First time winterizing

[Dennis H]

Going to be 81 degrees in Mesa next week. Shorts and T shirts for the next 10 days at least. C'mon down!.....Dennis

[saflyer]

5 minutes ago, Dennis H said:

Going to be 81 degrees in Mesa next week. Shorts and T shirts for the next 10 days at least. C'mon down!.....Dennis

Great idea. Makes me think we can fill a jug with water to flush the toilet enroute and hit the road. 

[Guest Ray Davis]

1 hour ago, Dennis H said:

Going to be 81 degrees in Mesa next week. Shorts and T shirts for the next 10 days at least. C'mon down!.....Dennis

 Dennis, That's not nice, here we are dealing with Alaska weather here in North Tx.  We are dealing with a once in a life time winter it was -2 the   other night.    It's  been below freezing for days now, I lost count.  If I put on shorts and T shirt I would freeze to death.                                                 Tex invested heavily in solar and wind now we're paying for it, pun intended.   The solar is covered with snow and the wind turbines are frozen.            I think Mother nature is telling us something if we'll listen.  Politics is ruining our great way of life that we worked so hard to provide to the country   and to see it all destroyed for some political experiment is insane.  Green energy is wonderful when it works but the technology is not there yet            Our house is all elect,  but fortunately I had installed a gas heater in the fireplace so we can stay warm between the rolling elect power outages.          We are not equipped to handle these sustained low temps so I'm sure I'll have some burst pipes     

 Rant is over for now                                                                     

 

Edited February 17, 2021 by Ray Davis

[Dennis H]

Ray, I do feel your pain. Winterize your home and head to Arizona. The winter temps across this great country is insane. I'll stay clear of politics but I do hear you. The great thing I try to remember is I've worked hard all my life and am now able to reap the rewards of that hard work. Something the me generation will never be able to do. Relying on someone else to take care of you because you failed to do so while younger is begging for failure. Nothing in life is FREE regardless of what some people try to make one believe. We are truly blessed with being able to turn the key if we don't like our neighbors, don't like the cold or don't like the heat.....Dennis

[Guest Ray Davis]

 

Dennis, I wish we could.  We used to go to Yuma in the winter.  Marilyn's cousin ( RIP ) and her husband would come from Wash state.  They rented a house and we stayed in our coach.  Those were good times I miss the desert this time of year.   If things ever get half way back to normal we plan to travel again.   At least we got our first Pfizer shot, now another strain or two is on it's way.   What the, this is not how I pictured our golden yrs.  Ha Ha   Actually just glad to be alive and well.  Other countries have tried sharing the wealth and they all ran out of other people's money, we'll do the same IMHO.   The way to share in the wealth is to go to work but who wants to do that anymore.     

Edited February 17, 2021 by Ray Davis

[Ivan K]

Ray, We are in the same boat here in N TX. Same thinking too.. All packed to turn the key and head towards AZ last weekend when our daughter was supposed to come home to house sit. By that time we were already under snow and ice. Took her 3 days of flight cancelations and rerouting across half of the country to finally get here from Atlanta. All I could do was to hide the bus inside the shop thinking thats the best way to avoid winterizing. Not so much, when blackouts started and temps went to zero. My shop oil heater still needs electricity. Running AH on diesel not possible while inside a frozen building. In desperation, I cut a hole in the shop wall and routed generator exhaust through it. I actually like it now as a permanent solution for the future times. The 12K gen now runs everything I need, including my man cave/office in the corner where we spend most of time now. Glad I kept the 200 gallon tank full. Everything outside is frozen solid so in hindsight I am glad to be here for when things melt and damages become obvious. I expect our pool equipment be toast for sure. We expect to be gone for few months so I can't just leave it. We lived 7 years in Canada and never had this problem but also did not have all the extra stuff to worry about. That white sh!t looks nice from behind the window tho... my rant is not done, just not here. Stay safe!

[Guest Ray Davis]

 Ivan, looks like Canada followed you home. ROFLMAO. have I got too many letters there?  

[Ivan K]

3 hours ago, Ray Davis said:

 Ivan, looks like Canada followed you home. ROFLMAO. have I got too many letters there?  

Moved to Texas 25 years ago. Got rid of snow shovel year later. Now I could have used it...nah, just wait it out.

[LakinZ]

Winterize my RV and don't use antifreeze by draining the RV’s tanks and pipes of all water. Using an air compressor will pressurize air so that I can blow out water from the RV’s tanks and pipes, and the air compressor should be 30 to 50 psi.

[Bill R]

@LakinZ What do you do with the water in the p-traps for the sinks and shower?  I put a bit of anti-freeze in them.

[Tom Cherry]

16 hours ago, LakinZ said:

Winterize my RV and don't use antifreeze by draining the RV’s tanks and pipes of all water. Using an air compressor will pressurize air so that I can blow out water from the RV’s tanks and pipes, and the air compressor should be 30 to 50 psi.

That worked well for my gas Winnie.  I chose to go to a complete RV Antifreeze when we brought the Camelot home from the dealer and the low was going to be about 5 Df that night.  Been doing that since.  I did have an issue a few years ago.  The toilet flush valve (ball and the spray combo) actually had a leak.  We had temps  in NC where we barely broke 20 for a few days.  Without the residual warmup during the days, the 3 or 4 Df night temps for a few days probably did it in.

i had decided that with the cost of an Aquahot boiler as well as the Sanicon, that the extra half hour of so of time and the $35 for the  RV Antifreeze was a small and cheap insurance policy.

When i did only the air purge, i did it way longer and then used used RV Antifreeze in the traps.  In reality, once you do the initial air purge, I probably don’t spend that much more time as the RV antifreeze goes into a system that still has, rhetorically speaking, so water trapped as i only spend 10 minutes or so after i do a 3 or 4 air purge at each faucet.  A buddy ran an HR dealership and said it was more expensive to do a complete air purge as you let it run or were supposed to, when using air.  So the labor for the additional “get it all out’ air purge was more than the RV antifreeze and that labor….and you were 100% sure.

Just know what the environment that you expect and i& there is a really cold and hard freeze without any daytime sun or residual warm up, then take supplemental measures.

FWIW, the system heat, if you have a Monaco that is 2005 or so newer is marginal.  The beige cargo heaters were “redesigned”, by a legal team and their reliability is lousy.  There are many topics here and a file on how to fix or repair a heater where the “fix” was never tested….