Airtonic. D2 space heater.

On hook up today and switch  on the heating, notice from outside it smelled of diesel when it first started up, is this normal. I know if power goes of it will kick in on diesel  but all is well with electric. Is there any way you can see what power it's using. Many thanks Paul

Does the Airtronic ever use electric power source. I thought it was purely a diesel fueled heater unit.

In the auto sleeper handbook says if there is a power failure the heating automatically comes on  on by diesel.

paul long wrote:On hook up today and switch  on the heating, notice from outside it smelled of diesel when it first started up, is this normal. I know if power goes of it will kick in on diesel  but all is well with electric. Is there any way you can see what power it's using. Many thanks Paul

There is normally some fuel residue left in the hot box after use , when working on fuel it will draw from your battery to operate the working parts, usually the leisure battery.
Our 59 Symbol (two vans ago) had a diesel/electric unit , our leisure battery usually lasted for 2 hours before requiring a recharge
Boaby

But the Airtronic only uses 34w at full output (2200W) so is not electric powered, diesel only with 12v to glowpin only.

So what your saying is that it diesel and it can run from mains & leisure battery  for the blower.

hi
As far as I'm aware the eberspacher d2 heater is diesel fuelled, it is ignited and the fan powered by the leisure battery,mine is ! Check for exhaust at side of van 30 mm ish corrugated metal pipe!    
Dave h.        Bank holiday Monday. WET

Thank you , yes pipe just in front of the rear wheel. I'm sorted  now and thank you to you all. Regards Paul.

If the battery is a bit low, the heater may fail to light, but running the engine during start up should sort it.

Thanks Peter,  thats good to know. Paul.

The D2 can have a mains electric section added (my previous 2008 Duetto had this feature). With the Airtronic unit added the heater would run on either mains electric, up to 900 watts only, or diesel up to (I think) a maximum of 2,200 watts. It was easy to switch between either fuel, but strangely the mains electric side was noisier than the diesel, because the fan ran all the time at full flow (even when the heater element switched off). Another curiosity was that the mains electric side would not work at all on reversed polarity and under this condition would automatically change to diesel only operation.