Remote controlled engine heater

18 Nov 2021 Remote controlled engine heater

Posted at 10:30h in Firewall Forward by Mickey 0 Comments
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Lycoming engines like to be warm. When it gets cold, the best thing to do before starting is to warm up the engine. There are many ways to do this, and I’ve chosen to use a pair of ceramic personal engine heaters I got from Amazon for about 20 euros. These work fine, but they take a long time to warm up the engine, and it’s not that fun to wait around in a cold hangar while the engine warms up.

What I’ve done is added a “remote control” to the power strip that connects the two engine heaters. The setup is an old phone that can act as a wifi hotspot, an additional (free) SIM on my Swisscom mobile plan, and a wifi-connected power switch (Tapo P100).

Now, when I know I’ll go flying, I light up the heaters about an hour before I leave the house, which will allow the engine to come up to about 15 degrees, slightly below “room temperature”.

From left to right – phone acting as wifi hotspot, power cord, engine dryer on top of box holding wifi power switch and power strip.
Wifi remote control power switch with EU to Swiss adapters on each end.
Close view of the two heaters placed in the bottom of the cowl.
Wider view of where the 2 engine heaters are installed.
The GUI for the software that controls the switch – pretty simple! This is when it’s On, if not obvious.
This is the view in the app when the switch is off.
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