Which hose to buy for your Big Buddy?

[WhiskeyPete]

This review is from: Mr. Heater Hose with Regulator and Quick Disconnect for Big Buddy Heater #F271803 (Kitchen)

I was confused about the hose options so I contacted Mr. Heater to get the scoop. I have not actually used the hose myself (so the 4 star was arbitrary...seems like this is the way to go, tho'), but I wanted to share what the company said. (Please note that the product manuals for the Mr Buddy heaters are available on their HSOforum at the specific product link). My initial question and the company response follow, including the contact info for the company rep that sent me the information:

Initial question to Mr. Heater:

amazon.com advertizes that the plasticizer-free green hose(f273704) can be used with both the portable buddy and big buddy, but I don't see it listed in the big buddy manual. Is it compatible with both? Also, is the quick disconnect hose (F271803) compatible with both the big buddy and the portable buddy? Does this hose require use of a fuelfilter? If no, why not? Is it made of materials that will not degrade like the f273704 hose?

Response from Mr. Heater:

When you connect any of our Buddy model heaters to a remote propane tank, that tank can have over 120 PSI of pressure inside it.

This high pressure in the rubber hose connected to the heater can squeeze a plasticizer or an oil out of the rubber in the hose and once it gets into the heater it is trapped and will plug up the tubes and cause the heater to be an unreliable unit.

We came up with a fuel filter to prevent this oily substance from getting into the heater when using a high pressure hose.

The hose manufacturers came up with a hose that doesn't have the plasticizers in it so NO filter is needed (our part number for this plasticizer hose is F273704).

BUT the draw back with this hose is with no plasticizers in the rubber it causes the hose to be very stiff especially in cold weather. So you don't need the filter but you have to work with a hose that doesn't like to straighten out or is more difficult to work with because of this stiffness.

As far as the hose with the quick coupler, this is only available to be used on the Big Buddy MH18B heaters. The Big Buddy has two built in regulators but also has a male quick coupler built-in that by-passes these two regulators so if you have a regulated propane supply like in an RV or your house, you can use our hose to connect to this low pressure source (all low pressure is less than 1/2 PSI of pressure).

We also have a hose for the Big Buddy that has the quick coupler connection to the heater and a regulator at the connection to the propane tank, like on a barbeque grill.

Because the regulator is mounted directly to the propane tank it reduces the very high 110 PSI of pressure from the tank to the low 1/2 PSI pressure. Because this pressure is so low it will not be able to squeeze out the oily plasticizers from the rubber in the hose and does not need a fuel filter.

[Jeremy airjer W]

Big Buddy Hose Clarification