steve whiteside
Senior Member
Hey everyone,
Ive had my Grandby camper for a few months. I was just up at Mammoth Mtn skiing and camping for 3 nights. I used my heater while sitting around but then would turn it off and bundle up while sleeping. Im a light sleeper and didn't want the fan kicking on and off. Two of the nights were at 14F and the last night was at 5F. The first night it snowed about 2-3 inches. Other than that it was 40F in the day and then cold and clear at night. I was intent to get a good RV parking spot at the ski resort so I would leave my camping spot in the dark at 0615 each morning,
- I didn't have a condensation issue like others reported, although it was just me in the camper. I DID keep one of the upper vents open - about an inch and one of the windows with a 4" triangle open on the upper corner.
- Before bed I would get the water heater totally hot and then turn off the water heater. I had read that the heat leaking out of the water heater tank would keep things from freezing. Not true in my case. I would wake up to an ice icicle coming out of the faucet and it would take hours for the water to flow. Not sure exactly what to do going forward. I guess my next plan is to leave the furnace heat on the lowest setting and put up with the furnace noise. Perhaps instead just leave the water heater turned on and hope that that would prove enough intermittent heat to keep things liquid. I seem to have no damage after the trip to my water system.
- I had a hard time getting the cold/stiff vinyl sides to collapse correctly to pull the roof down. It was a pain in the butt to get 6 latches latched with the stiff sides. That colder morning it was all I could do was 5 latches and I left that 6th one unlatched as I drove off.
- I took a heated blanket that pulled about 180w while it was turned on. It was super nice to use to heat up my sleeping bags for the first 30 minutes of getting in. I had two zero degree bags inside of each other.
All in all I learned a few things and have a few lessons learned for next time. Plan to take my wife in Jan on the same trip. We will see how that goes. I bought a luggable loo for her. For me I would put on my shoes and trudge out in the snowy bushes to do my business- she isn't crazy about that.
Steve
Ive had my Grandby camper for a few months. I was just up at Mammoth Mtn skiing and camping for 3 nights. I used my heater while sitting around but then would turn it off and bundle up while sleeping. Im a light sleeper and didn't want the fan kicking on and off. Two of the nights were at 14F and the last night was at 5F. The first night it snowed about 2-3 inches. Other than that it was 40F in the day and then cold and clear at night. I was intent to get a good RV parking spot at the ski resort so I would leave my camping spot in the dark at 0615 each morning,
- I didn't have a condensation issue like others reported, although it was just me in the camper. I DID keep one of the upper vents open - about an inch and one of the windows with a 4" triangle open on the upper corner.
- Before bed I would get the water heater totally hot and then turn off the water heater. I had read that the heat leaking out of the water heater tank would keep things from freezing. Not true in my case. I would wake up to an ice icicle coming out of the faucet and it would take hours for the water to flow. Not sure exactly what to do going forward. I guess my next plan is to leave the furnace heat on the lowest setting and put up with the furnace noise. Perhaps instead just leave the water heater turned on and hope that that would prove enough intermittent heat to keep things liquid. I seem to have no damage after the trip to my water system.
- I had a hard time getting the cold/stiff vinyl sides to collapse correctly to pull the roof down. It was a pain in the butt to get 6 latches latched with the stiff sides. That colder morning it was all I could do was 5 latches and I left that 6th one unlatched as I drove off.
- I took a heated blanket that pulled about 180w while it was turned on. It was super nice to use to heat up my sleeping bags for the first 30 minutes of getting in. I had two zero degree bags inside of each other.
All in all I learned a few things and have a few lessons learned for next time. Plan to take my wife in Jan on the same trip. We will see how that goes. I bought a luggable loo for her. For me I would put on my shoes and trudge out in the snowy bushes to do my business- she isn't crazy about that.
Steve