Come winter, every RVer is looking at one of three choices. You can winterize your RV and store it for the winter and let it enjoy liberation. Second, you can fly south toward warmer parking spots in the great snowbird migration. Or thirdly, you can stick it and enjoy the spectacular and solitary splendor of winter camping. But if you’re going to go with Door No. 3, you need to make sure you have an all-weather camper that can handle the elements.
So,, whether you’re shopping for a new RV or trying to determine the cold-weather viability of your current one, you need to ask some questions. Specific ones. Because if you plan to take your RV into nature’s freezer, you need to be dead sure that it can handle what’s coming.
Which leads us to a simple but very important question.
Really consider: What is winter?
This might sound like a ridiculous thing, but remember: I don’t know you. Or, more specifically, where you live or plan to camp. Location has an enormous impact on what winter looks like. Recently, I wrote an article on fish house RVs. These specialized trailers are designed to be used on frozen lakes where temperatures can get well into the sub-zero range. Yet some of these trailers will happily provide hot and running water. All this to say, the conditions you’re hoping to camp in can make a tremendous difference in how your RV performs.
In New Mexico, where I live, the nights can get into the teens at the very coldest times, but then days warm up to the 40s and even 50s. Knowing that overnight temperatures are occasionally below the point where water freezes (32 degrees Fahrenheit), I’m not worried. But if temps routinely stay below the point of freezing, that presents a bigger challenge. And if the temperatures are well below the point of freezing, that’s a different discussion altogether.
Knowing the kind of conditions you’re going to be facing when it comes to cold can help you make a decision on what to prioritize.
Take cold-weather stickers with a grain of salt.
Despite the fact that most RVs are made in Indiana (where temps can get well below freezing), there really isn’t an industry standard for winter-ready campers. While many RV companies will put a bragging sticker on their RVs — that might be something like Arctic Package, Polar Package or any other branding — that effectively has no actual industry-wide meaning. That’s not to say that those RVs don’t have great, custom-designed, winter-tested features. They probably do. But it also means that the manufacturer is making their own certification. (Which most will brag about and explain in detail on their site. Which is actually very helpful.)
All that being said: Don’t worry. You can easily figure out how well your RV is set-up for winter and we have those tips here.
Ask about the manufacturer’s testing process.
There are a handful of companies that I’m aware of that actually test how well an RV can do in both freezing and high-temperature environments. One of those companies is Keystone RV who have their own climate chamber. Another is Truma, a German-based component supplier.
The limiting factor here for Truma is that they will gladly run a manufacturer’s RV through their climate testing chamber, but the RV company does need to use Truma components. The test they perform is pretty exhaustive. They’ll get an RV down to sub-freezing temperatures and then see how quickly their systems can raise the temps to comfortable levels. So, if your RV came with Truma components, it’s a great question to ask the manufacturer if the RV has been through this process.
Another company that tests and certifies their RVs is Jayco. Jayco sends their trailers to a climate testing facility that RV supplier Dometic owns to certify the winter-readiness of their rigs.
There may be other RV companies who have found a way to test their RVs and, if they’re willing to certify those results, that should certainly gain a lot of favor with you as a potential all-weather camper buyer. But there are RV companies who build very robust winter-ready units that don’t provide certifications at all. Which is fair, because there is no industry-wide standard.
Understand PEX plumbing has winter-resistant limits.
RVs are now almost all plumbed with PEX pipes. PEX is a plastic-like plumbing material that is pretty good at resisting damage in some freezing conditions. But the ability for a PEX pipe to withstand the cold, again, depends on how cold.
And, oftentimes, the failure point isn’t as much the pipe as the fittings. The RV industry is notorious for using low-quality fittings and that’s typically the failure point of an RV’s plumbing system.
Inquire how the heated underbelly is heated.
Many RVs state that the underbellies of these RVs are heated and that’s a true statement when they make that claim. But know that this heat is provided by the furnace, so you have to be running that. In many cases if you’re comfortable inside the RV, the holding tanks are protected by the furnace.
But many RVers choose to use electric space heaters instead of the furnace. Which will mean that the enclosed underbelly isn’t benefitting from the furnace’s heat. While an RV’s furnace can certainly have a thirst for propane, this could be partially due to the fact that it’s doing extra duty heating the underbelly.
