Waking up to find not much oxygen left in camper.

[HERR42]

I was up in Oregon with my two brothers visiting relatives during the last week. We were up at John Day and since I thought it was going to be cold I buttoned up the camper before we retired for the night. When morning came around I tried to start the coffee but my lighter wasn’t working. I could not light the stove. I don’t have the peizo igniters for the stove….yet. I had just bought a new gooseneck lighter to use with the water heater…..I dug that out. Click click….no go. So I reached for my good cigar lighter……no go. I was sitting on the seat…right in front of the fridge so I opened the camper door, stuck my lighter out at arms length and it lit with one click. As I brought the lighter back toward the camper it extinguished once inside the door frame.



Holy smokes! There was not enough oxygen to support combustion!



Wow, I will always be sure to crack a vent in the future.



You guys running non-vented heaters are taking a risk.

 

[RJones]

Scary story and glad you are OK. I’m always vented using a combination of port holes, windows, and roof vent. I don’t care how cold it gets.



I was up in Oregon with my two brothers visiting relatives during the last week. We were up at John Day and since I thought it was going to be cold I buttoned up the camper before we retired for the night. When morning came around I tried to start the coffee but my lighter wasn’t working. I could not light the stove. I don’t have the peizo igniters for the stove….yet. I had just bought a new gooseneck lighter to use with the water heater…..I dug that out. Click click….no go. So I reached for my good cigar lighter……no go. I was sitting on the seat…right in front of the fridge so I opened the camper door, stuck my lighter out at arms length and it lit with one click. As I brought the lighter back toward the camper it extinguished once inside the door frame.



Holy smokes! There was not enough oxygen to support combustion!



Wow, I will always be sure to crack a vent in the future.



You guys running non-vented heaters are taking a risk.

 

[pods8]

Are you saying just sleeping in your camper drove down the levels or were you running an unvented heater? If just sleeping in there, you must have really sealed up your rig, I can't imagine the stock configuration not having enough drafts in the turn buckle ports, sideliner, etc.

How were you feeling on all this, you'd need O2 levels below 15% to stop combustion, which should have caused increase respiration in most folks and potential confusion, etc. if lower.

 

[HERR42]

Are you saying just sleeping in your camper drove down the levels or were you running an unvented heater? If just sleeping in there, you must have really sealed up your rig, I can't imagine the stock configuration not having enough drafts in the turn buckle ports, sideliner, etc.

How were you feeling on all this, you'd need O2 levels below 15% to stop combustion, which should have caused increase respiration in most folks and potential confusion, etc. if lower.



no heater running at all! i simply closed the vents and the windows. nothing extraordinary.


i noticed no effects.....no headache, etc. although....i am always confused.

 

[SunMan]

no heater running at all! i simply closed the vents and the windows. nothing extraordinary.


i noticed no effects.....no headache, etc. although....i am always confused.


I can hear my C02 detector chirping from time to time when my camper is sealed up, sounds feasible.

 

[MarkBC]

Many times when it's cold out -- like, lower than 40° -- I close up all vents/windows, etc...and I've never had trouble lighting the stove.

I just recently -- on my current trip -- got my Wave catalytic heater set up (made a place to connect it to propane). I've been using it the past several nights (it was 21° where I camped at 10,500' in the White Mts last night), but I open one of the turnbuckle-access sliders a couple of inches and open the roof vent and inch or so.

 

[Dughlas Stiubhart]

With three people in the camper and everything closed and sealed, I could see all the O2 being used up over night. I always have vents, windows, or ports open to let the H2O out and O2 in, no matter what the temps--even when it was -3 F one night last winter in NM.

Stew

 

[leadsled9]

I used to sleep in the back of my truck with just a shell camper. I never had a problem with it being buttoned up.

Then one trip my girlfriend came along. The two of us in the back used up all the oxygen. Luckily, I woke up with a huge head ache....and opened the rear window. We we very close to being in real trouble. Just having the extra person in the back made the difference.

Since that time....I ALWAYS open vents while sleeping in any camper. I don't care what the outside temperatures are....I always open vents.

 

[DirtyDog]

Between Diego and I, my camper is usually 90% methane by morning.

 

[Overland Hadley]

Between Diego and I, my camper is usually 90% methane by morning.

 

[brett13]

This got me really curious, so I checked:

It turns out that the average person consumes (breathes) 388 ft3 of air.
Air is about 20% O2 and exhaled air is about 15% O2.
That means a person needs 19.4 ft3 of O2 per day.

