Montana Owners Club - Keystone Montana 5th Wheel Forum - View Single Post

sreigle · 09-22-2004, 04:56 PM

Hi WildBill. PrariePoodle gave you some good advice. We also use a heat-taped water hose and have never had it freeze up on us. We spend Nov/Dec in the Kansas City area. Last Dec we had some spells with lows down to 14 and highs around 21 for several days. The water hose did not freeze. Here's how I was shown to tape it by an experienced winter camper: Run the tape along the hose, parallel, then looped the excess back along the other side. Use some duct tape every foot or so to keep it in place. Then cover the whole thing with those foam tubes intended to insulate copper water pipes. Then duct tape the entire thing. However, do not at any point tape over the thermostat built into the tape.

The weakest point on ours is the low point drains (two of them) on the bottom of the rig. Not the tank drains but the low point drains for the water lines. There's two and they are next to each other. When ours froze hard enough it froze up into the belly and stopped water flow. A few minutes with a hair dryer (thanks Samantha!) thawed it out. For this coming winter I've wrapped those lines in insulation, the foam tubes, and duct tape. Hopefully that will be enough.

As Linda does, we also make sure the furnace runs enough to keep the belly area from freezing, the area with the tanks. There's a furnace duct into that area. We also use electric heaters but if it's to be sub-freezing we'll not use an electric heater downstairs at night but will set the furnace on 50 or 55, close the door to upstairs and use an electric heater up there.

I also have a five-gallon bucket full of loose insulation. I put this bucket over the park's water spigot to keep it from freezing, even if they've insulated their pipe. Just in case.

We put the shrink film on our windows, same stuff you get for a stick home. Works pretty well. If you have the dual-pane windows you might not need or want to do this.

I also got a can of aerosol expanding foam insulation and filled every opening I could find in the bellypan and in the basement area. I also put those foam tubes on the exposed water pipes in the basement.

Someday I'm going to drop the bellypan as much as I can and insulate water lines in the belly and shove insulation batts in there, like RC and Samantha just did to theirs (they live in Michigan). We did not do that for last winter but it sounds like a good idea. Linda (PrariePoodle) is in much colder weather than we were, too.

Most parks will provide a 100lb propane bottle for just the price of the propane. We use that. Otherwise we'd be filling propane bottles every few days during really cold weather. The furnace uses a lot of gas (thus the elec heaters to supplement the furnace).

I think that's about it. No doubt I've forgotten something but this is what I can think of for now. Hope it helps.

09-22-2004, 04:56 PM	#3
sreigle Montana Master Join Date: Nov 2002 Location: Oceanside Posts: 20,028 M.O.C. #20	Hi WildBill. PrariePoodle gave you some good advice. We also use a heat-taped water hose and have never had it freeze up on us. We spend Nov/Dec in the Kansas City area. Last Dec we had some spells with lows down to 14 and highs around 21 for several days. The water hose did not freeze. Here's how I was shown to tape it by an experienced winter camper: Run the tape along the hose, parallel, then looped the excess back along the other side. Use some duct tape every foot or so to keep it in place. Then cover the whole thing with those foam tubes intended to insulate copper water pipes. Then duct tape the entire thing. However, do not at any point tape over the thermostat built into the tape. The weakest point on ours is the low point drains (two of them) on the bottom of the rig. Not the tank drains but the low point drains for the water lines. There's two and they are next to each other. When ours froze hard enough it froze up into the belly and stopped water flow. A few minutes with a hair dryer (thanks Samantha!) thawed it out. For this coming winter I've wrapped those lines in insulation, the foam tubes, and duct tape. Hopefully that will be enough. As Linda does, we also make sure the furnace runs enough to keep the belly area from freezing, the area with the tanks. There's a furnace duct into that area. We also use electric heaters but if it's to be sub-freezing we'll not use an electric heater downstairs at night but will set the furnace on 50 or 55, close the door to upstairs and use an electric heater up there. I also have a five-gallon bucket full of loose insulation. I put this bucket over the park's water spigot to keep it from freezing, even if they've insulated their pipe. Just in case. We put the shrink film on our windows, same stuff you get for a stick home. Works pretty well. If you have the dual-pane windows you might not need or want to do this. I also got a can of aerosol expanding foam insulation and filled every opening I could find in the bellypan and in the basement area. I also put those foam tubes on the exposed water pipes in the basement. Someday I'm going to drop the bellypan as much as I can and insulate water lines in the belly and shove insulation batts in there, like RC and Samantha just did to theirs (they live in Michigan). We did not do that for last winter but it sounds like a good idea. Linda (PrariePoodle) is in much colder weather than we were, too. Most parks will provide a 100lb propane bottle for just the price of the propane. We use that. Otherwise we'd be filling propane bottles every few days during really cold weather. The furnace uses a lot of gas (thus the elec heaters to supplement the furnace). I think that's about it. No doubt I've forgotten something but this is what I can think of for now. Hope it helps.