How to winterize an RV: The complete guide

If you live in cooler climates, you need to know how to winterize an RV. In late fall, that is job one.

This week, we talk with a Master Certified RV Technician and one of the country's top RV experts to learn when, how, and exactly what steps to take to protect the plumbing system of your RV from cold weather.

Our guest on Episode 418 of the RV Podcast is Todd Henson, Director of Education for the National RV Training Academy. Also known as "the Beard," Todd is the lead technical instructor for a very popular home study RV tech training course that teaches everyday RVers how to do basic maintenance and repairs.

You can watch a video version on our RV Lifestyle YouTube Channel in the player below:

For an audio version, you can hear the RV Podcast through your favorite podcast app or through the player below:

How to winterize an RV: What you need to do

Here's an edited transcript of our interview with Todd:

Mike Wendland:

As the weather turns colder, we want to talk about winterization. And then, if I could bring you back next week, I'd like to talk about storing your RV. Because there are so many new RVers who are going to encounter their first batch of winter weather very soon, and even some of the experienced RVers are a little unsure of a couple of things. Winterization and storage. This week let's talk about winterization. When do they need to winterize those RVs?

Todd Henson:

Winterizing an RV means protecting the pipes from freezing

Okay. Now, here's the thing. When we are talking about how to winterize an RV, what we're trying to do is protect our plumbing from freezing water. We know as water freezes, it expands and that water is under pressure. It's in pipelines. It just has no place to go, so it ends up causing problems. It creates cracks. And then as soon as we go back out, we turn on the water, of course, we have a huge problem. So when do we winterize, of course, is whenever the temperature outside begins to drop.

Now, where it's difficult is, is for how long? Right now here in Texas, we're enjoying our second spring, so it is getting upwards in the 90 degrees, low 90s in the afternoon, but when we wake up in the morning, we're in the low 50s. The problem that we have is, as we continue to get into October, that number's finally going to come down, and again, we may be in the 70s in the afternoon, but in the 30s in the morning. And that's the deadly time for us as RVers, because even for a few hours, when we have a half-inch line, it doesn't take very long to freeze those.

So let's talk about the different types of winterization processes that we can do. But the first and foremost, we're talking about when. First off, if your season is over, obviously you want to go ahead and winterize. So in other words, you're back home, but you're not scheduling anything through the winter months, through the autumn months, that would be the best time to do it. It is best to do it when it's not freezing.

BONUS: Ever wonder about camping in an RV that has been winterized? Here's an article on how to do meals and cleanup in a winterized RV

The different ways of winterizing an RV

If you're still RVing out there, one of the things that you can do is if you can, keep it plugged into shore power. And if you have a four-seasons RV or all-seasons... They give it different names...