Polar Package Questions

[Gary719]

We have recently purchased new a 2008 Cougar 311RLS 5th wheel. I am wondering what the term [B]Polar Package[B/] entails. I will be traveling to Texas this winter and need to know how cold of temps. I can expect to withstand. Last winter it got down to 11 degrees near San Antonio. Any help would be appreciated.

(This post originally appeared in "New Member Check In")
Moved to Keystone Questions category

[Festus2]

We have the same year of Cougar 5th but different model. There have been several posts on the forum about this topic. I wouldn't be mislead by this designation of "Polar Package". Briefly, it means that:
1) there is an enclosed but uninsulated underbelly (approx 1/4 in thick Coroplast). This is certainly not enough to offer you any protection against prolonged spells of freezing weather.
2) there is a minimal amount of heat flowing through the ductwork around the holding tanks and some of the water lines BUT ONLY WHEN THE PROPANE FURNACE IS IN OPERATION.
If the furnace is not running, there will be no heat of course so you will need to find an alternate method of keeping your plumbing and tanks from freezing up.
If your RV is going to be in use during this time in Texas, then you can use space heaters, pipe wrap, skirting or some other safe means of making your unit "weather proof".
As I have indicated before in previous posts, the term "Polar Package" is simply a marketing gimmick by the manufacturer to lead one to believe that it will be okay to use in polar-like conditions. It isn't - IMHO. It will at best offer you little, if any, protection in very cold, winter conditions. You would be better off doing whatever you can to make it liveable and without winter pipe freeze up rather than relying on the Polar Package.

[campingcpl]

We have a 2009 Sprinter and it has the so called "Polar Package" on it. We have camped in South Dakota in late October for about a week with temps in the mid 30's durring the day and dropping into the teens at night. Even had about 6 inches of snow the week we where there. They had already shut the water off at the campground we stayed at so I had to fill the holding tank at a frost free hydrant. The one thing I had to do to keep stuff from freezing was I wraped the termination valves with heat tape and a little bit of pipe insulation. Other then that we really didn't have a problem with stuff freezing up. If this is something you are concerned about you can always take the underbelly loose and just add some insullation around your holding tanks. We have insullation around our tanks and like I said we didn't have problems with anything freezing up. I hope this helps you out. I'm sure there are other people that do cold weather camping and I'm sure they can give you even more ideas. And like Festus2 said putting some type of skirting around your unit would go a long way in helping as well.

[Gary719]

Originally Posted by Gary719

We have recently purchased new a 2008 Cougar 311RLS 5th wheel. I am wondering what the term [B]Polar Package[B/] entails. I will be traveling to Texas this winter and need to know how cold of temps. I can expect to withstand. Last winter it got down to 11 degrees near San Antonio. Any help would be appreciated.

(This post originally appeared in "New Member Check In")
Moved to Keystone Questions category

Just to clarify, it occasionally gets down to 28 degrees but doesn't stay long. The 11 degree night was hopefully a one time event, and in any case does not last too long.

Thanks for the infor. I love the information on this site.