Webasto Heater issues...

[ChillPhill]

I've noticed a few of us winter campers have had the Webasto STC 2000 air heater/furnace installed for cold weather camping.

Our experience (2003 Eurovan Weekender, 115,000 miles) has been that when the Webasto works it's pure heaven, but it's a temperamental beast at the best of times, and we always have our fingers crossed when we turn it on whether it will work or not.

After a trip camping in Montana this weekend, it was especially temperamental, and refused to work on several occassions. So instead of concentrating on the beautiful Montana scenery, I had to research what the $%#@ was going on. (The owner's manual is about the worst one I have ever seen) Thought I would share some of my findings here just for posterity.

First, apparently there's a cutoff switch that will prevent the heater from igniting if the gas tank is less than a third full. Never knew that. Apparently, it's to keep you from waking up, nice and warm, to a van with a gas tank that has emptied over night due to the heater doing it's job.

Secondly, all those flashing lights when the heater is not working mean something --- they are error codes. I finally found a site (not Webasto of course) that explained what they all mean here:

https://www.jpcdirect.com/webasto-heater-fault-codes-a-guide/

Third, the site above also shows the correct way to reset the Webasto: First, turn it on; 2, while it is on, pull its two fuses; 3. Switch the control panel to off; 4. Reinsert the fuses, and 5. Turn it back on again. That actually worked for us.

But on the last night of the camping trip, the heater flaked out again, this time with either no fault codes, or F01, which maybe indicates a fuel blockage or air blockage? Not quite sure yet how to clear that one up. Any comments appreciated!

Also, I'm curious to hear any one else's experiences with heating the EV at ngiht.

[IdeaNerd]

Don't have one yet, but hoping someone adds their experience to this thread...

[Gruppe B]

Strange, my Wesbasto would have a hard time determining how much fuel is in the tank as it is just fed from a tee on the fuel line before the fuel pump.

There must be a setting for just running the heater without worrying about running out of fuel. On mine there is a low battery shut off that I've triggered a few times...

The only problems I've had with my Espar and Wesbasto has been incorrect angle of fuel pump (installation error) and a pinched fuel line (critter chewing) that caused start errors.

[CdnVWJunkie]

[markcm2]

I have the STC 2000 and LOVE LOVE LOVE it.

These don't have a sensor for fuel tank level, as someone else mentioned, this is based on how deep the pickup tube is installed for the heater to prevent you from accidentally using all of your gas and getting stranded.

My friend and I both installed these about a year and a half ago. He has the rheostat temperature controller and I have the digital controller (I much prefer the digital timer/controller). We have both experienced issues with poor battery performance which at first seemed like a heater issue but was resolved when we got new AUX batteries which power the heater.

He has had a few instances where his took a few tries to start, it would cycle a few times but eventually start up. Mine has not given me any issues yet.

I've read that these should be lit up periodically and allowed to heat all the way up to keep them clean. There is a replaceable "disc" (?) burning element in these that is known to plug up with carbon; I've read about this on some other sites.