Drain heaters waterproof?

[monkey spanners]

Have got a drain heater to change on a site miles away on tuesday. Can't remember how long it needs to be so bought one of those self limiting cut to lenght jobs with the termination kit.
Just reading through the destructions now and it states that the termination mustn't be in the drain itself whats the chuffin point of a heater thats not water proof...

Has anyone run one of these Flexelec heaters from RPW inside a drain with or without problems?

Other options are gets lots of ordinary ones in different lenghts and take back the ones i don't need

Cheers Jon

[sedgy]

it depends on the length , but if you could double it < run it from evap terminal to the end of the drain and all the way back again- into the drip tray< there would not be any posible open cable joints to get wet and fuse,
best of luck

[fowlie]

i always run it on the outside and insulate the pipe with armaflex,i hate it when its run on the inside of the drain as all the crap of the day gets caught in the drain.been using the selflimiting tape for years as its alot tougher than the precut tape

[old gas bottle]

i,ll go along with that one,run it outside matey,just changed one that was threaded on the inside,what a mess they had got into asswell,traped in the evap tray comming out of the drain hole and also not to the bottom of the drian pipe where it needs it, other thing is it wont matter to much about the water proofing, you can allways smear some silicone on the bottom seal, dont they come with a little tube ?

[monkey spanners]

Cheers guys,

I've got a selection of heaters so i can pick the one that fits best.
I think the drain line is 52mm and about 2m long. and about 5m up in the air.

Fun fun fun

[Tayters]

I fitted one last year inside a drain using frezzatrace tape. This was before I knew it should run on the outside (only found that bit out a couple of weeks later).

To be sure it wouldn't conduct at the end, I put one piece of heatshrink with about 3/4" overhanging, shrunk it, folded over the overhang, put another bit over and some more heat shrink over that then wrapped a bit of insulating tape around it.
Still going strong to this day but had I realised it was designed for the outside then that is where I would have put it.

Waitrose use an internal tape made by Flexilec which is cut to any length. This stuff has an earth shield around the tape for safety reasons but doesn't come cheap..

Watch out with some ready made tapes as the first few feet don't heat up

[coolhibby1875]

as the posts above say i think your better wrapping it around the outside and armfleaing over it!

[monkey spanners]

Thanks for the replies

Well, after about 5 hours to defrost the old drain pan and pipe enough to unstick it from the bottom of the evaporator i ended up feeding the new waterproof tape down the drain as per original as it was easier

Why are heaters better on the outside?

[lowcool]

i always go internal,use heat shrink with glue in it and havent had a failure yet

[lawrence1]

As an apprentice i was taught to run the liquid line up the drain where ever possible,,,sometimes a real pain in the armpit but it works.