14 Proven Tips to Master Winter WITHOUT Winterizing Your RV 

All good tips as usual. I recently bought a roll of reflectix, it says on the label not to use on dual pane windows. I think using it in cold weather would be ok, but the summer heat is not a good idea due to the reflection of direct sunshine. The heat may be too much for the glass and seals. In Texas, it does get very hot between the reflectix and the window. Maybe on the outside of the glass is ok. Hope this helps prevent dual pane window damage to your viewers that don't read labels.

have you changed the spark plugs yet? I see you have 92000. my mechanic doesn't want to do it. he says they blow out, I have a 98 V10 chinook

Thanks Brian! I like to drive our motorhome periodically rather than just start the engine if it is sitting for more than a month.

Thanks Brian for sharing! Like 59. I liked the magnets in your first curtains to reduce air currents. Since you have solar, do you need to run an extension cord out? Or do you just run all of this from solar?

All great info! I leave my RV plugged in, and I have an AT&T hotspot on so I can monitor the temp and humidity from afar (stored 13 miles from home, unfortunately), and I also have Alexa compatible plugs so I can turn the 100w heaters on and off as needed. Also using Blink cameras to monitor the RV. I am, admittedly, a geek...

Down here in So. Cal, I’ve never really done any winterizing either…. We get below freezing from time to time, but I’ve been dodging the bullet of frozen water lines…. Some great ideas for sure here and knowing the RV cover worked for you is the “Go Ahead” I needed to see. We do get some high winds however, so I’ll have to make certain to secure it very well. It could end up in AZ if I’m not careful. 😅😂

We have the same identical motorhome. We live in ours. 6100 elevation. About 2 weeks ago our water pump froze in the compartment even with the basement heater running on and off all night. Apparently the heater does not produce enough heat in the lower compartments. Used your idea with 25 watt light bulb, works great, no problems. Even if you live in it, 15 degress stuff will freeze. Thanks for all your advice, very helpfull. PS pump was ok, still in one piece.

I have a 24' class c. I drain the tanks and water heater then blow air through all of the lines. This has worked for 20 years. All of the lines are PEX so just in case some water were to settle in a line somewhere, PEX is good well below zero F. A long time ago I used that RV antifreeze in my fresh water lines and it took forever to get the taste out. Did that once. In the black and grey water, it wouldn't make a difference.

We are spending the winter east of Quartzsite. Woke up this morning to 28°. We don't winterize our motorhome as the furnace. Keeps our tanks and basement warm. One year, we had some issues with our furnace. Our investigation found mice had built a nest. In the squirrel cage of the blower. Not sure why, but they could not run in a straight line. Safe travels and hope to see you around a campfire.

Really great information Brian! I use a lot of the ideas that You have mentioned in this video. I use my RV year round so it important to keep everything protected during the winter. I really like the way You did Your windows in your RV as well as your Class C. I do like using Armored heat tape for my drain lines just in case its super cold when I need to dump my tanks. My tanks then self are heated but have never needed to use them. Having thermometers and the ability to monitor all the areas of your RV that are vulnerable to freezing temperatures is really helpful. I do use an electric heater anytime I have extra Solar to dump as well. Keep up the great work and Happy Holidays!🎄👍

I'm an old electrical guy, we used to call that clay like stuff "DUM DUM" I keep it in my tool bag! Great video thanks for the tips!

Steel wool works but will rust away over time. I've had the best luck, against critters, with brass wool.

It difficult to find incondecent bulbs

Spray fossil doesn’t work 😢

One problem with storing gas in the tank with ethenol in it is that after several months it starts to separate.

Thanks for the great tips, Brian! Another thing I like to do is keep my HWH hydraulic jacks down to level the motorhome. Takes weight off the tires and makes for better maintenance and use while stored. When I run the engine each month I clean the jack cylinders, drop the coach, and then level it again to operate the system. Also, I used to use the tubs of desiccant. Now I use a Frigidaire electric dehumidifier. Even on a low setting, it's amazing how much water it removes.

Living in Georgia, we don't get very severe winters but it does go below freezing occasionally. When I know it's going to be below freezing in my 5er, I close off the bedroom including the heat vents. Then, like you, I add RV antifreeze to the tanks to protect the valves. I wish I could keep the slide outs closed but my heater vents are in the floor and they get covered up by the slide out. I leave the heat on at 40℉ and have never had a freeze up problem and I've been RVing since 1973. That said, I really did like some of your suggestions and will probably incorporate them into my cold weather routine. Thanks for the video and happy holidays!

Great video. Live in PacNW so we just blow out the water lines and put the antifreeze in p traps and tanks. Like your light bulb tip.

Great tips for the class a owners Brian I winterized my trailer I always air it out with the compressor then add anti freeze also a Camafro 90 watt heater and 2 driz air baskets thanks great video 👍

An additional thing that I do is to remove the water filter that is in my water bay. I did not do this one year, and the housing cracked! My unit has shut off valves on either side of the filter making isolating it easy.

