Alternatives to winterizing?

[ascdds]

We will soon spend our first winter owning a motorhome. When not camping, we store her in a covered, outdoor storage with 15A electrical service. We will still be camping 1 or 2 weekends a month, so I'm not real excited about winterizing then dewinterizing every 2 or 3 weeks. A friend suggested to keep the propane furnace set to 50 degrees but I'm not real jazzed about using up propane for that either just because I'm cheap. Are there any other alternatives, such as space heaters in the kitchen, bathrooms, and water bay which will use the storage place's electricity. If you use space heaters what kind do you use that would do the trick safely? Or are there any other alternatives I haven't thought of? Or should I just get off my lazy butt and winterize/dewinterize every time?

[lrsses]

Drain your water heater,fresh water tank other tanks blow all the water out of your lines add antifreeze to the traps 30 minutes done

[Lt Dan]

We use ours off and on during the winter, so I rarely winterize. I do use the propane furnaces, but set them at around 45 degrees and put a small 600watt heater in the storage bay and a 60 watt light in the wet bay. If you only have 15 amps of service, you will only be able to run one electric heater of any size. One heater will not protect your wet bay and interior water lines. Those heaters normally draw 10-12 amps each. We had temperatures down to 16 degrees last winter and I only used a few gallons of propane all winter. That cost less than the price of antifreeze for one winterizing.

[Mr_D]

I turned on one electric element and the burner in my AquaHot, opened inside doors and access ports, placed a couple small fans to move air and set the thermostat at 45° on all three zones. I also used a remote thermometer to monitor the wet bay and inside house temps. Ran it all on one 20 amp circuit all winter and used about 10 gallons of diesel.

[ascdds]

Originally Posted by Mr_D

I turned on one electric element and the burner in my AquaHot, opened inside doors and access ports, placed a couple small fans to move air and set the thermostat at 45° on all three zones. I also used a remote thermometer to monitor the wet bay and inside house temps. Ran it all on one 20 amp circuit all winter and used about 10 gallons of diesel.

What remote thermometer do you use?

[TonyMac]

Your low point drains, and your icemaker solenoid are exposed to outside temps, no matter what you set your thermostat to. Your water heater will need to stay on propane as well, it is exposed to outside tems as well and it draws alot of 120vac and combined loads could trip the 15A breaker, = disaster.

[Mark D]

Originally Posted by lrsses

Drain your water heater,fresh water tank other tanks blow all the water out of your lines add antifreeze to the traps 30 minutes done

This is what we did with out last motorhome in Ct with no issues. Make sure the PSI is below 40psi. You only need a little anti freeze to protect the traps.

Leave all faucets open if you can. I icemaker is the hardest. Washing machine just turn on for a warm wash until you hear air, then add some anti freeze to the drum and set to spin and rinse.

The keeping it set to 50 deg only works if you have a heated basement.

[Frank Miller]

The OP didn't mention if he was storing the coach in Alaska or Florida so it may be difficult to judge how much temperature compensation would be needed.

[ascdds]

Originally Posted by Frank Miller

The OP didn't mention if he was storing the coach in Alaska or Florida so it may be difficult to judge how much temperature compensation would be needed.

I am in Tennessee. Average lows are in the 20's in January but it can get close to zero or below on rare occasions. Lows in the teens are not uncommon.

[Frank Miller]

Camping every couple of weeks and storing outdoors with temperatures below freezing is a hard combination to deal with. Blowing out the lines as lrsses suggests is relatively fast and easy but unless you are going to drain and add water every time you go out, you'll need to take water for drinking and potty flushing.

Without de-winterizing, your risk and cost are extremely low. You still have all the other benefits of the motorhome but you'll need to take containers of water.

If you are going for one to two day runs that could definitely work to not put fresh water in the tank and lines and you would only need to deal with draining the grey and black tanks.

For longer trips and a higher level of comfort, you'll need to take the other suggestions for maintaining heat to keep the water pump, water heater tank, and pipes from freezing. However, you run an increased risk of unexpectedly losing the heat source while you are away from the coach and that could be both costly and not have the use of the coach when you want it.

