Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

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Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

January 18, 2016, 04:22:02 pm

Susan & I are constantly thankful for the amount of experience — and willingness to share it — demonstrated on this Forum. In keeping with good Forum etiquette, I searched "single digit temperatures" and "very cold temperatures" before writing this post. Found great help in this thread from 4 years ago:

http://www.foreforums.com/index.php?topic=16394.msg104821#msg104821

We've taken the steps recommended in that thread — operating from internal water tank, light in the utility bay, filled the opening where 50 amp electric cable comes in, etc. So, far we have been just fine with AquaHot running at night. But tonight's forecast is for single digits and we aren't supposed to get above freezing during the day, for the next several days.

Any additional suggestions? Or are there any "gotchas" we might not know about, since this is our first winter full-timing? I'm still getting up 2-3 times nightly to check outside temp and reading from remote temp sensor in the utility bay, nervous. Have seen as low as 33 degrees. I assume (but we all know the trouble assuming can cause!) the temps are warmer behind the utility bay panel on which the black and gray dump handles are mounted?

So far, we're amazed and pleased at the winter-worthiness of our Foretravel, confirming what others said in the thread! Thanks in advance for any addition tips, or any warnings re: something we might not know.

Re: Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

Reply #1 – January 18, 2016, 04:55:13 pm

Cover the opening and run the diesel if you can. That pumps a lot of heat into the bay too. Set the temp at 70 and you will be fine with the light you put downstairs. A remote thermometer is nice as is the little cube heater for down there but I have spent many a night around zero degrees F.

Re: Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

Reply #2 – January 18, 2016, 04:55:54 pm

Oh and crack the fantastic fan. Don't run it but give the moisture a way out.

Re: Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

Reply #3 – January 18, 2016, 05:17:53 pm

Hi Richard,

At this point I don't even worry about single digits anymore. As long as your Aqua Hot is working properly you should be fine.

We are in St Louis, I think it's supposed to be about 7Â°F tonight

Here is a thread from 2014 with some tips for cold weather
How cold is too cold??

We have spent several nights in a row in the negative teens, on more than one occasion, the coach can handle that just fine.

I have several of the lasso personal heaters and highly recommend them for the bays...but a 100W bulb will work too.
Amazon.com - Lasko #100 MyHeat Personal Ceramic Heater - Space Heaters

As an Amazon Associate Foretravel Owners' Forum earns from qualifying purchases.

Re: Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

Reply #4 – January 18, 2016, 05:25:43 pm

Douglas/Amanda,

Ya'll need to head SOUTH. That is what the key is for!

Follow the long-established mantra: "When an orange tree is happy I am happy".

BTW, we are in Carabelle, FL and will be working our way south. Having a "heck" of a time finding a CG in the Tampa/St Pete/Clearwater for a couple of weeks in February.

Re: Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

Reply #5 – January 18, 2016, 06:00:31 pm

Richard, you will be OK with all of the good advice you have so far. Nothing beats a good pair of wool socks in the evening. Like many we have been out in our coach at well below zero. If you have to start it up turn on the AH engine preheat the night before. A full tank of water seems best to me. Right out of the ground it is probably 50 degrees or so and a big chunk of warmer than outside. Leave the gen autostart on. If you lose power overnight it will come on and keep things powered up.

Get out those flannel jim jams with the bunny feet and snuggle up.

Re: Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

Reply #6 – January 18, 2016, 06:42:58 pm

Richard and Susan,

Here's a thread from 3 years ago when we were camping and it was below zero for several nights.

