Hi everyone. Just wondered if anyone out there has any helpful tips for winter caravaning. Only had our van since March last year so haven't been out during the winter yet. We are off this weekend and although looking forward to it we are a little worried that we are going to be a bit cold !! Any tips from experianced caravaners would be wonderful!
New to winter caravaning?? Any tips?
- Thread starter worzel1
- Start date
We are off again this weekend for another potential sub zero weekend in the caravan. Tips when it's really cold that we have been using with good results:
Wrap the aquaroll in a thick ski jacket or buy an insulated cover. I also wrap two layers of pipe insulation around the water pump pipe and cable tie it in place. It has worked OK until we went down to -8 and then it froze up and had to be thawed out in the caravan.
The heater is more powerful on gas if it's a Truma system, so when arriving on site we give it a good blast on gas before switching to electric.
You keep a noticeable and surprising amount more heat in by shutting the curtains and blinds
Take a torch. One of the ones that goes on your head is really good.
We burst a water filter when it froze last winter so between trips I take it out.
Make sure the battery is in good nick and charged. Cold weather and short days means that it has to work harder
Probably a bit wussy but as the van is at home, I leave the heating on the day before we go away to dry it out and warm up the contents a bit.
Hope this helps
Wrap the aquaroll in a thick ski jacket or buy an insulated cover. I also wrap two layers of pipe insulation around the water pump pipe and cable tie it in place. It has worked OK until we went down to -8 and then it froze up and had to be thawed out in the caravan.
The heater is more powerful on gas if it's a Truma system, so when arriving on site we give it a good blast on gas before switching to electric.
You keep a noticeable and surprising amount more heat in by shutting the curtains and blinds
Take a torch. One of the ones that goes on your head is really good.
We burst a water filter when it froze last winter so between trips I take it out.
Make sure the battery is in good nick and charged. Cold weather and short days means that it has to work harder
Probably a bit wussy but as the van is at home, I leave the heating on the day before we go away to dry it out and warm up the contents a bit.
Hope this helps
Great thanks. We had heard about putting a coat round the water so we will do that and will definately leave the heating on the day before in the hope that some of the chill will be out of the furnishings. Do you have a blown air heating system, if so is it ok to leave on all night? I know that you shouldn't leave it on gas.
Hi Worzel If youve got a old sleeping bag try putting your water bottle in that and if you can put that in a large plastic bag thats even better, You can if your not going to use your pump at night bring it inside fill your kettle up for the brew in the morning and fit the pump when you need it, But through the day wrap it say in an old towel just to keep the cold out.As for heating we went to scotland for six nights over new year snow on the ground all the time put your gas fire on for a good hour to warm the blow air pipes then turn off the gas and switch to electric, ours was on for the full six days and nights no problems, you could even invest in a small electric fan heaters for topping up but dont leave them on at night
I do leave the heating on overnight but only on electric. One more thing, you may need to pop a bit of antifreeze in the waste tank. I didn't one freezing night and it was a bit difficult to get the ice out of it the next morning. Any cheap car antifreeze will do. Our heating system is a blown air Truma and it held its own fine at very low temperatures on electric once we had warmed up for half an hour on gas.
We did have a hot water pipe freeze somewhere under the front bed the night it went down to -8 but I think leaving the vertical flaps open under the bed will stop that happening again. That one was a bit strange as the cold water flowed fine but no hot until we thawed the pipes out round the water heater.
We did have a hot water pipe freeze somewhere under the front bed the night it went down to -8 but I think leaving the vertical flaps open under the bed will stop that happening again. That one was a bit strange as the cold water flowed fine but no hot until we thawed the pipes out round the water heater.
OK thats a good one. We hadn't thought of putting anti-freeze in the waste tank. I am sure its like caravaning for the first time in the summer, once you have learned how to make life easier it all comes together. Think our heating is the same as yours so hopefully it will do the job. Thanks for your help.
Thanks Cheshirecat, yes I might have an old sleeping bag that would make an ideal fit. Hopefully this time next week I will be full of confidence that my caravan can cope with extremes of cold and will wonder why I was so worried!
Hi Worzel,
Welcome to Winter caravanning.
You say you know not to use the heater on Gas - I used to take that view being a cautious type. However when I mentioned that on this forum I had a load of responses from people whose knowledge is far greater than mine pointing out that it is perfectly safe to do so. The burning unit is fully sealed from the inside of the caravan.
Cheers
Mike A
Welcome to Winter caravanning.
You say you know not to use the heater on Gas - I used to take that view being a cautious type. However when I mentioned that on this forum I had a load of responses from people whose knowledge is far greater than mine pointing out that it is perfectly safe to do so. The burning unit is fully sealed from the inside of the caravan.
Cheers
Mike A
Hi Mike A
Thanks for your response. Thats interesting. We have always thought that we shouldn't leave the gas on overnight just in case of fumes. Don't know whether I dare leave it on so think we will see how the electric copes with sub zero temperatures first.
Hi Worzel,
As we only use the caravan in winter I can only agree with all the advice given already,Don't forget to drain all the tanks when you get home and make sure you have switched to propane, we use a insulated cover for the aquaroll and when it's freezing hard we use a bucket instead of the wastemaster as its easier to kick a block of ice out of and also we use antifreeze in the toilet because thats one thing we don't want as a huge block of stinky ice LOL!
Aimee
As we only use the caravan in winter I can only agree with all the advice given already,Don't forget to drain all the tanks when you get home and make sure you have switched to propane, we use a insulated cover for the aquaroll and when it's freezing hard we use a bucket instead of the wastemaster as its easier to kick a block of ice out of and also we use antifreeze in the toilet because thats one thing we don't want as a huge block of stinky ice LOL!
Aimee
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