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82ND AIR
10-19-2012, 05:25 PM
Has everyone with a 2012 cougar 5th wheel checked to see if the heater vent in the upstairs bedroom works? I know a few that dont blow out air and have heard some dealers admit it is a design flaw.

Roller4Tan
10-19-2012, 05:28 PM
Mine works "bouncey:" so far.:p

Festus2
10-19-2012, 08:04 PM
Poor air flow from the furnace into the upper bedroom area has been an issue with many 5th wheel models. There have been several threads and discussions about this problem that have previously taken place on the forum. Several solutions and remedies to fix and address this issue can be found if you do a forum search on this topic. Try doing a search to see if you can locate the threads and if not, let us know and we can help you out.

concours
10-20-2012, 06:10 AM
I was told by our bealer that on our 2013 Cougar 331 MKS the lack of air flow and heat in the bedroom is because we have the winter package and some of the heat and air is directed into the underbelly to heat the tanks. Great design. The bottom line is if you want to be warm in the bedroom you don't buy the winter package, am I missing something?:banghead:

Ayotte
10-20-2012, 06:29 AM
Ours is fine. Too hot in bath room, had to block off the register some.

Jim W
10-20-2012, 06:49 AM
I think part of the problem is the material they use to furnish heat in the front bedroom. At least on the 318SAB 5er Keystone uses a flexible heating duct that is nothing more than a thin wall (.062 or thinner) wire reinforced tubing something like a clothes dryer would use to vent exhaust air to the outside of a house. To me this will loss heat as the duct work is routed in the basement; so heat transfer will occur with the surrounding cold air in the basement first and then cool air will be provided to the bedroom due to this heat loss.
Although this might be an issue with most of the owners of a Keystone product, my wife and I do not mind this. We tend to like a cool to cold bedroom to sleep in when heat is needed during the night to protect the water lines from freezing do to freezing temperatures. The furnace will be turned down to 45 or 50 at night so it will not run unless it is really cold out like25 or under at night.
Jim W.

geo
10-20-2012, 08:16 AM
82nd Air -

Festus2 is correct, we have had this discussion before, but allow me to give you some hints.

Jim is correct, if you remove the screws on the basement wall and remove it, you will probably find "dryer vent" coming off the furnace manifold and directing the warmed air to various plenums or other vents.

Look first at the connection between the "dryer vent" and the flat plenum for the bedroom. On my Alpine, I found that the connection between the vent connection and plenum was, well, unconnected. Some A/C / furnace duct aluminum tape solved that problem. Another problem I found: Look at the furnace distribution plenum. On mine, one of the "dryer vents" was attached on the port next to the converter. In fact, it was such a close fit that the vent was crushed almost shut, and the vent was heating up the converter. I rearranged the vents off the furnace plenum so an unused port on the opposite side was used and the port next to the converter was sealed off. You might also want to check that the "dryer vent" is not crushed.

Concours has been given some bad info by his dealer. The vent for the "Arctic/etc. Package" comes off the furnace plenum. If it really would affect any heating registers, it would affect them all equally. Besides, the "Arctic Package" provides extremely little protection to the tanks. See my three part thread that describes that. As Hankaye says - that package gets you a sticker next to the front door - and little more.

I will bet my first hint will solve your problem, but check your furnace plenum. Don't need to fry your converter.

Ron

Festus2
10-20-2012, 02:53 PM
concours -
Geo is correct when he says that you have probably been given some incorrect information/advice from your dealer about the Arctic Package and warmth in the bedroom area.
Firstly, any "heat" that, by some unknown means, does find its way to the tanks will be virtually useless in providing any protection in keeping them from freezing. There just isn't enough volume of warm air that will reach them and what heat that does will quickly dissipate into a large and essentially uninsulated area surrounding the tanks.

Secondly, I am not sure if you have the option of not buying the Arctic/Polar package. If there is an option, then why would one want to pay for something that doesn't work? You might want to check with your dealer (if you can believe what he says) or with Keystone to see if this package is an optional or a standard feature.

jbsmith
10-20-2012, 05:11 PM
Although I have not dropped the coroplast from the bottom of our 331MKS, the forward duct work is supported by a square-box plenum. The lower plenum supplying the main part of the trailer is connected to another plenum in the forward section by a round articulated aluminum duct located behind the center panel.. Air flow from the two vents in the bath and bedroom is poor.

I suggest removing the panels in the storage compartment and straighten this round piece of duct and tape *ALL* of the plenum seams with metal foil tape. This reduces/eliminates air leaks from the plenum and duct. As far as I can tell, the warm air leaks into the storage compartment is a "feature" that keeps the water works relatively warm.

In my opinion, the "polar" package is intended for use only with a city water and sewer connection, and as others have mentioned will likely provide very little protection to the fresh water and waste water tanks and valves. As far as I can tell, "most" of the PEX water lines are routed through spaces that share the heat ducts. I'm not sure about the long run to the rear kitchen.

I installed additional valves on my water lines that allow me to isolate the forward and back half of the trailer. We use our trailer year round...so with the valves in place I can use only the bath room and shower without having to drain my antifreeze from the back half of the trailer. We then re-winterized this section when we return.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD

concours
10-21-2012, 08:52 AM
The problem is simply poor design what Keystone has done is taken the bathroom, the bedroom and the 4inch under belly feed hose all within 3 feet of each other from the coldest part of the plenum after the plenum has taken 2 90 degree corners to rise to the upper level
It simply will never work well I intend to take a more serious look at the system in the spring

onebadazzsrt
02-03-2013, 04:27 PM
I have a 2012 and as well and I cut open the under belly to find that it is totally
sealed, I don't know if you can cut the upper material open to access the heating system. Has anybody else tore into one of these?