Now, get your checklist of questions ready.
If you’re shopping for an RV that’ll stand-up to winter’s chill, here are some of the questions I would look for and use as a guide.
How are the outdoor shower fittings protected?
Many RVs simply have a thin plastic door over the outdoor shower. A few have an insulated compartment door. There are fifth wheels that put the outdoor shower fittings into the heated front compartment.
Remember: This isn’t about you taking an outdoor shower in the cold of winter. It’s about the exposure of the fittings (which house water) to freezing temperatures. The fact is that the outdoor shower fittings can be the weakest link in an otherwise winter-ready RV.
If the RV you have doesn’t have a way to protect the outdoor shower, consider adding shut-off valves before the water gets to the outdoor shower.
How are the sewer/gate valves protected?
No matter how well the holding tanks are insulated from the cold, if the sewer or gate valves (or fullway termination valve) is exposed to the elements, that’s where you’re going to have issues. Some RVs have these enclosed in the underbelly of the trailer so they don’t freeze. Which is a big thing to ask about if you’re shopping for an all-weather camper.
If your current RVis not enclosed in the underbelly, you might pour some RV-safe antifreeze into the black and gray tanks after you’ve dumped them. This will cause the pipe that extends into the elements to at least have antifreeze in it.
Are there tank heating pads?
Many newer RVs have holding tanks with 12-volt heating pads on them. These are pretty nifty because they activate once the temperatures hit a certain point. (Often around 40 degrees Fahrenheit or below.) So, even if you leave the switch for these turned on, they don’t draw power unless it gets cold enough.
If you have these, there’s usually a switch on or near the control panel to activate them. If you don’t, they’re not horribly difficult to install. They simply stick to the holding tanks. But they can only do so much as these are essentially a pretty thin sticker of heat that doesn’t provide incredible warmth, though it’s not bad.
Does this RV have an enclosed underbelly?
More and more RVs, even many budget-focused travel trailers, have enclosed underbellies. In the simplest case. all an enclosed underbelly means is that there is a layer of what looks like plastic cardboard that encloses the underside of the trailer. This may provide minimal insulation but doesn’t provide much.
Is the enclosed underbelly heated? And if so, how?
In many cases, larger and higher-end RVs come with a heated and enclosed underbelly. This is a next-level step as it takes the enclosed underbelly and provides heat into the space. The way this is accomplished is with a specific duct from the furnace into the underbelly compartment. This can make a big difference in how cold the temperatures can be before you have to worry about freezing pipes.
But, again, there’s no universal standard so some underbelly compartments are simply covered with the corrugated plastic, which is that plastic cardboard-looking material, and some have further insulation. Asking how the underbelly is constructed therefore can also be enlightening.
OK, but what if I already have an RV I love? Can it become an all-weather camper?
This is common, so if you’re reading this and you already have the RV you love, you have company. And the good news is that there are indeed ways to protect your RV’s plumbing system.
First of all, if you’re only using the RV occasionally, you can still camp in a winterized RV. While you won’t be able to take advantage of the plumbing systems in that RV, the rest of the rig will be fine to use. (Which may not be ideal, but it is possible.) Of course, many of us buy an RV so we have a toilet in the middle of the night. If your RV is winterized you could flush the toilet with RV antifreeze, which will help keep the contents of the black tank from freezing.
If you’re camping for a longer period of time, many RVers will put some sort of barrier around the bottom of their RVs. From cardboard to hay bales and even specifically-designed inflatable solutions, RVers have reported that blocking the winds from blowing under their RVs is a good way to help keep things from freezing.
In addition to blocking the pathway of the winds, some RVers also place a small electric heater under their RVs after they’ve put a wind barrier. But use caution so that you don’t create a hazardous situation doing this.
Of course if you have a heated underbelly favor using the furnace, so that it can do it’s job. (We keep an eye on our propane tank levels with these propane tank monitors.)
Again, depending on conditions, a heated water hose could solve the problem of keeping the water flowing from an outside source. But some RVers just fill their freshwater holding tank and use that.
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