Espar bunk heater guide!

It’s that time of year again, folks. The time when you find out just how well insulated your blankets really are because your @#&! espar shat itself again. To avoid a rude and chilly awakening, take some time now to check your espar over, and if you haven’t, (get your shop or TK dealer) to service it. The first thing to do is to turn it on. Turn the heat all the way up, open your windows, and listen. You’ll hear the fan start up and a few minutes later you’ll probably hear a whoosh all of a sudden. Look outside and see if white smoke is coming from the exhaust pipe, too. If there’s no white smoke, it goes whoosh and sounds a bit like a tiny rocket engine, and then the fan speeds up, it’s happy. Let it burn on full power for about half an hour. If however it sounds like it’s hesitating, or it hasn’t been done in a year, it’s due for a service. This can easily be done yourself with just a few tools, or just as easily farmed out to your local reefer shop. First things first: if it’s a little smoky and unsteady at first, but lights first cycle, you’ll want to try burning kerosene or diesel 1 for a half hour. These heaters don’t like B20 and kerosene will let them burn hot and clear out much of the soot from the B20. To do this, find the fuel pump, probably on a bracket on top of one of your diesel tanks. Disconnect the fuel line, attach a length of tubing, and put that into the bottle of kerosene. Test as before, if it doesn’t start at first try again. If it’s still unsteady after that, then it’s time to change the fuel filter and the glow pin screen. If you order a service kit, it’ll come with the gaskets to split the case and burner, glow pin screen, insertion tool, and fuel filter, but not the all-important glow pin wrench. I’m not going to touch on splitting the case to scrape out the crap, because you need a torque screwdriver to get it back together. First: Remove the intake hose or screen on the unit. Then, pop open the two plastic tabs and lift the top of the case off. The glow pin is roughly in the middle, just neat to the controller. It has two fat wires going to it. Unplug the glow pin and use the glow pin wrench to unscrew it. Remove it and set it aside. Next, use a pick to remove the screen. Discard. Use some pipe cleaners and solvent to scrub out the hole and remember to gently clean out the vent hole in the side too. Scrub the glow pin clean too. Test it with a multimeter. Insert the new screen using the black tool, then screw the glow pin back in until it’s snug and then a little more to get it about güt ‘n tight. Plug the glow pin in. Close up the case and make sure it’s latched and that you can spin the fan freely by hand. Reinstall the inlet hose or screen. Now, we’re going outside. You’ll need two wrenches and a set of pliers or a screwdriver. Find where the fuel pump lives. It’ll be on top of a tank, probably, at about a 20° angle. Disconnect the hose from the bottom side of it, then use one wrench to hold the end of the barb closest to the pump still and the other to unscrew the end you pulled the hose off. Remove the filter and discard. Reinstall the new filter in the same way, screw the barb back together just a bit past hand tight, and reinstall the fuel line. You’re ready to test.