It gets cold in New Zealand, below 0 degrees C in winter.
Also I have a girlfriend who complains about being cold even when it’s warm, so inevitably I’d either have to spoon all night or install a heater.
I decided to get a heater.
A small electric heater would be the easiest, but these use up heaps of electricity (150W was the smallest I could find), so I started browsing eBay and came across this beautiful no-name brand diesel heater from China, only AUD $178 (NZD $191)
It works by burning diesel to produce heat, and uses hardly any electricity once running, current draw is less than 1 amp.
I’m a huge fan of trying cheap Chinese shit alternatives. In this case, the original is the Eberspacher Airtronic D4 Diesel Heater, a German brand which costs NZD $3,370 here
Of course there is a risk that cheap Chinese no name brand stuff will break or won’t work properly or won’t last long.. but for the price of the ‘proper’ German heater I could buy 17 of the Chinese ones 😁 and live life on the edge.
Anyway I ordered it, it arrived, and I got to installing it, which was a major bitch because:
- A nut securing the diesel pickup was missing, so I had to go to Bunnings again to find a replacement
- I had to take apart the drawers under the bed to fit the tank to the side
- I had to crawl around under the truck to run the fuel line and fit the pump and filter, ruining my classic black v neck tshirt
- I had to make a custom bracket to install it where I wanted – which was at the side underneath the floor (so it wouldn’t take up space inside, would suck fresh air, and so we wouldn’t hear it as much from the inside)
- The absolute worst part was cutting a hole in the floor for the outlet. It wouldn’t have been that hard if I’d noticed the metal frame before I started, but I was too excited and didn’t… so I ended up using a mixture of jigsaw, drill and angle grinder to make a hole for this:
Despite all the complaining I managed to finish the job and the heater was all installed and connected.
Switched it on and it worked so well that the girlfriend had to take her top off because for the first time in her life she got too hot !! Definitely worth the money for that alone 😃
1 x Cheap Chinese Diesel Heater + $191
Bolts & nuts from Bunnings + $3
Total: $9,772