General conversation about winterizing.

[M109Rrider]

Had a great camping season. Never really kept close track but I'm guessing around 20 nights. Today I winterized the camper. Drained the tanks, drained the water/water heater and pumped it full of antifreeze. I also disconnected the battery and put it on a tender. .
What do you do in addition to the above mentioned to prepare your RV for the long cold winter?

[grhodes50]

I buy a couple of buckets of DampRid to help keep moisture from building up inside the tt. I buy it at wal mart.

[mtnguy]

Originally Posted by M109Rrider

Today I winterized the camper. Drained the tanks, drained the water/water heater and pumped it full of antifreeze.

You filled your water heater with antifreeze ?? You really don't need to do that. Just set the bypass valves, drain the heater, and leave it empty in future years.

[windrider]

Don't leave antifreeze in your water heater. It will eat the anode rod, if you have one, and then it will start eating the tank itself. Just my two cents.

[M109Rrider]

No antifreeze in water heater. It's bypassed.

[Steve38]

Rodent control. Don't forget to take precautions or they will cost you a lot of $$

[hankpac]

After draining from the low point drains, I recap them, pull the whole house filter reservoir, and empty it, and leave the filter out replacing the reservoir. then I drain the water heater by pulling (unscrewing) the anode rod/plug. I leave it behind the heater cover, so it is there when I want to use it again.
then I turn my bypass valves, so no fluids run into the tank.
Finally, I have a kit permanently mounted on the intake line near the pump, and I use that to completely charge all the lines.
Lastly, I put a few oz in the fresh water tank to keep the dregs of water from freezing.
A word about that: I never ever drink the water from our tanks. We cook and drink water we carry in special 5 gallon containers. Everything else is for washing, not drinking.
As to mice: I put Decon at each ground contact point. I don't have much problem at home, since we have cats, and a lot of Decon out, but when dry camping, we have not only white footed mice, we have pack rats (about half a pound or more) that eat the wires and nest on top of the batteries. So, more Decon, and constantly check for rats under the hood.
Ironic, We leave here in January, for warmer climes so I dump all that antifreeze when I get to Texas. About 2 gallons, but it saves my pipes.

[kandl]

Originally Posted by M109Rrider

What do you do in addition to the above mentioned to prepare your RV for the long cold winter?

Pray that global warming will accelerate and that we won't have to suffer through five months of snow'n ice!

The emoticon above is precisely representative of what happens to us after five months of snow and ice. Some refer to it as cabin fever...

[paulmac]

Only other thing we do is remove the battery and store it indoors (heated cellar) and cover the camper. We also leave the refrigerator and freezer doors cracked open to keep them dry and mildew free.

[tentcamper1]

all the above and I turn off the propane tanks, blow some air into the tank rinser to get any water out of it, cover the electric jack with a bucket.
we also remove everything from inside, vac out the cabinets, wipe them clean, vac the floors and take the register covers off and vac, etc - a good cleaning. sounds like a lot of work but we can get it done in about 4 hours. we have dogs so I want to make sure there are no hidden pieces of food for the mice to get.