How To Stay Warm In The RV When It's Cold Outside

There is a group of us RVers that like to camp all year long and we live where that is possible.  Some of us Cold Weather RVers have little choice and must be in our RV all year long.  So how can you stay warm inside the RV when the world around you is just too cold?






Let's be clear on one point. If you have a rig that can take the cold it can only take it if the main furnace is set to keep the inside of the rig above freezing.  Most all weather rigs must have the furnace running to keep water pipes that run inside the rig from freezing.  That includes the black tank and grey water tanks as well. So you will need to keep the rig furnace going but you do not need it running at 72 degrees.

Let's talk about keeping you warm and comfortable.  I suppose we could all dress like Eskimos, but that seems a bit much for just reading a book inside our rig or maybe eating dinner.
You could wrap yourself in an electric throw blanket and be comfortable, like this one.

Electric Throw Blanket

If you added these to your feet you would be warm as toast.

Warming Footies

OR

Snoozies Many Styles

These Footies or Snoozies and the electric throw you should be able to sit around and enjoy TV or read a good book.

But what about sleeping in bed?  That is a good question, so let's take a look at that.

You could put one of these Mattress Heating Pads on your bed and plug into electric and sleep warm as toast all night.  These heated pads come in all the popular sizes King, Queen, and Twin.  I have shown the queen size below;

Mattress Heating Pads

Because heat rises this mattress type heating pad is much better than a heating blanket and will use less power to keep you toasty warm during the cold night.  That might be good for the sleeping time but what about being up and moving around the rig?

Ah, but you need to heat the Rig so you need more power, I mean heat.  Then you want a Ceramic Space Heater  This type of heater generates a lot of heat for very little electricity used.  The one pictured below is what I use.  I use two of the Ceramic Heaters. One blowing toward the bedroom and one in the living room blowing toward the kitchen.  These heaters will cook you out of the Rig, they can generate so much heat.  I winter camp in North Texas and it can get below freezing, as we all found out in the winter of 2013/2014.  But even though my water hose froze outside, inside we were as warm as toast.  Shown below is the  Space Heater I have;

Electric Space Heater

I have listed some of the features of this unit below:

• Small Heater Measures: 6.2" X 4.74" x 8.3" . 
• Three Modes Heater With Fan: 1.High Heat (1500-watt), 2. Low Heat(750-watt ), 3. Fan Only.
• FOR SAFETY: 1.Automatic overheat system will shut the unit off when the parts of the heater overheat. 2. TIP-OVER SWITCH will shut off unite when tipped forward or backward.

If you have a four-legged friend (Furkid) traveling with you, please take note: this unit comes with Auto Shut-Off.  If the Heater is tipped over the heater shuts off automatically.  This is a very important feature if you are traveling with four-footed friends.  There are some clumsy two-legged friends out there as well.

There are other options to keep warm in the RV you could also use one or more of these oil filled heaters.

Oil Filled Space Heater

The simple controls allow users to customize their heat with an adjustable thermostat and three temperature settings, and the ComforTemp setting maintains an optimal room temperature while conserving energy. The heater never requires refilling, and the anti-freeze technology automatically turns the unit on when the temperature drops below 42 degrees.
Oil heaters are quiet and run about 10.5 cents an hour to operate which can be a money saver compared to other types of heaters. 

 I know from experience that these hints and tips will work. They keep the family warm during our cold weather camping, which we enjoy most of the time. 

Until next time.

And finally, please remember that this blog is an Amazon affiliate. When you order something through any of the Amazon links, it doesn’t add anything to your cost, but I do earn a small commission on everything you buy. 
Just click on an Amazon link, then shop as usual.

Water Out Of The Campground Faucet, YUCK!!

Well,  I suppose that most of you enjoy Artesian spring water with just a touch of Evian for good taste at your campground.  I know I do. NOT!!  While most city water is ok (well some is less than ok but just barely drinkable). Most campground water is not even ok but is drinkable.  With just a little bit of  DIY skills, you can improve your drinking, cooking, and shower water to be something to be proud of.  Enter the RV water filtration system.