The way we deal with it is to not de-winterize for short winter trips (couple of days) but only for longer trips. For shorter trips we also make more use of roadside rest areas, keep several gallon bottles of tap water in the bathroom for the potty, and shower in the campgrounds. Even in the summer we tend use bottled water for ice, cooking and drinking rather than risk local water so not a huge difference.

Each option has a cost and a risk so you'll need to decide what works best for you.

[SuperGewl]

Depending on your location, if it gets down and dirty cold and has a hard freeze or not depends on how you go about setting it for winter.
If you don't have one then you need to purchase a small air compressor, pancake type or something of the sort.
What you want to do is drain potable water tank then blow the system out with 25lb air or less. It normally takes me about 30 minutes to blow it out completely. I open the potty water drain when I get home from camping and let it drain then come back the next day or later that day and blow it out. One or two things to not forget are the Ice maker and the Washer if you have one. All I have is an Ice maker. You need to disconnect both the input and output line to the Ice Maker control valve and also pull the Ice maker water filter and drain it. For the washer you need to drain water line to it and the water in the washer(good luck).
Then drain the black and grey tanks.
Then I use about a gallon of RV antifreeze in the drains. I pour some down each p-trap and a good bit in each toilet (I have 2) I also open the drain valve from the front black tank to the dump area just for quick burp to allow antifreeze to go thru the macerator and the line back to the dump.
Also leave ALL of the faucets OPEN. This gives the water somewhere to expand to if it freezes.
If you blow out all of your lines when you put it up every 2-3 weeks and leave the faucets open you should be good without having to put in the RV antifreeze every 2-3 weeks during the no-use time. I would however get yourself some 30 to 40 watt incandescent light bulbs with and place them in the lower storage areas, wet bay and some even in the MH to help maintain temp above freezing. Remember you are not trying to heat it but just put a little bit of heat in a sealed MH. You don't want it to catch fire or melt something.
Good luck finding a light bulb

[Cat320]

Get a dozen or so drop lights from WalMart. Put 60 W bulbs in them and put two every place you have water sitting....water pump, washer, refrig, etc. Then put anti freeze in the P traps and toilets.

[aether_one]

I'm in north Florida and it gets in the teens and 20s occasionally but I have never winterized. We'll us an electric spaceheater in the RV set low if it looks like it is going to be cold enough.

The thing to remember is you have to take into account how cold it will get and how long it will be cold.

If you're in the 50s during the day and expect a drop to the low 20s for a few hours and then back into the 50s it's not as big a deal as being in the low 30s during the day and mid 20s during the night for several days.

Electric heaters have saved us from any issues in all cases though.

[Busskipper]

Originally Posted by ascdds

We will soon spend our first winter owning a motorhome.

When not camping, we store her in a covered, outdoor storage with 15A electrical service.

We will still be camping 1 or 2 weekends a month, so I'm not real excited about winterizing then dewinterizing every 2 or 3 weeks.

A friend suggested to keep the propane furnace set to 50 degrees but I'm not real jazzed about using up propane for that either just because

I'm cheap. Are there any other alternatives, such as space heaters in the kitchen, bathrooms, and water bay which will use the storage place's electricity.

If you use space heaters what kind do you use that would do the trick safely? Or are there any other alternatives I haven't thought of?

Or should I just get off my lazy butt and winterize/dewinterize every time?

http://www.irv2.com/forums/f258/fyi-...on-413395.html

Either Heat or Blow it out - Or lose sleep and........... One week maybe leave the Heat on........... two - three + weeks blow it out I'm not only Cheap but like to Not Worry - - - ......... - - - -

So try the Blow Out and see if that works for you - I usually can do it in #0 Minutes ........... - -

Smart not Lazy, Best of Luck,

On edit;

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...?ie=UTF8&psc=1

With a 500 watt heat lamp/Quartz in the kitchen and a 250 in the basement - should keep it at 42 degrees + Insulate the front Windshield with reflexit - lazy cheap and Works unless below say 10 degrees -