RV Fireplace – More charm than cheese
Our RV Fireplace is one of my favorite things in my RV. Yes, it chews up electric when it is running. Yes, it seems a little “rednecky”.
But honestly, the mood it creates in the room, the clean convenient heat, and the instant heat really makes a fireplace insert a wonderful addition to your RVing fun.
I’ve written previously about how much I enjoyed the RV Fireplace.
Convenient and Easy Heat
In defense of the RV fireplace, when you are hooked to shore power, a fireplace insert really doesn’t take that much power. A big reason for this is that the RV is a very small space compared to a house.
Our electric bills were never that big when we were able to directly observe the bill – not true at some RV parks where you get “free” power.
The other nice thing is that we never had to go for runs for propane. Propane never seemed to last very long with the furnace running.
How much money would an RV fireplace insert cost you per month (or per day)
Where we live we pay $0.10 a kilowatt hour. If an RV fireplace is a 1500 Watt appliance (1.5KW), then WORST CASE (which is impossible unless you simply run the fireplace outside) is that the total KW hours would be 36. At $0.10 a kilowatt hour then you would pay $3.60 a day.
Realistically though if temperatures are no more than a 30 degree difference from your desired temp, I have a hunch your heater would ONLY be on about 1/2 of the time.
So I think the heater would consume approximately $1.80 per day. This is just a rough idea.
Space Saving yet practical decorative accent
A really big advantage of the RV fireplace is that it doesn’t take much room. It is an insert that fits neatly underneath the cabinet space created for the TV and entertainment center. This means that you can get a really nice accent without using much space.
Our fireplace, the Dimplex BF8000 was not without faults having failed twice. It works OK after it has been off for awhile, then after a few minutes of operation the heating portion simply quits.
We’ve replaced this one time already with an RV repairman doing the work. Our RV repairman tells us he doesn’t think much of these fireplace inserts. I don’t know if he was against the Dimplex or the fireplace inserts in general.
An RV fireplace is very repairable
The 2nd time we repaired the RV fireplace, we decided to do it ourselves. We wrote about it in this article detailing the repair of our RV fireplace. The heater elements are not hard to find – they are abundant on Amazon. Here is a link to a search for heater elements like our Dimplex fireplace.
An RV fireplace would be easy to install as an after market add-on
When Sheri and I repaired our fireplace, one of the most interesting aspects to me was the fact that there was no special wiring. It only required a straight 110V plug-in.
This means that if you can build a nice looking shallow box in your RV, you could have a fireplace. They aren’t too hard to do and only require a simple 110V outlet.
How does the RV fireplace insert make such a realistic looking fire?
I had the opportunity to look inside of an RV fireplace so that I could see how such a realistic flame was created.
What the very clever inventors of these do is to create a turning shaft – much like a spit for roasting a chicken – that goes from the left side of the fireplace to the right side of the rv fireplace.
This shaft is wrapped with very reflective aluminum foil which has lots and lots of crinkles.
The shaft is illuminated with a light that has a flame color. When the shaft turns, the lights reflects on the back of the fireplace and that makes the dancing flames illusion.
Where can you get fireplace inserts?
My go-to source is Amazon. But Amazon is just a reflection of what is available at many other places.
electric fireplace insert(s):
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Jim says
Looking for something to replace the factory installed electric fireplace with a vent free or direct vent propane unit…probably <10k BTU.
In my area electric @$.30/kW and unreliable.
Any help or direction appreciated.
Thank you!