Practical Boat Owner

Too hot to handle?

A bulkhead mountable fire extinguisher heater made for Sam’s Dahlia

The words most dreaded by mariners, if you believe the old books, are ‘fire at sea’. There are, however, moments when a person does think longingly about heating, particularly this side of the equinox.

One of these moments came recently, sitting in my ketch off the west coast of Scotland, anchor down. The great Trevor Robertson, having no space for fuel, prepared to spend a winter in a whole degree above freezing. At the softer end of the spectrum are various diesel heaters like the Eberspächer and its cheaper and perhaps nastier clones. The candle method is a bit too Spartan for , and I do not like the smell of diesel. We therefore pondered a bit.

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