Eberspacher cuts out after ten minutes

Post by **ringo** » 05 Feb 2007, 13:38

Very annoying this. When in the french alps last week i desperately needed my eberspacher - however, it would only stay on for 10 minutes. If i did a power cycle it would start again straight away.

I tried all the usual tricks - it wasnt a battery issue and i even changed the controller and the same problem occured.

This was happenning when temperatures were sub zero (it was minus 6 in the van at night).

As soon as i moved to mid france where the temperature was around 2 degrees the eberspacher worked fine for hours.

Any ideas ?

Thanks

Ringo

Post by **Mocki** » 05 Feb 2007, 15:16

were you using red derv?

it sounds like "waxing" to me,
add a 1/4l of petrol to 5l of derv to stop "waxing" of buy good quality road derv with antiwaxing in it

Post by **ringo** » 05 Feb 2007, 15:25

Hmmm, not sure of the quality of the french diesel.

The eber runs from fuel from the diesel tank - and this was filled with french diesel. It is possible that the stuff i filled up on in mid france was the stuff that the eber was using. However, the van ran fine on it. Also, it was kind of strange that the eber started working again (for another 10 minutes) immediately after it had finished its cool down (when i had done a quick off/on).

Thanks for that - you may well be right.

Ringo

Post by **Mocki** » 05 Feb 2007, 16:04

the ebber fuel filter gauge is very fine, any amount of "waxing" would block or partially block it, and if your ebber fuel supply pipes are outside they are thin enough to assist in the "freezing"

maybe???????

Post by **ringo** » 05 Feb 2007, 16:29

Im with you on this one.

But......

Can you explain why the eberspacher works fine for another 10 mins immediately after its shut itself down ?

Hmmmm

Post by **kevtherev** » 05 Feb 2007, 16:35

Latent heat from the van...warms the pipework?...maybe

Post by **irish.david** » 05 Feb 2007, 18:23

When it stops do you get any flashing red LED's? Does the green LED stay on the whole time? Does the fan keep running but it stops putting fuel in so the air coming out gets cold?

The thermistor that provides the feedback for the temperature in the van is mounted in the intake just before the fan. Maybe if the temperature is too low in the incoming air the thermistor goes too far in one direction and it screws up the control system. As far as i know the temp control on ebers work by comparing the resistance of the thermistor to the resistance of the variable resistor controlled by the thermostat knob. If the termostat resistor is set "higher" than the thermistor it starts the fuel on the eber. If the thermistor was giving a funny value it might screw up the comparitor.

I suppose that next time you could run the engine and regular heater until the van warmed up enough to keep the eber going...

Dave

Post by **ringo** » 05 Feb 2007, 20:21

Thanks David - all interesting stuff!

The green light stayed on. Pretty much as it would when it reaches its temperature, cuts out and then kicks in again when it feels like it. (Except it never kicked back in!).

All this talk of thermistors - you may well be right.

Im going to have a good luck at the eber manual and see if i can learn anything.

I know it used to cut out because i had an unbalanced system - but i could always get it to stay on after a bit of experimenting with the knob

Thanks for all your help - if i find anything out i will let you know.

Ringo

Post by **irish.david** » 06 Feb 2007, 01:50

I've had a quick look at the eber manual and found something else that's worth considering. Earlier i was talking about the petrol eber when the diesel eber works in a different way to the petrol one in the way it regulates the temperature. On the diesel when the temperature gets to the setting on the thermostat it reduces the frequency of pulses going to the fuel pump to 1/4 of what they are at full heat. I can only assume that this is to keep the combustion chamber up to temperature or to keep pressure in the fuel line.

This means you can check to make sure the comparitors working by setting the thermostat low and starting the eber. Listen to the ticking noise from the fuel pump and when it drops in frequency turn the thermostat up a little. The frequency should return to normal. Then wait a few minutes and the frequency should drop again. All this has to be done with the van closed as the thermistor measures the air temperature in the van.

Other thing to watch out for is the temperature switch for the glow plug. If that is working at the wrong temperature the glow plug may not be switching on at the right time meaning the combustion chamber isn't hot enough to ignite the diesel going in there.

Dave

Post by **ringo** » 06 Feb 2007, 09:36

Thanks Dave - i only hope browsing the eber manual at 1.50am helped you get to sleep!

Unfortunatley i have no way of testing it at the moment - it works perfectly well in England. I might give it a go when i get up in the morning after a really big frost.

Im not sure the temperature of the van ever reached anything high enough to meet the thermostat temperature in the 10 minutes it was on!

Ringo

Post by **bigbluebus** » 07 Feb 2007, 12:52

i don't have a rheostat / temp control thing on mine, just an LED timer

mine will run for about 5 minutes, getting slightly warm then cuts out. If I reset the timer & try again it runs toasty for full 60 minutes (max allowed on timer).

Does my head in messing with timer so I've found if engine's running during the 'dodgy' period, get to about 6 minutes, switch off engine and eber keeps running toasty.

I don't understand, but it works