree with you. I built a diverter (not a baffle) for our RPod 179. It makes a big difference by diverting the heated air so it is better distributed throughout the cabin. I used to use a fan to help for this, but it is no longer needed with the diverter. Given that my DC to DC charger would be directly in the path of the hot air from the furnace, having the diverter is useful to ensure that it does not get overheated. Plus, I can safely put things in the empty space that otherwise would not be usable. I'm not saying to fill it up. There still needs to be room for return air flow, but some of the space can be used, even for items that might be heat sensitive. It might not strictly be needed, but it is a very good modification to make that some might find very desirable for the better heat distribution. Edit: Just because the factory did not include it does not mean that it isn't needed. There are lots of modifications I have made that the factory did not include because it made things easier or better (in my opinion). Forest River is not necessarily going to put some items on because they want to keep the cost low. It just means that we get to do the modifications if we want to improve things.

I was trying to minimize the OP's efforts to get their trailer furnace system working. In that context a custom furnace diverter is certainly not needed. The vast majority of owners, myself included, don't have one are are just fine without it.

The gap under the bed is plenty big enough for natural convection to work fine transferring heat into the room. The temp under there will be a little warmer than the room but that won't result is any noticeable reduction in heating efficiency, the warmth will still find it's way into the room no problem. I personally found the space under there being warmer to be beneficial, I'd place my wet boots and clothing under there and it would dry them more quickly. I never noticed any significant cold or hot spots in the room that would require active fan operation to levelize.

I suspect that perhaps what you are perceiving as improved efficiency from a diverter is just more rapid injection of heat into the room when the heater turns on. That could actually be a disadvantage by shortening the heating cycle, which is already too short to be efficient (large heater small room). I kept bottled water under there to provide some warm thermal mass to lengthen the furnace cycle.

That being said if you like having a diverter, or have some electronics under there that is heat sensitive feel free. Just be sure it's not reducing the effectiveness of the cover and causing short circuiting of hot outlet air back into the furnace inlet. Other than that, it causes no problems that I can see.

You might want to check out the Truma Combi system. Most of the higher end small RVs seem to be using that system now.

Another question for those of you still following this, should I be concerned about using a furnace that has not been run in over 6 years? Id there something I can do to make sure it's running correctly? To be honest, I've been worried about using it, since ya know, there's a flame happening under my bed. lol

Since you can remove both the furnace and the water heater I think there should be plenty of room for it plus some ducting to keep the inlet and outlet separated enough. Perhaps outlet under the table and inlet forward in the under bed space in the 179? You could use aircraft SCAT tubing for the outlet ducting, good for up to 500F temps.

As long term DIYers neither of us are likely put off by warranty disclaimers like that, pretty much anything we do is at our own risk anyway.   

There are multiple videos on DIY installs of the Truma system on YouTube.