I always look forward to your videos. The topics and content always interest me.

Hi Brian, we want to replace our window shades with curtains and were wondering if you could share some advice or even produce a DIY video. What rods did you use, and how did you attach them to the walls? What black-out fabric did you use or were you able to purchase curtains? If so, how did you alter them to fit the RV windows? Etc. 🤩

Very good. I will work with some of these ideas. I find condensation (without using propane) builds and so on. I thought of another thing worth doing when you do you vehicle run ... after doing the shift through the gears ... even backing up and and forward again will assure the brake lining from rusting or sticking so much. I was a Ford tech ... keep those caliper guides cleaned and lubed (use special caliper grease only).. good summer project. Semi metallic pads have metal and it will tend to rust if not kept free. Here in the PNW shoes and pads will make noise regardless until they warm up and dry. ..,, Trivia, when coolant gets up to temp it doesn't mean the motor is warmed up... just the coolant .. think of where the water jacket and oil areas are in a motor, ... when the motor is 100% warm, the oil and coolant are nearly the same temp. Coolant warms up and cools off quicker than oil. Thus, when first ready to take out of storage and use.. doing all the same things you're doing, drive it easy for 15 to 20 miles and get that oil up to temperature... the motor will love you for doing that. 🙂

Lithium batteries don't need a trickle charge since their internal resistance is so little.

On the windshield, that wraps around front side windows, I put a custom made cover on the outside (available for class Cs online) and I put reflective bubble wrap on the inside of all of the windows.

Up here in Canada we have to do a full winterization due to very cold temps. However, some of your advice and ideas will come in useful after we de-winterize for our trip south in January. Thanks!

Most important is perspective! This is all absolutely good information Brian, but as a full time RV’er I know there are some things that are not a good idea. They could even get an RV in trouble. When you live in your RV throughout the winter it means that there are one or more people inside generating moisture. Easy to forget is that this happens 24 hours a day, day in day out. If the bucket of desiccant was the only counter measure to this, and it would be able to keep up, it would be done, ready for replacement, in perhaps 3 days. A fulltimer needs to apply another strategy. Insulating windows from the inside would have the typical effect of making the windows even colder, and with the more humid air inside they would act as impromptu dehumidifiers, dripping their harvest right down the dashboard and walls. As ugly as it may look, it’s best to tape that reflectix against the outside of that big single pane wind shield. Any insulation inside, including nice thick curtains will lead to colder windows with a dramatically increased chance on condensation. Let me make clear that this is not a concern when a person just parks their RV in the winter and lives and breathes somewhere else. We have an dehumidifier that at some moments is very useful and very necessary to run but since I have started measuring CO2 levels in our RV I noticed that the amount of ventilation with dry winter air that is needed to keep the air healthy seems enough to keep the humidity levels low enough not to get condensation anywhere but in the deepest closets. Mind you, while we are still in Tennessee for a couple of days longer we have the reflectix at the outside of our wind shield. Needless to say, humidifiers are out of the question in an RV. Bad news for those who really need one. As we are too cheap to invest in heated hoses we only hook up to fill the tanks every 3 days or so if it is freezing. And yes, like you suggested, we have the fresh water tank full during cold nights. So far (December 10) there have been only few freezing nights where it was necessary to unhook and store the hoses. Practically this means that we are about to lift the jacks and head south. (Who wants to go through that sh*t? :-) ) So much for the differences between intermittent rv’ing and fulltiming. I have some tips: The space heater I like most is coincidentally also the cheapest space heater you can get at wallyworld, the $20 Pelonis heater. Just a month ago I re-tried a ceramic heater and as I expected, those things get too hot and are too loud for my comfort. Especially them getting too hot worries me. Can those things start a fire? The Pelonis cheapo in contrast is quieter, has a much larger air throughput, and has 3 power settings which brings me to another point. Apart from it offering more options to manage energy, It is more comfortable to run 2 of these at half power then it is to run 1 at full power. While the air out of these things is less hot then out of a ceramic heater it is at it’s highest setting still too hot to nicely mix with the rest of the air in the RV. Consequently most of the heat would rise to the ceiling which still leaves you with cold feet. The only disadvantage of these heaters is that they are about twice the size of a ceramic heater. Ahwell. Lightbulbs to keep things from freezing is certainly a good idea. I opted for yet another few of those cheap heaters. Not only do they have a thermostat that enables a person to set and forget them in the basement while saving energy on non freezing days, they also have a higher heat output to help with extremely cold days. Unlike a light bulb they also come with several protections. A little disclosure: I rewired the units in the basement a little so their lowest setting is not 700 watt but only about 400 watt. Of course they are a lot bigger than a light bulb so you need to have the space. To regularly run an engine seems debatable, for diesel engines at least. Some say it’s important, some note that idling a diesel engine will never get the temperature up high enough because of the way they breathe. Some say it’s best to not start the engine unless you are ready to use it. Paul

Thanks for the video.

Why do you have your sewer hose near your fresh water hook up?