Fully insulating my RV for winter living

[angrybreadbox73]

Well ya'll here is my current situation and plans:   for the time being I have to pay-off some very extravagant bills that me and my soon to be ex-wife have accumulated and when they are paid, I plan on getting a lot in Dayton, Ohio at one of the mobile home parks.  I would like to put the angrybreadbox at a campground here but, alas, there aren't any that are open year round.  So far, I've gathered all my belongings, they are in the RV and my semi but, my question to all of our fulltimers is:  in the wintertime, I know from the factory, our beasts are not too well insulated.  Where and what kind of insulation would any of you sugest and not just the walls and roof and floor, also i will neeed to adress the freshwater and grey and blackwater freeze issue?  Now, I do have ideas of how but just wanting to know before I do it, what has worked well?  Thank you all soo very much!

[LJ-TJ]

 N:(   I sure hate to be the bearer of bad tidings but I don't believe any of our full timers are doing it in the North. I'm sure there either down south or out around Arizona some were. I live in the north country and have a pretty good idea how to insolate but boy I just can't see how you could do it reasonably in one of our little bagos. You might be better off trying to rent a mobile home until the weather warms up some. Maybe around the first of May.  Hm?

[ClydesdaleKevin]

USUALLY, as fulltimers, we don't usually encounter extremely cold weather for any length of time.  With our business we travel to renaissance faires year round, so we are essentially snow birds weatherwise.

I said USUALLY because we are right now in Alachua, Florida, and it was 17 degrees last night!  And it has consistently dropped below freezing for over a week now at night.

That said, two ceramic heaters do well enough to keep the RV livable...cool inside but good sleeping weather.  The furnace heats the rig right up but is expensive to run, especially at this time of the year for us, between shows.

Fortunately Winnebago was smart in their design, so all the internal water pipes run INSIDE the RV...behind cabinets, under the bed, etc.  But you are right about holding tanks!  I was worried about our freshwater tank last night because the compartment under the bed gets the least amount of ambient heat from the RV, but since its only half full it didn't break, or even freeze at all for that matter.

The grey and black tanks are extremely exposed to the cold however.  Since the black tank is only half full and treated with chemicals, its okay, and since we keep the grey open when in a park its empty, but your post got me thinking.

If I were to settle down somewhere north, what would I do? (besides have my head examined...lol!)

They sell heating pads for your holding tanks that run on electric, so that is one upgrade I would definately make.  I'd put one on the freshwater tank too, just to be on the safe side.  Then I would stuff as much fiberglass insulation as I could over and around the tanks.

If I was in a park, I'd make sure I left my greywater open to the sewer dump during the cold weather, and make sure the hose runs downhill so it doesn't freeze and rupture.

I would also make sure I insulated the water hose coming into the RV with foam pipe covers...I think they even sell electrically heated pipe wraps that I would consider wrapping around the hose.

If I wasn't going to move the RV in the winter, another thinng I might consider doing is making some kind of a skirt, like you see on park models, and sealing off the whole underneith of the RV.

And finally, I would probably invest in an external park model furnace because they are a lot more efficient propane wise, and I'd probably run one of the ducts underneith the RV into the empty space created by the new skirting.

Given the choice I wouldn't do it at all...I like snowbirding, and in 2 days we are headed 240 miles south, so we are escaping the clutches of winter once again.

Hope that helps!

Kev