Heat

[kitfoxvixen9095]

thanks, do they seem to be sufficient airflow? there are some available in the 150 to 240 cfm range..thanks

[War Eagle]

I have ridden in several of the Series 7's that our group made and they used the 60 cfm fans. Flying on 20 degree days required you have a good buttoned jacket and gloves but it was certainly tolerable. No ice was on the inside of the cabin.

I put 100 cfm fans in my bird and I have a higher degree of comfort on a 20 degree day. My jacket isn't as heavy and it is unbuttoned and I take the gloves off after I have been in the air for a short while.

If I was doing it over again I believe I could still get more heat if I used a bigger cfm fan. The 150's sound interesting and I would probably try those.

One limit you have to be aware of is the size of your heater core and how many BTU's you can hope to get from it. Mine is rated at 18K BTU and if you move too much air over it then the temp of the heated air will begin to decrease. I'm not saying the 250's wouldn't be better than the 150's but it would probably be beneficial to do some testing or if you can do some calculations to verify that they will infact still provide improved heat flow for the cabin given the current size of your heater core.

Of course you always have the opportunity to increase the size of the heater core and the heater inlet/outlet sizes to generate more BTUs for the bigger fans if you needed to.

[Slyfox]

if you go for a heat vest, you can take your hands with gloves on, I use a real thin pair, and put your hand inside your coat and on the vest. Feels real good. Not only that your inner core is nice and toasty. I run my vest on the 912 charging system with no problems. When Cheryl use to fly with me in the KF, her vest worked just fine with mine.

[Dave S]

Another thing to consider in addition to making heat - that is to make sure you are not loosing heat un-necesssarily.

n our series 7 - went through & closed off as many pneumonia holes as possible - made real sure the cowl was sealed up, fabricated some flaperon horn-spar seals on the turtle deck - made sure the leaks were plugged around the wing root.

A lot of cold air comes from the baggage bay and that can be helped with a little judicious windproofing.

The door seals can be diddled with to make sure no gaps or air leaks exist - at least on the 7 - I know other models are a little different on the door closure.

The result keeps the interior shirt sleeve comfortable down through 0 degrees F OAT with the factory heater/muffin fans. Need to throttle back the fans as the OAT gets to 30 or so.

Sincerely,

Dave S

[SkyPirate]

One thing I am doing on my build, at Cabela's and Bass Pro, in the camping area,. They have sleeping bag mats that weigh 14 ounces, they are 30 inches wide, and 82 inches long, about .625 thick, I'm going to line the doors and cabin with this material with exception to the fire wall, I'll use an approved blanket for the fire wall, should hold the heat in good and make the cabin allot quieter

[Dorsal]

Welcome back

[Dick B in KY]

Good to hear from you Skypirate, after such a long time.

Dick B

[SkyPirate]

thanks guys for the welcome back

[kitfoxvixen9095]

thanks for the input on the heater. i settled on two Dayton 150cfm brushless fans. I built a framework to mount them up off of the heater core so that i would get airflow through the entire core and not just the circular area right under the fans. I attached a pic with only one fan mounted...

[t j]

I gave up on making heaters after my third attempt last year and it too turned out to be a dog breath heater. I just have a little 503 rotax air cooled engine and I guess the exhaust just doesn't get hot enough.

I made my first flight with my new heated vest yesterday. It is amazing!
http://gerbing.com/Products/Liners/heatedVestLiner.html