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Old 09-30-2019, 02:35 PM   #1
Cattail
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Cold Weather Camping

Floridian needs help: How cold does it have to be, and for how long, for freeze damage to occur to an occupied RV plumbing system? What aspects of the plumbing system are most vulnerable? At what temperature does it make sense to winterize the RV and head to a motel? BTW, I understand that the freezing point of water is 32 degrees F.
Thanks in advance!
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Old 09-30-2019, 06:02 PM   #2
Tbos
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If it’s going to be below freezing for a couple hours you may want to remove your fresh water hose house and drain it. If you run your heater you should do fine.
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Old 09-30-2019, 08:49 PM   #3
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From personal experience, I find that if sustained overnight temps don't fall much lower than 27-28 degrees Fahrenheit and temps climb above freezing from most of the daylight hours, there is little risk of water lines freezing, especially while the coach is being occupied. A full fresh water tank and hot water in the HWT can aid too.

Rvs with enclosed underbellies marginally insulate the space that the lines are run through. In conjunction with operating the furnace regularly through the night, I think safe operating temps can drop a little further.

Obviously, an unoccupied coach needs to be treated a little differently. As there is never a gauranteed forecast to temperatures, if in doubt, it's best to use the pink stuff.
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Old 09-30-2019, 09:32 PM   #4
BulletOwner1
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Cattail, what RV do you have? That will help us in answering your question.

If it has a "Polar Package" of some sort that will help. Although those packages aren't designed to help a whole bunch they do help some. Usually consist of an enclosed underbelly and an extra 2" heat duct into said underbelly. Also, in one trailer I had the furnace had a higher output than one with no package. And maybe double pane windows.

If your RV is lived in and you are hooked up to sewer and water that presents other issues in below freezing temps. Here's what I do when temps fall to the point of being an issue. Leave your waste tank valves closed. When needing to dump just dump and close valves. A lot of folks will leave the gray open and black closed. During times of severe cold, like lower than the teens, leaving the gray open can cause it to freeze solid because not enough warm water is being flushed down to keep the line clear, especially if you leave a faucet dripping overnight to keep the inside plumbing from freezing. Then you have real problems. Also I would use the onboard fresh water tank, unhooking the city water inlet hose and only use it to refill the tank when needed.

Additional point. If you are using electric space heaters to heat the RV instead of the onboard furnace that 2" duct is not supplying heat to the underbelly. You need the furnace on to do that.

One more thing: don't trust that it will only get "so" cold. The weather prognosticators, while more accurate now than in the past, still don't get it right some times.
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Old 10-01-2019, 03:14 AM   #5
Cattail
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Thanks, everyone. This forum is a veritable font of experience and I appreciate your prompt responses. I pull a Bullet 210RUD Western Edition with the 30,000 BTU furnace. We plan to spend a week or so in late November in Western North Carolina, then winterizing and storing Cattail up there until we return for a week or so in late December. We are not expecting particularly harsh conditions that early in Western North Carolina, but you never know. At the end of December, we will pull Cattail back to central Florida for the remainder of the winter.
Thanks again!
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