Camper fires - does this make sense?

[mercrocker]

Ran mine up today as well and as a complete co-incidence I seem to have some dashboard gremlins affecting temp gauge, coolant warning light and dash lighting. Seems to be a fairly common relay problem. I've disconnected the battery just to be sure.....

[LynehamHerc]

Well after a second visit to the garage and another 4 week wait the jury has decided.

Both rocker cover gaskets have failed at the same time and have leaked onto the heat exchangers. Given how high the rear window is and the arrangement at the back you can't see any smoke and if it's ticking over on the drive it's not visible, it needs some airflow.

After crawling around underneath there was a greasy residue on the exchangers but not much in my opinion and I'd just driven it on greasy roads so came to the wrong conclusion, not for the first time.

There was no oil on the drive, it must have just dripped and stayed on the outside of the exchangers until it was burnt off and then pushed by the fan to the inside of them. If the heating is off the waste hot, and in this case smokey, air is directed under the engine so again it just stays there if it's ticking over on the drive.

Anyway that's my excuses, now they've got to clean the pipes out. Fortunately I have got a spare pair of heat exchangers as there's no way of easily telling how much oil is in the current ones.

Yes I am an idiot.

[Hooli]

Better to be an idiot than burned to a crisp though.

[LynehamHerc]

That's Panhard disappointed this time.

I'm sure that there'll be more opportunities in the future for conflagrations though.

[Hooli]

Yeah but if it went up on the drive it might melt your granny annexe.

[LynehamHerc]

Nice try but it's the wrong side of the house.

[mercrocker]

Glad you at least found the problem - there is nothing much worse than unidentified smoke from a rear-mounted VW engine....