Before we could or should cut the new hole in the trailer, we did some dry fitting of the old cover to the new heater. This was to get the dimensions for the new appliance- which was the combination of the old cover and the new heater. There was a lot of fiddling in this process so to reduce the likelihood that the styrofoam insulation on the Atwood would be damaged, we removed it.
We flattened out the lip on the front of the Atwood as well as any bends in the Bowen Flange with a heavy hammer and a metal bar-any heavy bar seemed to work. The bar is used as a metal break so it must be harder than the metal we were forming. Not so tough with aluminum! We used a spare hitch extension for this work, you can see it in the picture below. Once this was done the Bowen flange and cover would fit snugly against the front of the Atwood.
After flattening, the larger Bowen flange was snipped to fit the outer dimensions of the Atwood. You can see the initial snips in the picture above, left. We were really amazed at how well this worked! Take a look at the picture below (the intial mating of the Bowen and the Atwood). We used tin snips and a Dremel with a metal cutoff wheel to do the fine fitting. While the Atwood is about the same width its slightly taller than the Bowen. Cutting the Bowen flange and bending the extra bit inward also gave some additional structure to the new contraption so we left the bent pieces.
I am going to give you a sneak peek of how the flange fitting looks finally assembled. We were just amazed that it went together this well.
In the next episode, I will discuss that most terrifying of all…cutting a hole in the outside of the trailer and how we figured out where to do it!
I dissassembled the Bowen heater so that we could mate the front cover and flange to the Atwood. Essentially, putting it’s best face forward.
First I removed flange surround from the tank. The dimensions of both heaters (below) is pretty close, the Bowen being slightly shorter and wider than the Atwood. The Atwood was still within the outer dimensions of the Bowen cover. Can you see the one big difference in the pciture below? No, not the 40 years of cruft, the vent on the Bowen is on the right and on the Atwood on the left. More on that later.
I removed the aluminum surround from the Bowen. This was pretty straight forward. The surround is attached by screws and so…. I also had to remove the water and gas piping to the pilot/igntion before I could actually remove the surround from the tank. I just cut through these pipes with a metal cutoff wheel on a Dremel and a small hacksaw. No problems here.
Now I removed the front mounting-bit-part thingy. This is the part that actually mounts the heater on the trailer. This part, which is not really a part of the heater proper is made up of the flange that sits outside of the trailer and a back piece that wraps around the round tank. Below is a picture of the surround on the left and the tank and heater on the right after I separated the pieces.
The outside cover was easily cut away from the curved tank mount leaving just the frame that we would use to conceal the Atwood.
Now we had the old and crufty water heater removed from the perfect surround and cover. However, the disassembly was not complete. Our plans were to move the heater from one side of the trailer (the street side ) to the other (the curb side). This was to accommodate the new bathroom. Also, I had to deal with the different vent orientations. So, the heater cover must flip 180 degrees to be functional. More disassembly of the heater cover.
I had to remove the screen on the Bowen bottom cover so I could clean and mount it on the opposite side. The screen mounts in the cover via small screen tabs. Very simple and effective. A problem I found with the flip, is that the top cover became an innie not an outie (I can no longer easily slide the bottom cover up underneath the top because the lip is the wrong orientation). I am still able to do it but it is a bit harder now. Howver, since we have an electronic ignition with an interior switch, I don’t need access anyway, I’ll probably just screw the cover on.
Now with the assembly (and the cleaning that really was necesssary), the new heater is ready to be installed. But first we need to cut a new hole in the trailer….gulp.
This was actually simpler than I had envisioned. The water heater consists of the control/heating part and the tank. On the old Bowen, the pilot and controls etc are on the outside of the trailer, while the tank is on the inside. The water heater, as a unit, sticks through a hole in the side of the trailer. That may be obvious to you, but it was a revelation to me.
I started by unscrewing the front of the water heater from the trailer. Not really all that hard, once I got past the concept that when I removed the water heater I would be left with an unfinished hole in the side of my trailer. Yes, all the surround, flange and shaped aluminum had to come out. Yes, I really did have to unscrew it all, pry away the 40+ year old sealant and carefully disassemble the beautiful cover. Lets just say I took, notes, labeled everything and took pictures. Even then it was nerve-wracking.
Other than the emotional distresss, the only real tricky part came when Chris and I tried to actually pull the heater out of the trailer. Let me state, with absolute certainty, that the heater comes out by pulling from the outside/pushing from the inside, it is not removed by pulling it into the trailer.
(Pause, consider the lively discussion, resume)
The heater tank was held in place by a single bolt head in the bottom of the tank that slips into a metal slot attached to the trailer floor. This kept the tank from moving around from side to side. The tricky part for the removal was that the bolt head caught on the metal frame as we tried to tug it out. It really did not seem like the heater came out that way, but it did. Sliding a scrap piece of aluminum under the heater tank and on top of the threshold made a ramp and did the trick.
When we removed the heater it looked like this:
Like I said, big hole in the side of the trailer. Whoopee! Now we get to cut another one in the other side!
