Our Visit to Sugarcreek and Our New MAXAIR Fan

jpi68

Well it’s been forever since I posted anything here.. The last two years have been rather busy for us, we both retired from our jobs and moved from Colorado to Indiana. But that’s not why I am posting this… Last fall on a trip down to Nashville, TN the bathroom fan in our 2019 T@B 400 gave up the ghost.  So we made the trip to Sugarcreek to have a MAXAIR fan installed in the main cabin and moved the old stock fan from the main cabin into the bathroom. In addition we had Austin and the service team at NuCamp,  blow out and refill our glycol system, grease the bearings and check the trailer brakes… All went well and good as far as those items were concerned, however, when we got back to our campground that night, in Berlin, OH, we discovered our Alde system would not work… We had no heat and no hot water. I could not figure out what had happened. The Service Panel on the Alde Screen read water and glycol were both and about 89 degrees and they were not going up.  It wasn’t that cold last night so we just bundled up and put on an extra blanket and thought I’ll try and get back over to NuCamp in the morning to see what’s up with the Alde. Then in the middle of the night Susan wakes me up and said that it was getting really hot in the camper… I went and checked the service levels on the Alde and both the Glycol and the Water temperature were up to over 140 degrees. Me thinks that the system has self healed…. Not so… In the morning both of the temperatures for the glycol and the water were down in the 90’s. The next thing I tried was to reset the time on the Alde thinking that it might have been an inverted timed shut off that had caused the problem, no dice… Then I don’t know why but I tried the shower heat boost on the Alde control panel… The system came to life, but it was short lived. The Glycol and the Water heated up to appropriate levels, but just a quickly went back down. I called NuCamp and explained the situation, they told me to get over as soon as we could and Austin and his service guys would have a look. I explained the situation to Austin as best I could  everyone was totally perplexed… Of course nothing like this has ever happened, that’s typical for us.. It’s always something new.. We thought that air in the glycol line wouldn’t act this way, and since the system kicked in when I hit the shower hot water boost it couldn’t be the fuse.  We left the camper with Austin and NuCamp service team and went off to have breakfast. We came back a couple of hours later and Austin said that he would have to run some more diagnostics and get in touch with the Alde people to see what was up. The Alde folks couldn’t explain the situation… Austin said that the only thing that he could think of was to start replacing parts on the Alde, i.e., the circuit board to see if that would fix it. We came back at about three in the afternoon and Austin and the NuCamp service team had replaced the main circuit board and that appears to have fixed the problem. The system worked fine on Sunday night but quit on Monday night, except to work intermittently as I explained… Go figure… I have read where the Alde circuit board does occasionally fail.. I am wondering if anyone else has had a similar experience…

Sharon_is_SAM

Was the glycol pump working?  Sounds like the thermostat was not working.

jpi68

OK, now it is early Wednesday morning about 2am, here is the time line, Sunday night arrived in Berlin, OH, set up, Heat and water were OK. Monday morning dropped the camper at NuCamp service center, flushed the glycol system and replaced with fresh. Monday night no heat no hot water. Tuesday went back to NuCamp service center, replaced the Alde circuit board. Glycol Temp went up to the high 160’s water temp was up in the 150’s. Thermostats was set at 85 degrees. Right now the Glycol is at 170 and water is at 158. No heat detected even though I have the thermostat set at 82 degrees. Independent thermometer says the cabin is at about 68 degrees. The temperatures on the Alde panel says 73 degrees. No heat coming from vent in the bathroom. It should be blasting out heat…Or it would have in the past before the flush and refill…I still have a problem. I will call NuCamp in the morning…it seems that the Alde system is working but somehow heat is not circulating through the radiant heating system. Sharon you might have hit on something, if the glycol pump is not working properly would that mean that the hot glycol is not circulating through the radiant heating lines?

qhumberd

We also have the 2019 and I did a full flush and refill (but with Century glycol) a few months back. I learned that there are a couple of things you can check yourself. One would be the pump setting on the Alde. NuCamp likely set it back to around 2. It is a tiny dial with a small arrow on mine. If you turn on the Alde and turn it up to 5 you should be able to hear it and also check your reservoir tank and it should be churning. That BTW also helps clear any trapped air in the lines. If that is working you can then reset to 2. There is a second pump and dial next to the Alde flow but it only switches on when the hot water is in boost mode. It is normally also at 2. I am wondering why your Alde was functioning and then with flush and refill the thermostat and the circuit board somehow malfunctioned? Seems to defy logic. Hopefully Nucamp can sort it but my bet is on trapped air in the lines.

Sharon_is_SAM

Yes, you need to circulate the hot glycol in order to distribute the heat to the individual convectors.  Check the pump setting on the pump, not on the control panel which does not change the pump settings.