Camping in Cold Weather-Long but hopefully useful

Hope you find some useful ideas,

Rich

Re: Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

Reply #7 – January 18, 2016, 08:56:30 pm

make sure that the drain valve on the water faucet in the utility bay is open to drain the water out or it will freeze and break

Re: Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

Reply #8 – January 18, 2016, 09:40:38 pm

We spent a week in Kansas City, nights around 10 degrees. I had made an insert for the power access door, a sandwich of ply, foam, ply, with a slot space for the power cord. I also installed two Thermo cubes on short extension cords, so the cubes could lay on the floors of the water bays on each side of the coach. Plugged into the cubes were the 200 watt personal heaters. With my remote senders I could read the bay temps, from my inside portable receiver. I knew at a glance that the bays were warm. The cubes switch on at 38, off at 50. We never used the propane furnaces, and the coach was warm enough with 2 or 3 small ceramic space heaters.

We always have some nice fleece slippers to wear when in the coach. We also like our dual control electric blanket, and a down comforter. No one says we should have to rough it in a Foretravel!

Re: Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

Reply #9 – January 18, 2016, 09:51:08 pm

Quote from: wolfe10 – January 18, 2016, 05:25:43 pm

Follow the long-established mantra: "When an orange tree is happy I am happy".

Amen! We are about to do just that — except heading for Arizona this time, not Florida! Keep warm. :-)

Re: Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

Reply #10 – January 18, 2016, 09:51:54 pm

Quote from: red tractor – January 18, 2016, 08:56:30 pm

make sure that the drain valve on the water faucet in the utility bay is open to drain the water out or it will freeze and break

Good tip — done!

Re: Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

Reply #11 – January 18, 2016, 10:05:19 pm

Quote from: ScubaGuy – January 18, 2016, 05:17:53 pm

We are in St Louis, I think it's supposed to be about 7°F tonight. Here is a thread from 2014 with some tips for cold weather
How cold is too cold??

Read all with interest, thank you! You've braved colder temps than we hope to encounter. Well done!

Re: Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

Reply #12 – January 18, 2016, 10:17:48 pm

Quote from: Rich Bowman – January 18, 2016, 06:42:58 pm

Here's a thread from 3 years ago when we were camping and it was below zero for several nights. Camping in Cold Weather-Long but hopefully useful

Rich . . . Thanks! Several useful ideas, and a great chronicle of your Colorado Springs trip. Our cold days together at Huntington Beach State Park was nothing by comparison, but wish we had a fire pit where we are at the moment! On the other hand, it's way too cold to sit outside and enjoy it. You and Peggy keep warm, too!

Re: Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

Reply #13 – January 19, 2016, 12:15:01 pm

While we never stayed in the single digits we did get into the low teens before. The special items we did were to

* Run aquahot on diesel (not heat pumps) to make sure that the bays were heated.
* We have a separate front/rear water system. The front tank that doesn't get a lot of heat so since we had the luxury of of a 15 amp hookup so we added a second $9 walmart ceramic heater there and set it on full low. It kept it around 50F in there. I'm not sure what we'd do about that without hookups as I do suspect it would freeze.
* I closed up the utility bay and shoved a bunch of old bath towels near the opening and along the floor. The latent heat getting in there from the very close proximity aquahot was plenty to keep the faucet from freezing. In fact it was like 70F in there

The aquahot unit itself emits a lot of heat around it.
* And of course heat the coach to a reasonable temperature. Have to be cognizant of the fact that most of the water pipes run in the chases on either side of the coach. It's quite possible for the coach to be 40F or something above freezing while the air in that chase is much colder being right next to the uninsulated steel framing.

Others have had some interesting suggestions as well but that was good enough for us. I think we would have been fine with that setup down to -5F or so at which point I would start insulating bay doors more.

Re: Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

Reply #14 – January 19, 2016, 01:25:38 pm

Best one I heard was to tie a snow shovel on the back of your coach and go south until someone asks you what kind of shovel it is.

Re: Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

Reply #15 – January 19, 2016, 02:06:16 pm

Maybe a toboggan. All I know is we like it up North and know that at any time warm is just two days away. Easy to do for us, fully winterized, we just go. On our first trip to Florida in the winter the folks with leaf blowers to keep their sites clear of February's falling leaves caught us quite off guard. As did the more than 100° temperature change in three days.

