Running the furnace with slides closed?

[Mikendebbie]

A question for you northerners who routinely live thru temps in the teens (bless your hearts!!).
This winter storm that is coming thru the country this weekend and next week will drop temps here in Austin to the mid-teens for about 36 hours starting Saturday night. I have used air compressor to blow out the water lines and put pink antifreeze in the p-traps. I did not pump pink antifeeze into the plumbing system. I put a ceramic heater in the basement and i have an old incandescent shop light laying on top of the washing machine. I was thinking about running the furnace on 50* or so. All the slides are in - is it a problem to run the furnace with the slides closed?

Since I did not run antifreeze into the plumbing system, I can't winterize the Splendide washing machine. I watched a couple of videos for winterizing the washer and I called Splendide to ask what should I do to help protect it since I am not doing the full unit winterization. He said disconnect the hoses and open the bottom panel and look for a pan near the pump that may have drip water in it. My clothes dryer blocks access to the washer hoses, so that option is dead. I cant get to the bottom panel due to the cabinet fascia. That's when I decided to place the drop light in the washer-dryer closet and the ceramic heater in the basement, plus run the furnace on (say) 50*. Both propane tanks are full for now. I wish I had one more old incandescent shop light, but I was lucky to find this one.

I intended to run the furnace like this during (what turned out to be) the Texas Big Freeze Feb 2021, but we lost power for 5 days and the furnace ran the batteries dead in a day or so.

 

[twindman]

I don't believe freezing water is harmful unless it is in a closed system. i.e. a pipe that is closed on both ends or such. The expansion of ice breaks things, but if there is nothing stopping the expansion, nothing should break. Others pitch in for more info.

 

[MandK]

I have run my furnace with all of the slides in on our Montana. Temperatures were 5 degrees F +/- at night and upper teens during the day. Our 3121 did not block any of the heat registers with the slides in so I felt comfortable doing it. I measured the heated air temp coming out of the registers at over 120 degrees, so I can’t vouch for what might happen if a slide bottom is blocking the registers.
We were fully winterized at the time. We were on our way to Florida and ran it that way for 4 days in our daughter’s driveway in order to keep the food stuffs from freezing in the pantry and refrigerator. We ran it at 45 degrees and were plugged into a 20 amp receptacle to keep the battery charged, it worked fine. If the trailer had not been fully winterized, I would have set the temp a little higher to protect the belly better. Hope that helps, good luck.

 

[Mikendebbie]

Thanks Mark. My rig layout is very close to yours in the living room. I don’t think any registers are covered up in the bedroom or front bathroom. I will cross my fingers and hope for the best by running the furnace.

 

[LeftOverParts]

I placed a regular heating pad on our LiPo battery last fall when we were in Thompson CAN. If you have 120V available, maybe place an electric blanket or heating pad on the washer hoses???

 

[Thebricklayer]

We left Michigan last week (single digits) for Florida, we ran the whole way (3 days) with the furnace set on 50 to keep everything from freezing as we traveled, we do this every year.

 

[ChuckS]

Wont be a problem running the furnace with slides closed.. I've even run the furnace while towing when we came out of Montana in a snow storm...

 

[Pest]

We frequently run the furnace with the slides in, no problem.

However you may find that 50 degrees is too cold to keep all pipes from freezing. The heating duct that runs into the belly is not very long and barely blows heat all the way to the back or mid of the belly where the water tank and multiple pipes for the kitchen and drains are located.

I have thermometers installed in multiple places in our belly and have even extended the heater ducting all the way to the rear of the belly. I regularly have to keep the thermostat set to about 65 for the belly to maintain 30ish degrees higher than outside...e.g. 5 degrees outside means the belly/water tank/plumbing is around 35 degrees.

MInus 7 is the coldest we've been in and had to keep the thermostat at 73 to stay barely above freezing at 33 degrees in the belly.

Note that this is all without skirting, but all the holes and leak points have been completely sealed.

 

[DaleRobertson]

A question for you northerners who routinely live thru temps in the teens (bless your hearts!!).
This winter storm that is coming thru the country this weekend and next week will drop temps here in Austin to the mid-teens for about 36 hours starting Saturday night. I have used air compressor to blow out the water lines and put pink antifreeze in the p-traps. I did not pump pink antifeeze into the plumbing system. I put a ceramic heater in the basement and i have an old incandescent shop light laying on top of the washing machine. I was thinking about running the furnace on 50* or so. All the slides are in - is it a problem to run the furnace with the slides closed?

Since I did not run antifreeze into the plumbing system, I can't winterize the Splendide washing machine. I watched a couple of videos for winterizing the washer and I called Splendide to ask what should I do to help protect it since I am not doing the full unit winterization. He said disconnect the hoses and open the bottom panel and look for a pan near the pump that may have drip water in it. My clothes dryer blocks access to the washer hoses, so that option is dead. I cant get to the bottom panel due to the cabinet fascia. That's when I decided to place the drop light in the washer-dryer closet and the ceramic heater in the basement, plus run the furnace on (say) 50*. Both propane tanks are full for now. I wish I had one more old incandescent shop light, but I was lucky to find this one.

I intended to run the furnace like this during (what turned out to be) the Texas Big Freeze Feb 2021, but we lost power for 5 days and the furnace ran the batteries dead in a day or so.

If your skides do not block the furnace registers you will be good. Keystone Montana states in the owners manual to close/isolate propane bottles when mobile and not to run furnace when mobile.

 

[jwengermt]

We've driven many miles in cold weather. Leave the furnace set at 55. Our slides don't interfere with the heat registers. Never had any kind of a problem. Have been in 3 below and never had anything freeze up.

 

[Mikendebbie]

To follow up on this thread…this cold snap is over here in Central TX for now. We had 56 straight hours of below freezing temps plus about 1” of sleet/ice pellets on the ground…many hours in the low 20s with overnight temps in the teens. The cold air was preceded by 3.5” of rain. We did not get icing on the trees this time. Most important - we DID NOT LOOSE POWER! Slides were closed up. I put a ceramic heater in the basement on the wet bay side (with an old school mercury thermometer) which kept it at 50*-55*. I set the Microaire thermostat to “furnace/auto” and put the set point at 40* using my phone app (internet signal extends out to the shed the Montana lives in). We nearly emptied the 30 gal propane tank on the driver side. I got the tank refilled yesterday. I had no idea how much propane would be used - now I know! Cold weather and white stuff on the ground is much easier to deal with when the power stays on!

 

[MandK]

Glad it worked out! This weather has been a challenge for many of us.

 

[Oregon Coast]

I got incorrect information from Splendide, which they said you could simply drain the lines, and bottom sump. This process, leaves water trapped in the inlet water solenoid. The ONLY practical way to clear this water is to use compressed air, or circulate antifreeze thru the washer while running the washer thru its mini short cycle. Same problem for the dishwasher. Same problem for a stand-alone ice maker, and a freezer mounted ice maker.