Cold Weather Plumbing

[Doug Engel]

OK, I'll join in. Having lived in the Gunnison Valley for 16 years now and
having 2 older trailers (1959 &1969) as rental units, I can speak with some
experience about winter living in dwellings not really designed for sub-zero
habitation. I
For my money, I'd do the heat tape and ventilation plan. Best to have a
back-up if one fails. The heat tape of choice Frostex (maybe this is what BB
already uses):
http://www.deanbennett.com/frostex-heat-tape.htm
is turned on by cold in any area of the tape, not a thermostat near the plug.
It is pricey, but comes off of a roll so any length (pretty much) can be made,
It will turn on even if say, it is freezing under the bed but toasty under the
bathroom sink.
The ventilation sounds like the deal as well. When the fans are on, the warm
air will keep the water flowing and the heat tape won't run because the pipes
are already warm, no call for heat will be present.
The bottom line is it is far easier to deal with in the warm days of spring
and summer, despite how difficult the areas are to get at, than at 10:00PM in
Montana when it's -10 outside. But we already knew that. Happy Trails,
Doug'nPokey

Tom Warner wrote:
Have you guys really thought this out? Routing hot water from the
hotwater tank will mean the addition of new hotwater lines from two
sides on the PTs and one side on the FCs as well as pumps and some
way to sense the temperature to control things. How would you protect
the back of the shower using this method for instance?

In the PT you have actually two water branches one to the kitchen
side and one to the bath. On most forward controls you have
everything on one side except for those floor plans where the kitchen
is on the opposite side to the bath. I never did sit down and figure
out how to do it for the FC.

There are two problems, first winterizing the coach for storage in
the winter, and secondly using the coach in freezing weather. The
first case is a little easier to solve for the PTs. Install a bypass
using 3 ball valves and then injecting the antifreeze at the outside
hose connection leaving the sporlan valve turned on for city water
bypassing filling the water tank. Purge the water from each line and
everything is protected.

Winterizing the PT for freezing weather use is actually not that
difficult either. As I recommended to 'Ernie installing small fans
in various places to route room air into the cavities that are not
open to the air and then furnishing another register for the air
return appears to me to be the practical way to do this. . On my PT
the underside of the body is already heavily foamed so I believe with
this simple addition the pipes would be protected.

tom warner
vernon center,ny
1985 PT 40

At 07:15 AM 12/10/2006, you wrote:
>That the system iwas talking about all you have to do is add a
>pressure switch to tell the secong pump when to run
>Stephen 77fc35
>
>
>--- In WanderlodgeForum@yahoogroups.com, Terry Neal wrote:
> >
> > Hi Stephen,
> >
> > How are you? Staying warm up North I hope.
> >
> > How would a recirculating pump on the hot water line (at the end)
> > pumping the hot water back to the water heater itself work? I'm
> > thinking another Groco 12 volt pump with a switch to turn it on/off
>when
> > needed. Like the ones used in residential construction so that you
>have
> > instant hot water at all faucets all the time? I think that would be a
> > good solution. My system needs to be usable down to -20 or -30 & on
> > shore power or generator. With enough insulation & keeping the water
> > moving, that may be the answer?
> >
> > Terry Neal
> > Bozeman, MT
> > 82PT40
> > 74FC34
> >
> >
> >
> > Stephen Birtles wrote:
> >
> > > for that to work successfully you have to have a hot return from the
> > > farthest faucet requires another pump but can be done succesfully and
> > > only works when faucet is running
> > >
> > > --- In WanderlodgeForum@yahoogroups.com
> > > , Wilhelmus Schreurs
> > > wrote:
> > > >
> > > > Ernie:
> > > > What about having your hot and cold water lines together,insulated
> > > in a blanket or something like that, and then circulate the hotwater
> > > throughout the hot water lines? That way you would not require the
> > > heat tape or forced air fans.
> > > >
> > > > Bill 84 FC 35 SB "$quanderlodge"
> > > > Terrace, B.C. Canada
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > ----- Original Message ----
> > > > From: "erniecarpet@"
> > > > To: WanderlodgeForum@yahoogroups.com
> > >
> > > > Sent: Saturday, December 9, 2006 6:04:42 AM
> > > > Subject: Re: [WanderlodgeForum] Cold Weather Plumbing
> > > >
> > > > Installing a bypass and injecting antifreeze in all the pipes might
> > > be well
> > > > suited to folks that do not use their coach in the winter. Since we
> > > live
> > > > further south of the deep freeze, we use ours year round. in fact, I
> > > guess i could
> > > > have considered myself a fulltimer as I was in the coach 10
>months this
> > > > year.
> > > > What I was trying to get across, and hopefully I can this time. I
> > > would like
> > > > to be able to stay up in Montana longer- that is if I had a good
> > > system in
> > > > place where my water wouldn't freeze if it got to be zero
>outside for a
> > > > prolonged time.
> > > > Is heat tape the ONLY solution that is on the market?
> > > > It would be nice if there were small heaters- not noisy hair dryers
> > > that
> > > > could operate and send warm air down the side runs of the coach.
> > > > On my coach, the chassis heater lines do not run down the fresh
> > > water runs-
> > > > thus I couldn't use those. By the way, my chassis heaters saved our
> > > butts
> > > > driving home.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > Ernie Ekberg
> > > > 83PT40
> > > > Weatherford, tx
> > > >
> > > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]







Doug Engel, Gunnison, CO. 1981 FC35SB "Pokey"

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