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Old 10-18-2021, 03:55 PM   #1
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Are ceramic heaters safe overnight?

We’re on the final leg of our 9 week trip. The nighttime lows at our last stop, in the Hudson Valley of New York, is going to be below 40 degrees. I’m not worried about freezing lines at that temperature but just being comfortable in the coach at night. Until now we ran our ceramic heater when awake and turned it off at night. We haven’t (yet) run the furnace in order to save propane. I planned to set the propane furnace at 58 but wondered if we could just keep the ceramic heater on. I’m concerned about fire safety. I would hate to wake up to see flames in the RV, or worse. The ceramic heater ‘conforms to UL Std. 1278’ and turns off if it tips onto its side.

Suggestions on using a ceramic heater when sleeping? Thanks.
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Old 10-18-2021, 04:09 PM   #2
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Hi Marudnick,
I use one too, and it has a tip-over safety switch as well. I believe it is just fine, with two caveats:
-- Keep a couple of feet of separation from it and any other surface directly in its heat path.
-- If you have a pet who could rotate the heater, then the heater must be placed in a way that precludes that.
For example, I keep our ceramic heater on our nightstand, pointing over our slide-out Queen berth. This keeps it out of the way of our dog.
Keep warm!
Eagle5
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Old 10-18-2021, 04:14 PM   #3
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Hi Marudnick,
I use one too, and it has a tip-over safety switch as well. I believe it is just fine, with two caveats:
-- Keep a couple of feet of separation from it and any other surface directly in its heat path.
-- If you have a pet who could rotate the heater, then the heater must be placed in a way that precludes that.
For example, I keep our ceramic heater on our nightstand, pointing over our slide-out Queen berth. This keeps it out of the way of our dog.
Keep warm!
Eagle5
Thanks for your quick reply and suggestions. No pets, although we might have picked up a cricket at our last stop.
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Old 10-18-2021, 04:16 PM   #4
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My oh my - did he look like this???
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Old 10-18-2021, 04:17 PM   #5
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We've used them overnight often. At night, we place it on top of the stove.
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Old 10-18-2021, 05:43 PM   #6
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My oh my - did he look like this???
Never found it. Chirped for a while during the evening for a couple of nights. We’ll see if it chirps tonight.
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Old 10-18-2021, 05:45 PM   #7
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We've used them overnight often. At night, we place it on top of the stove.
Good to know. There is a place at the front of our RV where we could put it, out of the way of a bathroom run in the middle of the night.
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Old 10-18-2021, 06:23 PM   #8
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Be watchful to where you plug it in. Many of the outlets are of the quick squeeze together sped box type. The are prone to failure with heavy loads.

If you can use the washing machine or microwave outlet, it might be belter. I have wired a 20 Amp residentials outlet directly to the circuit breaker panel for aux heater use, 15 Amp Breaker # 12 wire.
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Old 10-18-2021, 06:45 PM   #9
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I do not like the noise the furnace in most RV makes and hate the blast of cold air until the fire is lit, so we use an electric heater almost all the time. We find it works fine to set on most any of the hard surfaces and even on the soft covered dash when it is a big flat one.
There are a couple items to think about but easy enough to work around with a bit of thought.

One is that a 1500 watt heater is close to 12.5 amp when the power is steady at 120 volts but power is prone to pretty wide swings. Sometimes it is the campground, other times it is simply a factor of all the milkers turning on the cooler at sunrise!

so the point is that we need to allow for some "safety" to avoid tripping the breaker, so we normally run the heater on the second setting of 750 watts to allow for more "safe zone". Not that it is a hazard but more that we do not stay where it is that cold for that long and I hate getting up to find a tripped breaker!!

I might go one step further for futre and recomm,end getting a remote reading thermostat that has a digital readout for far greater accuracy and less swing in the temp. You can place the remote readout and control near where you are and leave the heater whereever it works best to be safe and out of the way. I'm fussy (spoiled?) about temp and noise so setting the control where I am and the heater noise at the other end, gives me lots of nice things for a few extra bucks, or course!

This gave us lots of value:
https://www.amazon.com/Programmable-...965910838&th=1

Battery operation but plug the heater in the outlet plug and set the thermostat where you want it to control the temp!
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Old 10-19-2021, 12:31 PM   #10
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Be watchful to where you plug it in. Many of the outlets are of the quick squeeze together sped box type. The are prone to failure with heavy loads.
We have been using the same outlet for the space heater since last fall, with no problems. The only difference is that previously we turned off the heater at bedtime and froze for a bit in the morning. Last night I left the heater on at the lower setting and it was 63 in the morning, not too bad.
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Old 10-19-2021, 12:33 PM   #11
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This gave us lots of value:
https://www.amazon.com/Programmable-...965910838&th=1

Battery operation but plug the heater in the outlet plug and set the thermostat where you want it to control the temp!
Interesting product. I’ll check it out. Thanks.
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Old 10-19-2021, 12:47 PM   #12
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Interesting product. I’ll check it out. Thanks.
Don't get too excited about the "programable" part as I do not think of this as a program when you set it to a temp and it maintains it! To me, programable says you can set up a number of cycles during a day which this DOES NOT.

One of the things we have always found in Rv was that there are lots of cold spots here and there due to lack of circulation and little insulation, so leting me move the thermostat to the point where I want the heat controlled works for me and I do like to leave the little heater further away from me while we sleep.

I'm getting really interested in sleeping, so $20-25 is okay if it works!
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