The average daily temps are on the rise here in Hastings. Only 20° more till shorts weather.

Re: Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

Reply #16 – January 19, 2016, 06:15:14 pm

Most of you will think this is silly but the villages in fl will go down to about 34 tonight. Having one of the few Foretravels with Primus heat. I turned the heat on. This is my way of winterizing. I'm to lazy to want to repair a broken pipe and do the clean up. My old cold Michigan days are in the past. I wish all you brave soles the best during the cold weather. Bret has the best idea. Head for the sunshine state.

Re: Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

Reply #17 – January 19, 2016, 06:20:51 pm

Ya, FL, south Texas, AZ....

BTW really no point in a "fire drill" unless temperatures will be below 30 degrees for more than 5 hours. Even with heat off, the basements are well enough insulated that brief below-freezing temperatures will not cause issues.

If in doubt, leave a small pan if water in an area you are concerned about. Check it first thing in the AM.

Re: Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

Reply #18 – January 19, 2016, 08:49:46 pm

Quote from: joeszeidel – January 19, 2016, 06:15:14 pm

Most of you will think this is silly but the villages in fl will go down to about 34 tonight. Having one of the few Foretravels with Primus heat. I turned the heat on. This is my way of winterizing. I'm to lazy to want to repair a broken pipe and do the clean up. My old cold Michigan days are in the past. I wish all you brave soles the best during the cold weather. Bret has the best idea. Head for the sunshine state.

And what would "Primus heat" happen to be... I'll look it up, but wanted an owners point of view.

Re: Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

Reply #19 – January 19, 2016, 09:15:11 pm

Primus is a form of glycol baseboard heat. Primus is a company from Sweden that built propane fired boilers that heated the antifreeze that travel around the perimeter of the coach. Only a few Foretravels had Primus because the company stopped shipping to the US. Wonderlodge used them before Foretravel. Its a very quiet even form of heating the coach. I have three zones in the coach and the bays which each can be controlled. Its has two boilers that heat the liquid. It also has heat strips that supplement when plugged into fifty amps. This saves propane and when plugged in only one boiler runs unless the demand increases. I think only Lon and Cheryl on this forum and myself have Primus.

Re: Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

Reply #20 – January 20, 2016, 03:06:51 am

We are happy with the Primus system.
I was told that it was experimented with when the Unicoach was first introduced in 1995. The first units were equipped with the Primus system.
A coach was made for Justin Boot Co. that had a hot tub, Foretravel was looking for a system that could keep up with a hot water demand like the hot tub would require.
Its actually a pretty straight forward design, but complicated in throwing the right combination of switches to get it to do what you want it to. My problem is that I don't use it enough to truly get the hang of it or retain what I learn. I usually resort to reading the manual to get it tuned in. Every time I read it I learn something new.

joeszeidel, what is your build number?
Our coaches must have been close to each other in production.
Ours is 4614

Re: Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

Reply #21 – January 20, 2016, 09:12:32 am

Lon my build number is 4558 April 1994. I believe its the first U320SE built.

Re: Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

Reply #22 – January 20, 2016, 05:16:23 pm

Quote from: Roger & Susan in Home2 – January 18, 2016, 06:00:31 pm

Get out those flannel jim jams with the bunny feet and snuggle up.

Done! Best advice possible. ;-)

Re: Hints for Surviving Very Cold Temperatures

Reply #23 – January 21, 2016, 03:21:53 am

Quote from: joeszeidel – January 20, 2016, 09:12:32 am

Lon my build number is 4558 April 1994. I believe its the first U320SE built.

For what its worth, I was told by the previous owner of my coach , that my coach was used on the 1995 Foretravel brochure introducing the "new" Foretravel UniCoach. He told me the first Unicoach made was built for the owner, Fore.
If that's yours, its a VERY special unit!

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