Club 80-90 Forums

I know there have been loads of questions about these heaters but a search produced no results so sorry in advance if this has been dealt with before. My erberspacher petrol heater wouldnt work last week the usual problem used to be battery but I now have a new 110amp hour and pluged into a charger still no joy. The fan was running but cut out after about 60 seconds or so. I suspected fuel and after crawling under the van (2.1 MV petrol syncro 1990) located the pump. I remembered sitting in the back of my friends Riley 1.5 mid 60s vintage knocking the electric fuel pump with a spanner every time it stopped ticking to get us home, so I tried this trick on the erber off she went ticking like a good un and the heater started. My question is this had anyone had this problem is this the begining of the end for the pump, or is it time to try and get a new one.
Thanks
Peter

It might be just that you have a bit of corrosion on the connections.

The pump on the eberspacher and webasto is a clever design. There is a plunger inside and one way valve, the plunger is sprung, and when you apply voltage to it a coil magnetizes and snaps the plunger toward the fuel outlet pumping a metered amount of fuel. This makes a ticking noise, as the burner increases to it's maximum burn rate the ticking will get faster and faster.

The pumps do get stuck, or blocked. Just pull the fuel line from the heaterand switch the unit on, the pump is supposed to be able to squirt the fuel 12 inch's.

The heaters to get coked up.

My one has, and needs a 60 quid combustion chamber as it chuffs a bit on start up.

De coking, and replacing the glow plug is possible the cause.

If the brain thinks or detects no flame then it goes into shut down mode by blowing air through it for a while in case it is hot still.
heat exchanger

Unit

Combustion chamber and glow plug

Coke


Hope this helps.

Simon.

Thanks for the replies guys all seems ok at the moment I tried the heater a few times and the pump works fine first time and the heater does what it should. I just wondered if the problem of the pump not kicking in just that one time was the death knell of the pump. I understand the pumps are expensive to say the least so am keeping my fingers crossed

You can pick them up on Ebay for under £20 sometimes if your lucky. A Webasto one works just as well - occasionally you may need to adjust the fuel metering as it was set up for a different heater.

Some caustic soda will clear the coked up surfaces in no time. Just be careful as it's strong stuff and will heat up water to boiling point if you are making a strong mix.
Done this little trick loads of times on heaters and engine heads.
I would recommend wearing safety goggles if taking this route though.

Poor guy only had his pump stick and you've all got him doing a decoke!!!!

We'll have his engine and van stripped down in no time too!

pull the glow plug out and have a look. Mine used to work sometimes and others it wouldn't. I thought it was the pump as no pulse was sent to it. In the end it was the glow-plug clogged up and the brain in the heater stopped the pump as a safety to stop fuel input and posable fire i suppose. I just cleaned the plug and its good as new now.

jed