door & window frame heat

[Bnystrom]

I just picked up a 48" x 25' roll of Reflectix at Lowe's, so there's no frame to melt or distort. My plan is to add insulation (like Thinsulate) and fabric to one side of each panel to turn them into reversible summer/winter covers. I'll make them big enough to cover the window frames to reduce heat loss to the outside in the winter. I don't know if that will help much with summer heat gain; I doubt it.

[Life-in-Him]

We see those temps on the frame jere in CA just as we saw in AZ when we opened the thread.
Removing the residue from foil or other stick on could be done with goo gone or similar products.

With some of the "who cares" type responses, were back in the game looking at temporary testing kind of solutions.
Maybe we'll try insulation w/pool noodles that we can leave here as a bulk heat buffer on the frames. That should show a big & quick change to the heat map around one of the doors. Keeping that heat out should decrease a/c run time.
It's kind of like the fire story: build big fire stand far away or make small fire & be close. One requires a lot of wood wasted, the other not much wood to stay warmer.

[Bnystrom]

How are you planning to use pool noodles?

[Life-in-Him]

Originally Posted by Bnystrom

I just picked up a 48" x 25' roll of Reflectix at Lowe's, so there's no frame to melt or distort. My plan is to add insulation (like Thinsulate) and fabric to one side of each panel to turn them into reversible summer/winter covers. I'll make them big enough to cover the window frames to reduce heat loss to the outside in the winter. I don't know if that will help much with summer heat gain; I doubt it.

Good plan. We used white coroplast? & It works very well. Makes a 15-20° difference in inside temps when all windows are covered in winter with heater off. But the metal window & door frames are @ OAT.
Summer, we bring the inside down to 75. Put the reflection panels in (reflectix facing in ) & the rig will stay within 5° till morning regardless of OAT (temps have gone down to 45 a few night)

[Life-in-Him]

Originally Posted by Bnystrom

How are you planning to use pool noodles?

Brute force & ignorance? ;-)
Split lengthwise.
Cover frame on bedroom door & hold inplace with painter's tape.
The Cougar has 2 doors so it's easy.

I may just do s section on each side & map the temps side to side, & above & below the noodles side t6 side. That should show any benefits.

Then it becomes decision time & how to do a real "fix".
Doing it outside blocks lateral conducting into walls & doors while doing it inside only blocks that specific area.
The walls w/o anything are hot as far as 6" out now. So all that radiates into the rig. I'm assuming that 6" is from the door frames since they can be over 120°.

[Life-in-Him]

Another thought: use eternabond. It comes in 1/2" I think.
Though it would be extremely hard to get off

[Bnystrom]

Originally Posted by Life-in-Him

The walls w/o anything are hot as far as 6" out now. So all that radiates into the rig. I'm assuming that 6" is from the door frames since they can be over 120°.

I noticed the same thing that the hot window frames heat the wall for several inches. I'll have to try using Reflectix on the outside of the windows. Since I'll only use the covers when we're stationary, it shouldn't be an issue.

[Life-in-Him]

If you use the coroplast, we were told nothing will stick to it.
But I can't remember What we used.
We spread lot's of it on the reflectix & lot's on the coroplast till it got sticky. Then put them together.
So far aftet almost 2 years nothing has separated.

[travelin texans]

Originally Posted by Bnystrom

That's interesting, but our windows are basically flush with the outside walls, so I don't know what such covers would snap to. I agree that Reflectix isn't pretty, but it's a relatively inexpensive solution for now.

FWIW, my strategy for the Reflectix panels is to try to orient the RV so one side gets most of the sun and only install the panels on that side, the windshield and skylight, leaving the windows on the other side for light and ventilation.

The snaps were attached to the exterior walls around the the windows not the frames.

[Bnystrom]

Originally Posted by Life-in-Him

If you use the coroplast, we were told nothing will stick to it. But I can't remember What we used. We spread lot's of it on the reflectix & lot's on the coroplast till it got sticky. Then put them together.
So far aftet almost 2 years nothing has separated.

Coroplast is apparently polypropylene and there are specific glues for it, but you're correct, not much will stick to it. It sounds like you used contact cement of some sort.

Originally Posted by travelin texans

The snaps were attached to the exterior walls around the the windows not the frames.

Got it, thanks. I'm not wild about screwing snaps into my walls, so I'll probably go with a different attachment method.