[paulgato]

OK, so I'm in the process of installing an engine preheater which I bought back in October/November when the MET Office were predicting a long, cold winter. In fact we've had a rather warm and extremely wet winter and i haven't got around to installing the heater unit until now.

It's a 2Kw Kenlowe coolant heater and pump that is supposed to heat the engine to 85 degrees Centigrade.

I've got as far as plumbing the thing in to the heater hose and now I'm struggling with the electrics. Currently struggling to install the mains connector on the front grille without it sticking out forwards in a potentially pedestrian-injuring way.

It has taken MANY HOURS to install this heater thing but I'm getting there. And I am enjoying the process.

By the way, my initial impressions on running without using the alternator are encouraging. So far on my daily driving routes for work and social use, I have had no cause to worry about the voltage getting too low. It starts about 12.5 under load and it seems I can take it down to 11.5 under load with no problem at all. That represents about 4 or 5 hours driving with no lights or windscreen wipers, etc, or about 2 hours with all that stuff on. My overall running mpg average seems to be up by about 10% and the test runs I've done show that indicated mpg at 30mph is up from about 87mpg to 99.9mpg. (The gauge only goes up to 99.9mpg). 50mph test runs show a somewhat smaller inprovement of about 5%.

I have a CTEK waterproof, temperature compensated 10A intelligent charger sitting in the engine bay, connected up to the 90Ahr AGM battery, and I plug that in to the mains when I park up on my driveway. I have a 4-digit illuminated volt meter mounted on the dash that I can also read through the rear window if I'm not in the car, so I can get an idea of the state of charge while it's plugged in. The 10A charger seems to fully charge the battery overnight with no problem at all, although I haven't got in there with a current meter to confirm that.

More later...