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Welcome to UKCS.
Maybe not quite so straightforwards as first appears! Firstly you have to consider the fuel consumption and expected run time to decide on size of tank required without a refill! Many heaters seem to consume up to near 0.5 litre/hour at high setting, theoretically that could be 12 litres/24 hours use. Obviously the size of the tank is highly influential on where you can place it!
You wouldn't really want a tank with it's refill intake inside the van, or any space where fumes could penetrate the van interior. Ideally you'd want to treat it in the same way as a gas cylinder, leakage/fumes ONLY venting to atmosphere with a dropout vent on any enclosed space like a locker and totalled sealed from van interior. As to fitting in gas locker, that has it's merits with one exception, 'nose weight'! Even a relatively small 20L tank with fittings and contents will be around an extra 20Kg, that's quite a lot to try and compensate for to achieve correct nose weight on the towbar! That is a fair bit more than a second steel Calor 6kg gas cylinder at around 16kg, or a Flogas lightweight 10Kg gas cylinder!
Don't overlook that these heaters require quite a lot of battery power too, to power pumps, fans, controls etc. that may mean you need to upgrade your battery set up too, with maybe solar power to keep battery charged as you may only get one day of discharge on a standard leisure battery before damagingly low discharge state! Remember you can only safely discharge a standard lead acid battery to HALF it's stated capacity, so a 100Ah battery will only safely provide 50Ah before risk of permanent damage with continued use without recharge, and that's on a near new battery at it's max performance, they deteriorate with age, so expect even less out of a battery more than a year or so old!
All this weight is adding up! Heater, fuel system, extra/bigger battery, solar charger etc. can easily add say 40Kg to your van, that's coming off your payload! And don't forget you'll be carrying jerry cans of fuel as well, possibly in the car, but somewhere!
Diesel heaters are great and efficient in some ways, but usually fitted to diesel powered campers etc. drawing fuel off large capacity vehicle fuel tank and battery power from a source that can be recharged from running the vehicle engine, which may happen as part of everyday use with trips out. Fitting to a caravan is a different arrangement that requires careful thought to make truly viable. Not saying impossible, but requires some careful thought to all aspects.
I know it's relating to campervans, but this web site has some useful info: https://www.vanlife.uk/post/diesel-heater-for-campervan
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Topic: Diesel heater pennine pathfinder
via mobile 12/3/2026 at 10:11pm
