Tips to Keep the Tech Away: Preparing your RV for a Safe and Warm Winter

It about that time of year where in some areas of the country the heat pumps are beginning to fall short of keeping the RV warm. From maintenance to what to do if freezing weather is forecast, we’ve got you snowbirds covered.

Equipment Concerns

First off, see if your heat pump will kick in and provide heat. Even though it won’t be very helpful in freezing temps, it’s good cheap heat for the chilly fall days that is RV wide.

Next, crank up that furnace and make sure it fires and blows warm air before you need it. You don’t want to be one of several RVs having furnace trouble when you’re looking down the barrel of a freeze. There are many small problems that are inexpensive to fix, but if you wait too long everyone else is going to have bought those parts either because they need them for their RVs or by techs in preparation for winter repair work. If you blocked the return air for the propane furnace this summer to keep heat from coming in from the underbelly, don’t forget to unblock it.

If you have an electric fireplace, gently pull it out and vacuum/clean behind it. The most common error code for these is a message that means the dust and/or pet hair has built up and needs to be removed for safety reasons. This takes 15-20 minutes max, and if yours is mounted in a cabinet that also protects your TV on move day and doubly so if you have kids and/or pets you’re about to be grossed out by what all falls back there. We’re sorry and you’re welcome.

This isn’t specifically a winter item but in the fall when we’re doing all of this to prepare for winter we find it easy to just tack on a water heater service.

Weatherproofing: Keeping the Warm Air in and the Cold Air Out

Check your underbelly. There are more air gaps in your towable RV than you know, and heat and AC are leaching out of them. Near dusk, turn on all the lights inside and crawl under the rig. Everywhere you see light coming out is an air leak. We take steel wool, spread it out across the gap, and then use expanding spray foam to seal the area. The steel wool will help hold the foam in place and act as a deterrent to pests. We cut our propane bill by almost a third doing this last winter.

When Do I Have To Use the Furnace?

I understand not wanting to burn more propane than necessary, especially in situations where electricity is included in the nightly rate. Heat pumps vary by model, but usually they lose effectiveness between 40-45°F. Anything lower than that is a waste of electricity. In the 35-45°F range, the electric fireplaces are phenomenal at helping the heat pumps, and if you have to have the help of an electric heater we are fans of the oil filled radiator heaters.

So, if you have an RV with an enclosed underbelly and the furnace is ducted into the underbelly, run the furnace in freezing temperatures. It protects your plumbing and tanks as much as they can be protected. I know you’re thinking about costs, but if you don’t run the furnace and your lines freeze you’re looking at plumbing repairs and water damage. Our smallest invoices for these, even in parks that we don’t charge service calls in, is $400-600. There’s a lot of propane you can buy for that amount of money. The plumbing fittings go out of stock around freezes as well, so you could be several days without water in your RV while more fittings arrive from Amazon. Save the money and stress and just run the furnace.

Freeze Tips

If you’re running an RV with a furnace-heated underbelly and are snowbirds, we recommend taking the following steps to protect your RV:

1. Run the furnace to keep plumbing and underbelly as warm as possible. Warmth gives you the best odds of preventing freezing, and space heaters and electric heat aren’t routed to the underbelly.
2. Fill the onboard fresh water tank, and then before dark disconnect the water line from both the RV and the spigot, drain the water out of the water hose, and store inside the warm underbelly. Run off your fresh tank overnight and refill the next day at the warmest part of the day. When the spigot freezes, the ice in the line freezes the water next to it, and in this way the freeze spreads to your rig. Just disconnect. It really is easier. Those heated hoses tend to fail when you need them most so we aren’t a fan of those, either. Many of our calls during freezes start with a failed heated hose.
3. If it’s cold enough that you’re worried about living area plumbing freezing, open the cabinets so the heat can easily access into the cabinets with the plumbing. Foam board insulation can also be tucked along the exterior walls inside of cabinets to help keep the heat in and the cold out, and this can be especially helpful if you don’t have a “4 season” RV. It will also help keep the rig cool in the summer as well.
4. In cold weather, keep your propane tanks at 50% or above if possible. As tanks approach empty in cold temperatures, the rate of vaporization slows and the pressure inside the tank lowers. This will cause your furnace to fail to light or stay lit as though you are out of propane despite there being propane in the tank. When you swap tanks to a full tank, you’ll notice the furnace lights right up because the full tank can supply enough propane at the proper pressure to keep it lit. We tend to run the tanks that are closer to empty during the day if we aren’t able to refill and then run the tank with more propane in it overnight. This strategy can save you if the local area runs out of propane.