So...
At 12hrs in a sealed camper, you would consume 9.5 ft3 of O2 out of 194 ft3 of air.
The camper is roughly 200 cu ft inside.
But that 200ft3 is 20% O2 equivalent to 40ft3 of pure O2. That seems plenty to get one or two people through the night. At the very least, no problem for one person with no ventilation on the first cycle.

Hard to believe the O2 level could fall so low that a lighter wouldn't light. Though I wonder if humans can extract oxygen from lower concentrations, in other words, can you breath all 20% of the O2 or just the first 5-10%?

 

[DirtyDog]

This got me really curious, so I checked:

It turns out that the average person consumes (breathes) 388 ft2 of air.
Air is about 20% O2 and exhaled air is about 15% O2.
That means a person needs 19.4 ft2 of O2 per day.

So...
At 12hrs in a sealed camper, you would consume 9.5 ft2 of O2 out of 194 ft2 of air.
The camper is roughly 200 cu ft inside.
But that 200ft2 is 20% O2 equivalent to 40ft2 of pure O2. That seems plenty to get one or two people through the night. At the very least, no problem for one person with no ventilation on the first cycle.

Hard to believe the O2 level could fall so low that a lighter wouldn't light. Though I wonder if humans can extract oxygen from lower concentrations, in other words, can you breath all 20% of the O2 or just the first 5-10%?


Well if you've met Herr at a rally you would know he processes a lot of hot air

 

[Overland Hadley]

This got me really curious, so I checked:

It turns out that the average person consumes (breathes) 388 ft2 of air.
Air is about 20% O2 and exhaled air is about 15% O2.
That means a person needs 19.4 ft2 of O2 per day.

So...
At 12hrs in a sealed camper, you would consume 9.5 ft2 of O2 out of 194 ft2 of air.
The camper is roughly 200 cu ft inside.
But that 200ft2 is 20% O2 equivalent to 40ft2 of pure O2. That seems plenty to get one or two people through the night. At the very least, no problem for one person with no ventilation on the first cycle.

Hard to believe the O2 level could fall so low that a lighter wouldn't light. Though I wonder if humans can extract oxygen from lower concentrations, in other words, can you breath all 20% of the O2 or just the first 5-10%?



So three people in a camper would process about 600 ft2. And there is about 200 ft2 of air in the camper. So that means that the air would have been processed (breathed) 3 times.

If exhaled air is 15% O2, and fire needs about 15% O2, it makes sense that with air that has been processed three times fire would not happen.

Am I right on this? Or is my half asleep brain failing me.

 

[brett13]

So three people in a camper would process about 600 ft2. And there is about 200 ft2 of air in the camper. So that means that the air would have been processed (breathed) 3 times.

If exhaled air is 15% O2, and fire needs about 15% O2, it makes sense that with air that has been processed three times fire would not happen.

Am I right on this? Or is my half asleep brain failing me.

Sounds right. I have no idea how much O2 concentration fire needs though, but if 15% is correct, then yeah, no fire.

 

[Overland Hadley]

Sounds right. I have no idea how much O2 concentration fire needs though, but if 15% is correct, then yeah, no fire.


16% is what I found after a few minutes on Google.

 

[MarkBC]

16% is what I found after a few minutes on Google.


What kind of fire was the 16% figure for -- what was it that was burning, I mean? I don't know...but it seems like O2 required would depend on what the fuel was. Like, gasoline might be different than propane which might be different than wood. ??

 

[Overland Hadley]

What kind of fire was the 16% figure for -- what was it that was burning, I mean? I don't know...but it seems like O2 required would depend on what the fuel was. Like, gasoline might be different than propane which might be different than wood. ??


Yes, lots of variables. 16% was just a rule of thumb, an average.

 

[HERR42]

Well if you've met Herr at a rally you would know he processes a lot of hot air

the flamingo kid.....bah.....i liked the other moniker better........Princess


ha ha ha

 

[brett13]

Now I'm wondering what volume of air circulates when you open a couple of ports 2"? If I open a window corner 2" and a lower winder or portal 2", how fast does the 200ft3 turn over? I wonder if it is the entire cabin volume over night?

 

[RJones]

What is the wind speed outside?


Now I'm wondering what volume of air circulates when you open a couple of ports 2"? If I open a window corner 2" and a lower winder or portal 2", how fast does the 200ft3 turn over? I wonder if it is the entire cabin volume over night?