Not putting Anti Freeze in for the winter - Montana Owners Club

spinky · 09-11-2005, 11:36 AM

My husband decided that if he blew the lines out real good then maybe he wouldn't need to put anti freeze in for the winter. Anyone have any feedback on this. I'm not sure.

illapah · 09-11-2005, 12:15 PM

probably ok for the lines. Still think some in the drain traps would not hurt. That is the way I do it.

richfaa · 09-11-2005, 12:29 PM

It does not take but a small amount of water collected in a low area to cause a great deal of damage.RV anti Freeze cost 2.50 a gallon maybe less..$ 4 or 6 gallons, a small investment to know that you are safe for the winter.

Sunshine · 09-12-2005, 05:46 AM

Agree with richfaa. Hubby always fills the lines with antifreeze for the winter. He says you can never be absolutely sure that all the water is out of the lines when you use the air method. A small price to pay to be safer.

SAndreasen · 09-12-2005, 06:00 AM

I had a friend of mine whose favorite saying when asking questions about $s was "don't risk a lot to save a little." Oh how true. With antifreeze being as cheap as it is and only needing a small amount, don't risk the price of a major repair job to save $10. I use about 4 gallons of antifreeze and drain the hot water heater and have a bypass on it. Cost about $10 for winterizing. Wish I could go south than wouldn't have to use any antifreeze! Maybe next year.

kdeiss · 09-12-2005, 06:16 AM

I use air than Anti Freeze it takes 10 Min and 2 Gal for my unit.The Anti Freeze also keeps washers and seals soft.

jsmitfl · 09-12-2005, 06:28 AM

Unless he flushes the toilet and some of the check valves while letting air run thru them, hes in for a world of hurt. If anything at least run the antifreeze thru and then blow it out. He can save it for the next time then. still needs to put some down the drains and let some run into the main drain pipe to the gate valve.

sreigle · 09-12-2005, 06:55 AM

I've done it without antifreeze but it made me so nervous that I went back to antifreeze.

If you just blow them out, don't forget to remove the caps on the low point drains after blowing to make sure all the water is out of the low points.

And get a little antifreeze anyhow. You'll need to put a little in the toilet bowl to keep the seal from drying out. And put a little antifreeze in each sink and shower drain because there will likely still be a little bit of water in the traps.

Also, be careful not to use more than maybe 30 to 40 psi of air pressure. I once blew the o-ring out of the city water inlet one-way valve. It's not easy to get it back in and sometimes requires replacing the entire unit. Otherwise you cannot use the water pump without it pumping water out the city water inlet.

RV antifreeze is cheap. It always took less than two gallons on ours. And you have that nice clear hose setup on the water pump to easily pump the antifreeze through the system. Don't forget to drain the water heater tank and to turn the water heater bypass valve so you don't pump water into the water heater tank.

Illini Trekker · 09-12-2005, 07:27 AM

To me to make SURE the toilet and pump doe'nt freeze it's worth the piece of mind to use antifreeze!

Virgil · 09-12-2005, 09:24 AM

I might be doing overkill but I pump anitfreeze through everything and then blow it all out with air. I also dump about a 1/2 gal in each drain trap. I have done this for close to 20 years on all the various campers. The sweetest sound in the spring is the pump pressuring up, shutting off and staying off. I bought a travel trailer in February one time from a local resident. He was a truck driver so I figured he was pretty mechanical. I filled up the tank in the spring and turned on the pump. I had leaks everywhere. I learned a great lesson there. Winterizing is not hard to do and I certainly wouldn't take any shortcuts.

Wordsmith · 09-12-2005, 11:26 AM

The person who had our 3295RK before us employed this method. When I hooked the water up to it for the first time after purchasing it this spring, there was a leak at the galley faucet which I attribute to not using antifreeze. We had to replace the faucet, which is not a bad thing considering he paid for it and since we put a much better Moen unit in its place. Still, I would not feel secure without the "pink stuff."

As a hint, the original faucets in our 2003 unit were not made very well. It would not take too much water to freeze inside of them to break the plastic. Perhaps the fixtures in the newer models are of a superior quality.

Chaser · 09-12-2005, 03:49 PM

We live in "cold country" where temperatures can get below "0" very quickly and stay there. We blow our lines out, put in the antifreeze and keep the cupboards especially where faucets and pipes are open, and put a heater in it - all because we don't want to have to spend big $$ for lack of spending a few minutes of time, and we may use the unit as a spare bedroom, or not - move the slides in or out often, we just don't tamper or let anyone who is guesting overnight use the water in any form. So far, we feel we are doing the best thing.

Evy & Mike Orlob

ken · 09-13-2005, 04:11 AM

We will just put our two cents in too. We blow out the lines then add the antifreeze in the lines and drains. It can be costly mistake not to. Case in point, we had a TT years ago and I didn't winterize it like I should have and had to replace two connections and 10' of water line in the spring. It was very expensive.
Ken and Velda
Dahlgren Va
2005 3475 Montana
2005 2500HD GMC Crewcab with Duramax

PowellsMonty · 09-13-2005, 07:20 AM

If you run an electric heater in it and keep it above the freezing mark, is it neccesary to winterize? We use ours even when its snowing out at least once a month.
Thank you.

cargary · 09-13-2005, 04:46 PM

Does anyone have a washer/dryer combo out there? If so, how do you make sure that it is also winterized? Do you put antifreeze in the lines and then run the machine to pull it through or is there a better way? Thanks for any ideas?
Gary & Carole

CountryGuy · 09-14-2005, 01:51 AM

Cargary,

That is exactly what we do with the washer and the dishwasher in the stick built before we leave for the winter.

There are a lot of folks with the washer/dryer combo who live up our way, someone will happen along to tell ya what they do!

spinky · 09-14-2005, 03:29 AM

Thanks everyone for all of your input. After reading all of your comments my husband went and bought the anti freeze. I sure do feel better.

sreigle · 09-14-2005, 04:24 AM

Cargary, the manual for our Whirlpool has instructions that we followed without problem. All we had to do was pour antifreeze into the washer tub and run the "Drain and Spin" cycle for about 30 seconds. Our dealer told us not to bother disconnecting the water lines. The pipes are vertical and drain when we opened the low point drains under the coach. No problems. Different brands may be different so check the manual. Just in case anyone is wondering, while fulltiming we don't winterize anything.

Sunshine · 09-14-2005, 05:35 AM

Running a heater in the Montana during the winter helps prevent some of the moisture that occurs inside the coach.

sreigle · 09-20-2005, 08:42 AM

PowellsMonty, if you can keep the belly above freezing I would think you'd be ok. I thought about doing just what you're asking but was too chicken to try it. Where we lived a big ice storm could knock out the power and then the heater is not going to work. I also thought about using a lightbulb. Same problem plus I would worry about whether the bulb would burn out and I'd not know it in time to save the day. So I'd go with two bulbs if I went that route. Maybe I'm too conservative in this but I don't like spending money because I screwed up.

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