Lavaner Pro Compatibility

[erbeck]

We've been running Afterburner on a Chinese diesel heater on our boat for 5 years. Since it has been working fine, we have not worried about upgrading the software. When it started up, it flashed v3.5.2. The fan bearings on the heater started making noise, so we ordered a Lavaner Pro 5KW in November, since it was listed as compatible with Afterburner, which is key for us to operate remotely. 

The Lavaner Pro bench tested fine. We installed it and it runs fine on the boat. However, the triangular connector will not fully engage with the Afterburner. It seems just slightly smaller in some dimension.  Putting pressure on it and wiggling, we were able to connect briefly and transfer settings, but it will not stay connected without manual intervention.

Has anyone else complained about variance in the size of those triangular connectors or might this be a new problem? The male and female connectors of the Lavaner do fit each other snuggly, but they will not fully connect to our 5-year-old Afterburner or our old controller.

We are going to swap the triangular connector that came with the Lavaner with the original connector from our old diesel heater and see if we can proceed.

Update: Swapping the connectors enabled us to connect the Afterburner, but the battery symbol in the upper right corner is flashing 0.0V, error E07, and "Comms Fault" are on the bottom. The Lavaner controller shows no errors with either of the connectors, so I believe we have the wires attached correctly. 

Does anyone know if we need to upgrade the Afterburner to a later firmware version to run the Lavaner Pro?

[afterburner]

It has been mentioned in the past, but no one has ever found what exactly the difference is.
I think some forgo the (questionable) gasket ring and that may help.

Firmware update is not essential, but recommended to run the heater.
It had a long difficult birth, along the way many bugs and improvements were made.

[erbeck]

Good news!
1. Removing the gasket ring on the Lavaner triangular connector did not help. We replaced the Lavaner connector with the one from our old cheaper diesel controller. (Thank goodness we had an old one.)
2. Connected to Afterburner, still got the flashing battery and Comms Fault. Checked the firmware version on the AB: 3.2.2; Upgraded firmware to 3.5.2;
3. Connected to AB and got E-15 Crazy Pump. Reconnected Lavaner controller to resync settings, assuming they had been lost in the firmware update.
(Note: E-15 is in the latest User Manual, but not the Error Code-Issue-Solution Guide I found on the Facebook group.)
4. Connected to AB and got E-15 again. The synced settings had come in as .4 hz to 1.0 hz.
5. Chose Alternate Settings for fuel mixture on the AB. (2.0 hz to 4.5 hz)
Started the heater with AB again and the Lavaner heater is running just fine!
Unrelated to AB: We used the exhaust pipe cover that came with the Lavaner heater, but it filled our boat with smoke. I would not recommend using that as a heat shield.