[Art]

Good Morning Eugene – are you Webasto equipped? Hope & am sure others will chime in, yet “believe” it is all you need, along with generator running and plenty of diesel in your tank.

In my 10-year newer model there is a Webasto “powered” hydronic heater in the water bay compartment. There is also an electric back up heater in the water bay. Have read numerous posts of persons in sub-freezing temps for longer than we will have freezing here in the Houston area.

[Calvin]

I do have a Webasto heat system but never used it. Does it require the generator to be running when in use?

& a Good Morning to you

[Jeff]

Fill the water tank. Get a small cube heater, set it at about 500 watts, point it at the water tank and leave it on continuously.

Turn off the water pump, open the faucets and a lower drain but do not drain the water tank.

As a practical matter if you do nothing you are likely OK because it will take a long time of sub freezing temps before you have a problem.

[Dick]

Eugene – with our forecast to be as low as 12 degrees and below freezing for at least 36 hours, I, too, would be very concerned.

I forgot you mentioned you have electrical service. I would test run the webasto asap for at least an 90 minutes to see if it runs & cycles AND to see if the electrical service you do have is sufficient / does not trip its (shore power source) electrical box breaker.

If your webasto will not run, Call Rudy Legitt for a service appointment to get it running. GOOD LUCK & Please keep us posted.

[Calvin]

Do I need to be plugged into shore power to operate the webasto?

[Archived]

Yes… you need shore power as your batteries will need to be charged since the webasto uses DC voltage and will drain your batteries.

The question is whether or not your shore power is sufficient to enable use of your battery charger.

[Calvin]

I currently run a battery tender on my chassis batteries and a charger on the house batteries – if I add anything else it trips storage facility breaker.

[Dick]

If you have limited AC power Winterize coach then forget about it, I winterize but I have Aqua Hot so it’s easy, you have water heaters so I’m not sure, I wonder If Liberty has it set up to bypass water heaters for winterize??

[Calvin]

Eugene – sounds like you are set if you have a charger on your house batteries. NOW is the time to go test and see if your webasto will run, and if not, get Rudy to service it. I have a feeling you will need Rudy’s expertise.

***AFTER service, you must run it 30 minutes a month to prevent the webasto fuel nozzle from clogging (per Rudy)

[Marshall]

I sincerely appreciate everyone’s help. I just heard we are going to have this lovely weather for the next 10 days! Damn global warming!!

[Art]

what is the proper procedure to “winterize”?

[Jim]

I’ve been to Eugene’s coach where he stores it. He’s the victim of a landlord who stores many RVs while providing NO decent shore power. If BoaterAl was the landlord, BA would be “selling” Eugene 50amp/240volt shore power.

But BoaterAl isn’t the landlord.

Eugene is stuck with 15amp/120 volt; which isn’t squat if you’re trying to keep a coach from freezing up. I personally would NOT try to keep our coach from freezing up on 15amps, nor would I recommend it to anyone else. Too many things can happen. Like the power going out as a result of an ice storm or a brownout. Or coach drawing more than 15amps. In my opinion there just isn’t enough margin for error.

Here are my observations and suggestions:

1. I’ve attached a screen shot of WeatherBug’s ten day forecast for League City. We see only one night below 32*F. But that can change and the actual temps may beat the forecast by 5* to 7*.

2. Eugene can go to the coach, fireup the generator, fire up the Webasto, turn on the Cruise-Airs, and make sure everything is working. If the Webasto doesn’t work, call Rudy. He’s an advertiser and close by you. Exit 800 on I-80. Once Eugene knows all the equipment works as it should, if the temps get close to say 35*F, he can go to the coach, turn on the generator, fire up the Cruise-Airs and Webasto, make sure the valves are open so the coolant circulates through the water bay (assuming his Liberty has a cooling system heat exchanger in the water bay) and he should be good to go. Set two small box heaters with fans on the floor plugged into different circuits. He can choose to stay overnight in the coach to monitor everything and be there if something “quits” on him or let the coach soldier on alone. Leave the cabinet doors under sinks open,

If I was in Eugene’s situation, I’d fill the fresh water tank with water, leave the holding tank empty.

3. Take the coach to a nearby campground that has reliable 50amp/240volt shore power during the cold snap.

4. Find a friend nearby with an open 50amp/240volt shore power hookup.

5. Winterize the coach. I’ll go out to our coach, scan the Liberty manual pages on winterizing, and post them.

I suspect Eugene isn’t the only Prevost owner south of the Mason-Dixon Line who is struggling with this predicament.

[Corey]

I would not want to rely on Webasto,or power outage , and if it is inside another problem. You need to find out from Liberty about winterizeing, Water heater by-pass? I can winterize in 10 min 3 gallons of solution 9 bucks from walmart (805)712-9449

[Archived]

Thanks Dick – the local weather gurus are forecasting slightly lower temps – like you stated with a little wiggle room, which still causes concern. I did notice a thermostat in the water bay to control heat – I’ve got a few days to make preparations and it sounds like I’m going to have a few sleepless nights but we’ll survive – beats the crap out of a hurricane!

[Rudy]

Eugene: The thermostat in the water bay should control the electric heater in the water bay which in our 1999 XLV is a heat gun fastened to the roof of the water bay. The thermostat should control the 120volt circuit that the breaker placarded as “Compartment Heat” controls. Confirm that the heat gun or another heater is there, confirm that they are plugged into the correct outlet controlled by the thermostat. Depending on how your coach was wired, it might be possible to plug water bay heat source and the water heater into the same circuit/breaker; having both on the same circuit/breaker will trip the breaker.

You don’t know what a previous owner might have done to change things.

The water bay probably has three circuits each on a dedicated breaker: water heater, 120v volt water pump, and water bay heat source.

I emailed a PDF of the Liberty winterzation instructions to Eugene. Empty the holding and fresh water tanks; close holding tank before starting. Liberty says eight (8) gallons of RV anti-freeze should be needed. I ended up using 14 gallons. I was pretty liberal when I ran each of the faucets to clear the lines out and make sure the traps were full of anti-freeze. I left the fresh water dump open during the process. Last thing I did was to close fresh water dump and run some RV anti-freeze into the fresh water tank on the assumption there would be a little fresh water on the bottom of the tank that could freeze.

Any questions? Don’t be afraid to call. You have the number.