Well i'm not working, and haven't all week.I think it's too cold.Last friday i had water freeze on the glass, and the combintation of water freezing on the ground and being busy elsewhere has stopped me.
My transfer hose is still frozen.My IBC is a 1000l one (the usual kind), but on top i have a 400l flat tank as an addition.This addition is frozen too.
For prolonged and extreme cold like this it's best for me to give in.last jan even when it warmed up i still had problems thawing things out.I'm pretty confident i am more in control now.I found draining the heater and taking the pumps in on an almost daily basis tiresome.
Even with my eureka i still wouldn't be working at the moment, and when it clears up i may not be able to get back at it because of other christmass work commitments.
Childish.I found it quite interesting to try and crack a problem that the best and supposed more practical minds had struggled with.So the answer?
For the back of the van it's a fan heater with a frost stat setting.I also put large sheets of cardboard in the van roof and put a cover over the top of the van.This is the only solution that will work and saves removing reels pumps heaters etc.But of course if it's still too cold to work....
I'm not claiming to have invented this by the way, it's merely the best solution.
The eureka bit? Well my RO is in a shed, quite a large one as it happens in the grounds of slump hall.A lot must have similar if not exactly the same.The shed isn't insulated.The tool for this job is probably not the fan heater, the heat loss is too great.This is where the oil filled radiator plays a role, and i didn't invent that either.Lot's have said they have one of these.
So what exactly am i claiming to have come up with?
My idea is the micro enviroment.You don't need to heat the shed or the building which can be as cold as it likes.All that matters is the RO and IBC.So you need to create a micro enviroment that only or mostly just includes these items.This can be done by placing the radiator near the IBC and RO, and shrouding these in either cloth, cardboard or proper insulation materials retaining the heat within this area.
The radiator i have wasn't expensive but it has a time switch and needn't be on for long to keep things above freezing.
That's it, my idea in a nutshell.You don't need to heat the buiding just the tank.