Let's look at the simplest of these non-RV filtration systems and see what makes it filter.  The carbon/charcoal filter is the simplest of the non-RV water filters.  The filter holder can look like this

Culligan HF-150A Filter Holder

So how do you hook this blue thingy up to your RV?  You will need a few more simple parts.  The input and out put of the holder is 3/4" so any big box DIY store will have the needed plumbing parts.

You will need 3/4" Garden Hose to 3/4" Brass Coupler/Adapter  it looks like this

3/4" Garden Hose to 3/4" Brass Coupler/Adapter

This screws into the filter holder and allows the drinking water hose to hookup to it. (this attaches to the output of the filter holder)

For the input of the filter you will need a Female hose to Male pipe  It will look like the following.

Female hose to Male pipe 

You can mount the filter holder to the rig or you can just set it on the ground.  If you want to mount it you will need a Filter Mounting Bracket The filter mounting bracket will look like this.

Filter Mounting Bracket

You can use the bracket if you wish or just sit the filter canister on the ground.  Next, comes the Drinking Water Filter with Carbon  The filter comes in a two pack and looks like below.

 Drinking Water Filter with Carbon

So you are saying to yourself  why do I want to DIY this type of project when I can just go and buy one of these,

RV Water Filter

The answer is, that once the big blue filter is put together, you can get two of the filter replacement cartridges for big blue for less than one of the above filters.  Also, there is the chance of bacterial build up because, unless you are a full timer you are not using the filter enough.  With the replacement cartridges, you can just take it out and throw it away and use a new one next time you go out and you will still be saving money.

But wait there is more.

What if we add a second big blue filter?  Would we gain anything?  You bet.  So let's do it.

The two stage filter

For a two stage filter, you will need everything we listed for the one stage filter plus a 3/4" Brass Nipple that looks like this,

3/4" Brass Nipple - Length you must determine

You will need to measure the length that the nipple must be and buy one from one of the Big Box DIY stores. This nipple will be used between the blue filter cans and the other fittings will be the input and the output of the filters just as before.  You now have a chance to increase the filtering of your drinking water.  Now you will start to use Sediment Replacement Filter which looks like this,

Sediment Replacement Filter

A sediment filter gets rid of: sand, silt, dirt, rust particles and scale particles The park water should come into this filter first, then go through the Drinking Water Filter with Carbon and finally into your rig.  So now we are done, right?  Not so fast RVer slow down and keep reading.

The Triple RV Filter

With this type of filter system, you have the best possible filter system for still not a lot of money.  So what do you need?  Everything listed above plus an additional 3/4" Brass Nipple of the correct length to go between two more blue filter canisters.  Plus one more special type sediment filter the Special RV Filter which looks like this,

Special RV Filter

This special filter goes just before the Drinking Water Filter.  I know this looks like a lot of work but it really is not.  It is just a lot of hooking up of pipes to plastic.  You will need some Plumbers White Tape which looks like this,

Plumbers White Tape 

I would suggest getting several rolls as the tape tends to tangle and get wasted.  You will want to check for leaks after assembly by hooking up your filter system and be sure to let the water from the filter system to run on the ground for five minutes or until the water is running clear.  Some black pieces of carbon may come out onto the ground and this is normal.

Mounting the filters

You can use a 2"X 4" (2x4) of the length you need and mount the filter holders to that as a way of keeping them corralled together or you could mount them in one of the service bays on the rig. It is up to you.
The water you will get from the triple filter has to be drunk to be believed.  This system will not take pond water or salt water and make it drinkable.  This will, however, make city treated or treated well water taste just great.  And the wife's ice tea will be out of this world.






Until next time


And finally, please remember that this blog is an Amazon affiliate. When you order something through any of the Amazon links, it doesn’t add anything to your cost, but I do earn a small commission on everything you buy. Just click on an Amazon link, then shop as usual.