Rather than reflectix

[DougVelting]

So we recently went full time in our RV, and our plan was to follow 70 degree weather and never be cold again. 6 months later we are still in NJ and dealing with the cold. Nailed it...

Two weeks ago we spent the day trying out a cold weather solution that seems to be working so i wanted to share incase anyone else wants to give it a shot.

We had reflectix on the windows to help with insulation and keeping the heat out when we moved into the RV in july. Now that winter is here we went a different route and it seems to be working a LOT better for keeping the cold out.

According to google, the R value of trapped air is about 3 per inch, so...

On our windows that have the screens you can pop out, we popped them out, and got that frost king window insulation plastic, put it on the back of the screens, and popped them back in.

For the windows that dont have screens we got thin plexiglass and cut a "second pane" and screwed it onto the inside of the frame. (not a cheap investment, BUT in my opinion much easier to do it once and have it forever than to refill a 40 pound tank once a week)

Now we have about an inch and a half of air gap between the glass and "inside pane" on the windows. So, im guessing roughly an R 4 or 5 on the windows, AND we still get the radiant warming from the sun coming in during the day. We kept our precut reflectix panels so we can put them on in the summer to keep the sun rays out.

The other thing we did was eliminate ALL of the "major" air leaks we could find. We turned on the exhaust fan in the kitchen and then opened every cabinet door and tracked down where air flow was coming from and filled the holes with insulation.

The other thing we did was take off the panel in the outside compartment that hides our furnace, and blocked off the underbelly from the furnace with reflectix and AC duct seal tape, so the furnace pulls most of the air from inside, making it more efficient since its heating warm air instead of pulling in the cold air from the underbelly, and it REALLY helped with the cold air draft coming in from the air return.

The underbelly had its own exhaust port for warm air to be pumped into it, which i put a 4 inch to 2 inch reducer in. This reduced the amount of hot air going down there, and according to the remote thermometer it is staying over freezing down there even if it drops to 20 outside.

We have not gotten skirting on the 381, because we plan on leaving here in january, and not really being anywhere long term so we couldnt justify the cost / room the skirting would take up.

We have seen a SIGNIFICANT decrease in propane usage and the temperature inside holds a LOT more steadily now. Now our furnace is kicking on for about 4 minutes every hour to hour and a half at night.