At 06:12 PM 9/20/01 -0400, Mark Watts wrote:
>Anyone out there convert (or even recomend) the  built in gas heater to run
>intermitantly off of a second battery?

Yupp.. We take the kids sledding and ice skating in the winter.  The westy
is great to have available as a warming shelter.  To keep from having to
run the engine all the time, I switched the gas heater over to the
camp-battery set-up.  You'll need to really study the Bently diagrams to
find where the power needs to go (just to one of the fuses that were added
by VW just for the heater, I just can't remember where it is right now) and
be sure to watch the voltage of the batt.  If the system drops below 10
volts you should shut-down.  The carbon build-up on the glow plug gets
really bad when the voltage drops.

The only problem is camping.  In the '82 the BN-6 is really loud at
night.  It's like trying to sleep on top of a jet engine, or rocket
motor.  Plus if anyone is sleeping down-wind they could get gassed-out from
the exhaust.  When the voltage drops it's even worse.  But when we are
using TURD as a portable warming hut it's great.  Play all day in the
frigid air and know that a warm shelter awaits.. life don't get much better
than that.

Chris Smith
Head Slave