Summit/mojave heater guys...

[COCHEV]

Looking for real world performance out of these in the winter...

I have an A/C rig, plus the stupid broken diverter thing, plus I hate all the room it gobbles up on the firewall. I want to clean all that business up... BUT, I want good heat in the winter in my burb. Can anyone vouch for its performance?

 

[ryoken]

I ran one in the K5 for 3 yr's.. a good working factory unit will outperform it... that said, they work damn good...

the core is about the same size as factory, and actually the fan blows better on high, than the factory one does... the only reason the factory setup performs a bit better is due to the proper ducting for defrost, etc.....

 

[Deuling]

Can you route it into the factory duct?

 

[ryoken]

well, there are a couple issues with that... the summit unit has 2 round output's... you could run one as heat, than run one of the flexi round hoses over to the plastic defrost Y... round peg/square hole there tho.. you'd have to figure out a way to hook the round hose to the rectanglular opening... little custom adapter or something...

but more importantly, you have no option at that point to turn off the defrost, or floor heat.. it'll be blowing out both all the time...

even with my heavily modded fiberglass housing one in the K5, I'll eventually have to put in some sort of actuated diverter door in it to allow one or the other...

 

[Deuling]

I have also been looking at these., as I can't see a way of running my shock hoops with that big damn box in the way. But in my case I wouldn't really care if you can't change settings.It's only purpose would be defrost if I decide to go winter wheeling.

Oh and the fact that when I bought the blazer the diverter was broken and winter was coming so I zip tied it open, so I've only ever had defrost anyways lol.


I'll be watching for ideas

 

[ryoken]

yeah, you could probably gut everything and just leave in the factory defrost Y piece, feed that with both outputs from the Summit, and have KILLER defrost all the time..

 

[Deuling]

yeah, you could probably gut everything and just leave in the factory defrost Y piece, feed that with both outputs from the Summit, and have KILLER defrost all the time..

Cool. Glad I know a few tin knockers that could make me up some nice vent pieces out of galv and I bet some round duct diverters could be installed for quick manual change of said heat flow direction.


Sorry to hijack. Just got me thinkin.

 

[MrSchaeferPants]

Every rig I do the same thing, I rip out all venting, cables, vacuum hoses, etc, except what goes to the defroster, seal off the other sides of the diverter box. Cleans it up pretty good. I would like to fashion a better quality Y pipe system though. But my lazyness gets the better of me

 

[ktmoutfront]

My brother put 2 in a camando he had on a blazer chassis. One was front heat and defrost. Other was rear heat.

He split on duct for heat and defrost and made a manual operating door to shut the defrost off. Worked great.

 

[COCHEV]

I don't think I'd mind the defrost and floor heat on at the same time. Thats what I prefer anyways. There is a guy on here who modded his defrost y pipe to accept the round duct...

I was more wondering the heat output. Especially in a Burb. I was thinking maybe run two; one up front and one in the spare tire well to help keep the rear windows defogged...

 

[diesel4me]

You could snag a factory rear heater from a salvage yard Suburban for the rear..I put one from an old school bus in the rear of my 72 K5 that was under a seat and the thing would roast you even if the front heater was off...

It would probably be possible to use a Y fitting on the defroster hoses and rig up a cable operated manual buttlerfly inside the Y (like an old school exhaust cutout--or an old throttle body !) and be able to control the defroster/heat flow ..I've seen them sold at places Like Lowes,but perhaps not in that small of a diameter...

When my brother raced cars on the ice,they used to rip all the seats,dash and upholstery out,and many racers used a section of house baseboard heating coils across the windsheild to keep the windsheild de-frosted..it worked pretty slick..I know a plumber who used it to heat his P-30 step van and he said it worked great,in fact,he had to put ball valves on the hoses to reduce the hot water flow,or else get roasted in it..

 

[Heavyleft]

I have the three output port Mojave heater in my K5. It kicks some serious warmth in the cab. Obviously based on the thermostat temp rating you are running. If you are running a 160* T-stat, its decent heat...if your running a 190* T-stat...its great heat.

IMO,

Pros: Great heat output. Simplicity!

I adapted two ports to a vent on each side of the dash and one to the defrost.

Cons: No A/C (I have a softop so I run that down in the summer. A/C is over rated...lol. Im in TN.) Three speeds that you cannot control the heat level. (I roll down a window a bit or crack my wing window to offset as necessary or turn off after a bit). And its usually just me 98% of the time in the rig so Im easily happy with what I have.

I would agree that a well maintained and operated stock setup would work just as good but for me the overall simplicity of the unit works better for me.