Scottinvt
02-03-2013, 04:29 PM
Ours was the flexible pipe they use. Just a thought to check and run new rigid pipe in place and have the dealer install some closing / adjustable grates in the floor.

jbsmith
02-03-2013, 05:18 PM
We seem to get plenty of flow up through the pipe, but nothing seems to make it out the vents. I replaced the flexible pipe between the two elbows with a 4" Suncourt in-line electric duct booster fan and a DuctStat temperature sensitive switch. Obviously, the fan only works when we're plugged into shore power, but it definitely increases air flow through the forward vents.

smiller
02-03-2013, 05:24 PM
Geo has it right, basically poor design compounded by poor assembly and construction. You can take it all apart and do a little to improve the latter but it's never going to work very well without a lot of work. Luckily the fact that the bedroom is the highest point of the interior means heat tends to concentrate there, which helps mitigate the problem somewhat if you leave the bedroom door open.

concours
02-04-2013, 09:21 AM
The official word that my dealer got back from Keystone (and I did see the email from keystone) was that they do not measure air flow at any particular vent but they check the inside air temp with all the doors open :banghead: I will spend some time this spring working on the air flow as I know that I can improve it

SteveC7010
02-04-2013, 10:37 AM
Ours was the flexible pipe they use. Just a thought to check and run new rigid pipe in place and have the dealer install some closing / adjustable grates in the floor.

The grates they use are readily available at any home improvement center, and they have great selection of different colors and styles to boot. It's another of those items that I wouldn't go to an RV store to replace or modify.

SteveC7010
02-04-2013, 10:58 AM
A number of folks have reported here about finding damaged or crushed hot air ducting in their brand new rigs. I would tell anyone with an air flow issue to first verify that the ducting is in good shape throughout the trailer.

The second thing to do is to verify that there are no obstructions in the ducting.

My next step would then be to access the furnace and check the hot air ducting and distribution. On mine, I found loose connections and a lot of air leakage. I tightened up screws and fittings and then used some HVAC tape to seal up the fittings on the hot air distribution box.

The hot air ducting that goes forward into the upper level bathroom and bedroom is simply a sheet of tin screwed to some floor joists in our Cougar. There is a lot of air leakage along that and I am going to seal it up with the HVAC tape when I get the trailer out of storage in the spring.

The round ducting used in RV's is just 4" flexible dryer vent tubing. It's fairly inexpensive and available at home improvement centers everywhere. If you have crushed ducting, cut out the bad part and replace it with good stuff. You'll find couplings, clamps, and such in the same aisle. The HVAC tape is there, too.

For those that regularly camp where there is shore power, you can buy 4" round duct fans that will fit right into the same ducting and greatly improve air movement. If you can't find a 4" fan, buy a 6" fan and two 6" to 4" couplings. that will really help!

For the ambitious, the hot air ducting that runs under the trailer can be insulated to prevent heat loss. But that is a two edged sword if you have the enclosed underbelly. A little heat loss in there can be a good thing if it ensures that the holding tanks don't freeze up in really cold weather. Insulating the ducting might fix one problem and cause another.

Finally, the furnaces have to pull air from somewhere to heat and blow back out into the living spaces. Make sure the cold air return isn't blocked, both on the furnace and whatever cabinetry, etc. is there. On my Cougar, there is a single louvered wooden vent in the cabinet wall next to the furnace that is the only cold air return. We make sure there is nothing blocking it in any way whenever we plan to use the furnace.

Roller4Tan
02-04-2013, 11:29 AM
I checked out my ducts on our 318SAB and found that even tho' the bedroom register was next to the bathroom wall, the duct continued all the way forward to the front wall of the pass thru storage. I made an air dam of cardboard and metal duct tape just forward of the register. I also did the same just behind the rear register in the living room, as this one ended in a crimp.
I also rebuilt the gawd awful two step to the bathroom to a three step and found the slinky transition from the kitchen to bath-bedroom area barely attached. More metal tape to seal that area.
At the furnace plenum I sealed off the unused duct ports with metal tape as well. I used the camera on my phone to look thru the vents after removing the register covers, to check for blockage.
The only spot I can't see real well is where the duct comes out below the furnace plenum to connect to the main duct. I'd have to remove the furnace to see that area :banghead:
Aw the joys of owning an RV.
Oh by the way, the air flow still isn't that great, a little better, but not much.

eds451
02-04-2013, 02:33 PM
Another thing to check is the excess hose you "may" have running from the heater to the bedroom registers. I found on my 2007 about 6 feet of coiled vent hose in the step. I cut the excess out and now have much better heater flow to the bedroom.

Comptech
02-05-2013, 01:07 PM
My solution to this issue was to install vents that could be closed, I found almost identical air vents at Home depot that could be closed. This allowed me to almost close the vent close to the furnace getting the most air pressure, and open wide the vents far away in the bedroom. So I think most of my problem is the way the air distribution scheme was designed...

onebadazzsrt
02-09-2013, 11:11 AM
They must have done away with the flexible hose on my model, they used the floor joist as the main vent line from front to back. I will try and do away with that method up top and use some smaller diam. hose.

dea3851
02-10-2013, 09:24 AM
I must have got lucky on my rig ,its heats and cools very well, I'm and old furnace guy and every thing look good. Don Ludington Mi