Heating during Winter travel

[MntDriver]

Originally Posted by ottffss

Careful with the doubt. On Feb 1 and again the next night Feb 2 of just last year, 2011, Tiger Run was at -35.7F and -33.9F respectively and the day never got out of the minus singles. You must have missed those days. That makes a sustained multi-day subzero freeze which has far more impact than overnight dips. I never froze anything - except a finger or two - while there all winter... TR tends to be 5-15 degrees below the surrounding Frisco/Breck temps due to geography. PS -40F = -40C.

I have found this irv2 sticky Newmar post to be the best prep for dealing with these temps...

http://www.irv2.com/forums/f103/esse...use-45353.html

.

I was questioning an above poster about not having supplemental heat in the water compartments and only using his furnace in those temps. and not freezing up. (We don't know what type of motorhome he has either) Winnebago Class A's are generally good for down to about 20 degrees F with running the furnace, before supplemental heating in the sewer/water compartments are required to keep those areas above freezing. (per Winnebago) Any other type of motorhome is a moot point, as this is a Winnie forum, and the OP has a Winnie.

To the OP: I have a 35A model like yours, and hence two water compartments. Here's one of my Winnebago posts I posted a couple years ago in the Winnie forum at RVForum "Is my Basement Heated?" that might be helpful to you, since we both own the same model.

http://www.rvforum.net/SMF_forum/ind...?topic=20173.0

[Eaglesview]

No lack of advice on this one.

We have Aquahot and we find running down the road when outside temp is below 50F it is most comfortable to run he Aquahot furnace which will be heated by the engine. Below 35F we will have the basement heat on.

Dry camping below 40F we will run the generator overnight, use ceramic heaters and have the engine block heater turned on. Above 40F use the Aquahot diesel burner with the generator on autostart.

With RV Park power we generally use the ceramic heaters to save diesel. Always have the engine block heater turned on the night before departure.

Have froze up one side of coach traveling through Wyoming at about 10F with a strong crosswind. Thawed out with no damage overnight.

[bachler]

The temp posted Is/was -37degrees below zero.I have also chained Our DP. and ran over lookout pass Montana/Idaho. in snow all the way Pulling a Covered trailer with the snowmobiles in it. The state patrol was stopping trucks. We got to the road block they had a little conferance Asked if we had any dought, I said No; and they said go on over. 28 miles of 12 miles per hour. With singles on the out side duels. we would take a month in the winter to do snowmobileing; The memories/pictures are unbelieveable. The only problem is Most everyone doughts it Once in Oregon we pushed 3 Feet of snow with the Vectra Chained up. ;; We did it. My Wife and I.

[bachler]

Oh I would like to make it perfectly clear. the coach brand had little to do with the heating. We had a Winnebago. Where is that classified ?? I like to put it like this . It is the best of the worst. yet I feel it Could be the worst of the best. It is somewhere in there

[Danny Beck]

Originally Posted by mikf

Danny depends on where you live and what kind of rig you have. if you have a heated basement you will have to run your propane furnace when the temps drop below freezing. if it is not heated you will to come up with a way to get heat to the area where your holding tanks are. again a lot depends on what your rig is.

I do have basement heat, one of my concerns is the hot water heater and the frig? Do i need to drain the hot water heater?We live in the Atlanta area and the coach is a 07 Revolution 42..... thxs for your help

[win35p]

To all the responding forum members..Thank you! I have found this forum to be a wealth of information on so many topics. For us newbies, the experience of posters and their knowledge is invaluable and many times better than a dealer will give you! Happy Holidays to you all!

[bachler]

I cut a piece of Insulation and covered the Vent on the Water heater; It never froze at 25 Above FFF; Just don't forget to take it out when Fireing it up''

[WheelingIt]

Like some of the others said propane is the way to go without AC hookups. Your heat pumps don't really work below 40 and it's not really practical to run them on the generator anyway. Your biggest issue will be the batteries. We've camped down to 17 without hookups and it's totally do-able, but you have to watch your batteries closely! Here's my tips:

1/ Use the furnace -> Below 40 the furnace is the way to go. If you're running your furnace all the time your tank should last a good few days, depending on draw. The furnace DOES draw power from the batteries however so you have to watch your battery levels closely.

2/ WATCH the batteries -> The biggest issue we ran into during our low-temp dry-camping was our batteries. Lead-Acid batteries LOSE capacity as temp drops. What this means it that your 220AH battery bank may only be worth ~150AH at 32° F (0° C), and even less if it's colder. SO THEY WILL DRAIN FASTER! Watch them closely and if you have auto-gen start on your generator use it. In cold temps you'll be running your generator 2x/day and maybe more if you're drawing alot of power..

3/ Consider an external heater -> We have a separate propane heater (Mr. Buddy) that we use before we go to bed. You have to make sure ventilation is done properly (*very important*), but these external heaters don't use any electricity and can be great for monitored heating while you're in the rig. The Olympian Wave heaters are another idea. We also have an external ceramic tower heater (DeLonghi) that we use when we have hookups.

4/ Buy some INSULATION -> The windows are big heat drains. We've stayed alot warmer since we bought some Reflectix to cover them up. If you've got any hoses outside the RV they'll need insulation too.

