Have you checked the Owner's Group?

Motorhomes, in general, have redundant systems. For example, many motorhomes have a refrigerator which can be powered by electricity (110V via "shore" power or through the inverter) or by propane (ours does not as the previous owner replaced the dual-fuel refrigerator with a residential electric one). The water heater can be powered by electricity or propane/diesel (on Miss Doozie - electricity or diesel). We can hook up to "shore" power or run off batteries (until they get depleted) or run our generator. We can use city water hookups or use water from our fresh water tanks. We can level the bus with air (letting out air from certain airbags to get us more level) or with hydraulic jacks (4 of them, that can be used to raise a side or front or back of the coach.

Nowhere is this redundancy more evident than in the heating systems. Now, honestly, we have not used our heating system a lot because we try to avoid being in places when it is cold. So... we may have used heat in the evening or overnight or in the early morning to take the chill off, but we generally have not needed heat all day long.... until this trip....

So... we have multiple heat systems. There is dashboard heat that we can use when we're driving - it does ok to keep the passenger area of the bus warm when we're traveling, and honestly, the engine does a pretty good job at warming up the back of the bus... so that is fine for traveling. When we are stopped, there are "heat strips" on two of the three overhead air conditioners that will provide "some" heat - really only down to about 50F. And... they require electricity, so we don't use them unless we are plugged in to shore power; in general, we don't use them!

Then there is the Aqua-Hot system - I don't know enough about it to explain how it works, here is some information from the Wanderlodge Owner's Manual:

The Aqua-Hot Motor Coach and Marine Heating System is an on-board heating system that provides a continuous supply of domestic hot water as well as interior heat where and when it is needed. Both heating features are accomplished by a 50,000 BTU diesel-fired burner and a 1650 watt [5630 BTU) electric heating element [110 volt/ AC). These two heating sources, separately or simultaneously [during high heat demand periods], maintain the temperature of the Aqua-Hot's 50/50 solution of water and antifreeze. In addition to domestic hot water and interior heating capabilities, the Aqua-Hot has also been designed to preheat the vehicle's engine prior to starting. This feature provides easy engine start-up on cool mornings.

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ROOM THERMOSTATS
This installation uses two room thermostats for the living area, The living room, kitchen, , and bedroom utilize the Dometic "Comfort Control Center" [see the Dometic manual for operation.) The bath uses a separate thermostat. Adjust each thermostat to the desired
temperature. This procedure activates the Aqua-Hot's zone circulation pumps and zone
relays. The pumps circulate the heated solution of water and antifreeze to the heat
exchanger's blowers. There are three heat exchangers in the kitchen/living room, one or
two in the bathroom, and one or two in the bedroom.

On the Dometic Comfort Control Center (aka thermostat), we can select zone (1 - Front, 2- Kitchen, 3 - Bedroom) and mode (fan only, cool (air conditioning), furnace, heat strip).

In the kitchen/middle of the bus - Dometic Comfort Control Center at top... but... then there is another thermostat below it...

And in the bathroom are two additional thermostats... What are they for??? ARGH!

We had found that the lower thermostat in the kitchen operated an electric heater in the toe-kick area under the stovetop in the kitchen area. It was nice to be able to use it as it blows the hot air towards where Dwayne usually sits (and he is generally cold), whereas the Aqua-Hot heat exchanger (in the toe-kick area under the kitchen sink) blows hot air where I usually sit (which is NOT needed! Enough said!). We were enjoying using the electric heater when we were along the coast in Oregon... the fan was making a bit of noise, so we pulled the unit out of the wall and vacuumed it... soon after that (maybe immediately after, we couldn't remember), it stopped working. We could hear a relay clicking under the kitchen sink when we moved the temperature control on the wall, but... no heat. We pulled the blower unit out and inspected it... Dwayne tested and, sure enough, it wasn't getting power.

So... Sunday... we emptied everything out from under the kitchen sink, took the cabinet apart, so Dwayne could get to the location where we could hear the relay (it was within the silver-colored box on the upper left). He checked the wires coming in to the box and no power there either. Must be a circuit breaker?

We checked the breaker box, and none of the breakers was "flipped".

We found one with a likely label "Front A/C - Front Elec. Heat" and flipped it off and back on... no joy.

So, about this time, I asked Dwayne if he had checked "WOG" - the Wanderlodge Owners Group, to see if anyone else had experienced this problem. He had not, so I did a quick search, and found a question from a guy with a 2003 LXi (our is a 2000 LXi) that sounded a lot like our problem, with this response:

On earlier models the galley kickspace heater was controlled by its own thermostat under the a/c thermostat in the dining area, but to get the heater to turn on, you had to have the front a/c switch at the dash on, and you would probably want to turn off the cooling for that position.

Never did figure out the logic for that.

__________________
Ron & Dorinda Rueckwald
2000 LXI 43 ss
St. Joseph, MI summer, Clearwater, FL winter

Note that the answerer happens to have the same year as ours (though his has a "ss" - single slide) - a very good possibility that his coach is very similar to ours!

Would YOU have thought to turn on the "Front" Coach Air Conditioner to get *heat* from the electric heater in the middle of the coach?

We flipped that switch to "on" - the box under the sink had power, and the wall thermostat now turned on the heater! Success!!!

The cleaning of the fan had nothing to do with the "problem" - probably at some point one of us noticed that the switch was on, thought, "We don't need air conditioning..." and turned it off. It may have happened at about the same time we cleaned the fan... who knows?!?

If someone else reads this and wonders about what these heaters look like...

This is what the electric heat register looks like in the toe-kick area...

This is what the Aqua-Hot register looks like in the toe-kick area.

Note that the Owner's Manual also covers this... if you happened to think to look there:

ELECTRIC HEAT
Electric forced air heaters [120 vac) are located in the bathroom and kitchen. Your
electric heaters are provided for auxiliary heating. Since each heater draws 10-15 AC
amps, operator load management becomes an important consideration.
KITCHEN HEATER OPERATION
1. A/C Master Front switch on shifter panel must be turned ON.
2. Kitchen thermostat must be set to HEAT and set for temperature desired.
BATHROOM HEATER OPERATION
Bathroom thermostat must be turned ON and set for the temperature desired.

Note that the electric heater in the bathroom does NOT have an additional switch to turn on... consistency is overrated I guess.

One last "heater" story: When we were looking at Blue Birds to find one to buy, we flew to Atlanta and drove to see a couple of buses, including Miss Doozie. One of the buses was located south of Atlanta, and the owner previously worked at the factory. I was in total learning mode, and asked, "I understand that there are multiple heating systems?"
The owner responded, "Yes, there are the heat strips, and the Aqua-Hot," (he may have said other things too), "and then there are the big-black-round things."
I had done quite a bit of research on Blue Birds, and did not remember reading about "big-black-round-things"... so I questioned further... and he responded,
"Those big-black-round-things on the outside of the bus... you just get them turning and head south!" (aka tires!)

So... our normal plan is to use those big-black-round-things to help us avoid needing heat from other sources, but it is nice to know how to get heat from those other sources when we need it!