To Heat or Not To Heat

[bertieboy1]

Is it better to have heat on in the van during winter.
Personnaly I keep the van cold (no heat),the theory behind this is condensation forms during cooldown and if there is no cooldown there will be no condensation.
Anyone any thoughts or experience on which is best?

 

[Parksy]

With our caravan in storage there is no heat on but some of the windows are on the night latch which allows air to circulate freely around the caravan and reduces the potential for condensation. I also move the upholstery away from the sides of the caravan with an air gap for the underseat lockers, same thing for the fixed bed mattress.

 

[Trevormc]

Don't heat our van during winter, but do open it up on warm days ( van behind house ).

A few days before we go away for the first time after winter we will put a 25W heater on day and night. Yes it takes the chill out of the van.

Trevor

 

[emmerson]

We keep a 650w oil-filled radiator on 24/7 during the off season,but with at least one window on night latch.
This is dual purpose: as we only have a tiny cottage, if we have visitors they can sleep in the nicely aired van!

 

[Trevormc]

Sorry should have said 250W not 25W.

Trevor

 

[seashells]

We do not heat our caravan but on warm days we do open the windows and let some air flow. We will be going away next weekend and this will be the first trip of the season so A oil filled rad will be going in the van a couple of days before we leave to warm the caravan up and hopefully this will make it easier to get the caravan warm once on the site. It also helps that the caravan is stored in our South facing garden so at least it gets the sun in it when it decides to shine

 

[knight-1]

Not to Heat!............ B) Who has money to burn? Think of your bank Manager and the environmet! There are other ways of keeping the damp at bay apart from turning up the heat. Having any unattended electrical appliance runnng 24/7 is an obvious potential fire risk, :woohoo:

In addition to the comments already stated, we also use two 1Kg dehmidifier bags. I was sceptical at first about using these and didn't think they worked. That was until they were used in TOH's car. The results were empressive!

Granted our van is one of the smallest vans you can buy;............ probably! Not sure on the quantity of air volume a 1KG bag will tend to but our van never smells damp.