I wrote a post about our whole cold-weather dry-camping experience if you're interested in more tips:
Lessons in Cold-Weather Dry-Camping = Our Sierra Nevada Week-end | Wheeling It

And another one about insulation here:
http://wheelingit.wordpress.com/2011...ion-for-rvers/

[win35p]

Originally Posted by bachler

In America Up till a few years Ago. Wrenchs were SAE sizes. Temp. were in FER;(my post is in FER) then those folks came along that had problems understanding OUR (USA) so what do they DO they srart changing It to the way it was In a country, That they couldn't stand. Now here they are changing things .. Insted of saying Merry Christmas , I say if you want things to be like they were in your old country, PLEASE go there and live happy everafter. I am not trying to be little anyone just stating The facts As us old USA people see them;; Some things do not need to be changed.... If you all want to change something. Find a Sub for WATER/food/money/ ETC.

Dear Bachler
Better cut back on those rum balls and hard egg nog!!! Happy Holidays refers to more than just Christmas (remember New Years?)! At any rate, to you especially..Merry Christmas!

[mikf]

Originally Posted by bachler

In America Up till a few years Ago. Wrenchs were SAE sizes. Temp. were in FER;(my post is in FER) then those folks came along that had problems understanding OUR (USA) so what do they DO they srart changing It to the way it was In a country, That they couldn't stand. Now here they are changing things .. Insted of saying Merry Christmas , I say if you want things to be like they were in your old country, PLEASE go there and live happy everafter. I am not trying to be little anyone just stating The facts As us old USA people see them;; Some things do not need to be changed.... If you all want to change something. Find a Sub for WATER/food/money/ ETC.

you da man.

[ottffss]

FWIW The USA is one of only three countries (Burma and Liberia the other two) that do NOT use/mandate the metric system of measurement. Kinda says something....

Even though the USA officially allowed the metric system with the Metric Act of 1866 and the Metric Conversion Act of 1975 made it the "preferred" measurement, it has never been mandated although numerous pieces of legislation have been passed (particularly over the past quarter century) encouraging/requiring metric use in specific situations. Yep, go Congress go....

Metrication in the United States - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[Hikerdogs]

The metric VS fractional debate is far older thn the SAE. Before 1900 there was a movement to standardize fasteners to metric dimensions. At that time there was no such thing as a standard size bolt with a standard thread pitch or wrench lands. Every manufacturer made their own proprietory fasteners in an attempt to capture the replacement parts market.

It wasn't until the Just before WWI that industry started standardizing fittings and fasteners to minimize the training, and parts and tool inventory needed to support products being marketed to the military. SAE was fundimental in deciding which fastener sizes and thread pitches should be made standard. They didn't invent many of them but rather determined which ones should be used in critical situations.

Fractional dimensions won out in the end but by a very narrow margin. Once the SAE got the ball rolling most industries got on board knowing the military and consmers wouldn't buy their products if they needed special tools and a seperate inventory to maintain them.

Fast forward 90 years and things changed. We are one of the last countries using fractional standards for anything. Companies are finding it's just too expensive to design and build products for individual markets. No one in Europe or the far east is interested in buying a prodct they can't maintain, and the American market is no longer large enough to be the driving force. Industry either changes to meet its customers demands or goes out of business.

I'm not an avid fan of the metric system but it is a fact of life. Like most people in this country I prefer the system I grew up with. I guess I'd rather see American companies make and sell products with metric dimensions around the world than have them go out of business. Then we'd have no choice but to import everything, and I'm sure it would all have metric dimensions.

[skigramp]

Well said Hikerdogs ...

Today all automtic transmissions are PRNDL ... remember before the gov't said they would only purchase vehicles with that sequence we had several shifting sequences ...

I am old enough to remember when starters were an option on cars ... my grandfather put up a real fuss the first time that he bought a car (starters were standard) and you couldn't crank it to start ... the air was full of blue words the first morning he tried to start it and the battery was dead ...

The way I see it we will all be using metric wrenches one of these mornings ... the air may have some blue words ... but metric will be our only choice

[bachler]

Just for the record; Personal attacks are not vary nice. However form some they must be overlooked. When I was spinning wrenches back in the 1950/60/70s There were few Metric. Is the change good bad I am not one to decide that. When the vote was taken In the beginning of the states ; English won By one Vote over German. Altho not a law it was the offical language;; Opions Are sometimes Basis for dissagreements. Thats OK. I don't care what the size is. AS with tempature reading. Is it fer. or cent. I prefer Fer, 32 is freezing. Some per. Cent zero == freezing . Which is right ???

[DAN L]

Hikerdogs,
"The metric VS fractional debate is far older thn the SAE. Before 1900 there was a movement to standardize fasteners to metric dimensions. At that time there was no such thing as a standard size bolt with a standard thread pitch or wrench lands. Every manufacturer made their own proprietory fasteners in an attempt to capture the replacement parts market."

about the year 1841 there was some standardization in britain. british standard and whitworth were used on british motor vehicles and aircraft well into the middle of the 20th century.
my 1966 bsa motorcycle has british standard whitworth fasteners. snap-on still sells bsw tools.
this is way off the topic of heating rv's while underway but it is very interesting.

British Standard Whitworth - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[bachler]

As mentioned in prior posts. Moisture is a problem.. While we done our snowmobiling in cold weather The ice on the windows was an ever present problem;;; . Now even in our house we had a oil furnace put in N.gas Took it Back out reinstalled an oil furnace.. Here is what we found, It seems that gas has moisture in it. (it sounds unreasonable) When it burns and somehow it is expelled into the heated air. When we would run the genset and use cube heaters there was less water on the inner windows. (insolated windows) then with the Gas furnace; However what worked for us was to keep a small candle burning in the sink; Now at the time it seemed to Raise the tempature in the Motorhome, and also Helped reduce the moisture,, Now on contery to all your Beliefs I am NOT Mr; INSTINE, But those are the facts as we experianced them. The secret is in the candle;;; Some one try it. and please with an open mind post the results as you experianced them.. Life is good; Is better when you Share;;