Truma Therme TT2 safety cut out
Our van has a Truma Therme TT2 water heater which until yesterday has worked well for us. Unfortunately, I’ve made a bit of a faux pas and have broken it.
The on/off switch is in a bit of an awkward place and is hidden by curtains as well. Leaving site yesterday I unhooked the electric hook up and emptied the water from the tank, but failed to check that the water heater was turned off - it wasn’t, the switch, I later found out, was still on.
Fast forward three hours to when we arrived home and you can guess what’s coming. Got the van back on the drive and hooked up the electric to recharge the battery after the mover did it’s thing and a few minutes later the circuit breaker tripped.
Several attempts to turn the electric back on and much head scratching later I isolated the fault to the circuit with the water heater. Yup, I seem to have burned out the element since there was no water in the tank when it came back on.
I absolutely hold my hands up and accept operator error as the cause. I’m not trying to shift blame but I’m surprised there isn’t a fail safe in the system that prevents the element from heating up if there’s no water to heat.
Therefore, and since I now have to shell out £90.00 or so for a new element (seems excessive when the entire unit can be bought for £140.00!), my question is this:
Can some kind of safety be retrofitted to the system to stop this kind of thing happening again? If so, how? Any MacGuyvers out there fancy having a think about it? Perhaps some kind of pressure switch on the cold water feed maybe?
What do you all think?
Comments
-
I'm sure the op won't be the first (or last) to get caught out....
so, it begs the question....
depending on when the van is next to be used, is it vital to drain down the hot water system when leaving a site....?
unless there is a forecast prolonged period of severe sub zero temperatures forecast, I never drain down...
ok, were rarely home long enough to worry about it, but I've seen and read of caravanners draining hot water simply to refill at the next site later that day...and then go through the filing and tap spluttering process again...
is this necessary....surely with the tank only holding just 10 ltrs (Truma) or only 8 ltrs (ALDE) it can be anything to do with weight.....can it?
agreed, if heading back to storage for a long period, but in other circumstances......?
0 -
For me draining the system down is more a case of pracitcality and hygene. We're not planning on using the van for a few weeks and I really don't fancy the idea of water being left in the tank so I always drain down. Whether this is necessary or not is probably a matter of personal preference but as a bit of a self confessed germ freak it gives me peace of mind.
In my van the tank isn't in the most accessible of places, either, so if I drain it before packing our paraphenalia in the locker it saves me the hassle of having to empty the locker again to be able to get to the tank.
I have since tried to reset it by filling the tank but it's having none of it, it seems to be well and trully FUBAR'd!
I've been having a think about the problem and I reckon a simple water switch should be enough to create a circuit that turns the heater off if the tank is empty.
0
