RE: Cold night in Florida

[wssfetch]

 
We re having the coldest weather of the year here tonight.  Overnight lows forecase in the teens. I have the camper opened up in the backyard.  Earlier this evening I turned on the heater (heat strip in AC).  May go out and turn on a ceramic heater in the camper overnight.  Water is not hooked up.  Anything else I should be concerned about?

[mike4947]

 wssfetch
It might be a good thing to open up any cupboards or dinette seats that have pipe running through them if there s any water in the system so the heat can get to them.

[byrdr1]

 wssfetch
Cold You aint seen COLD...
 its 8 degrees outside right now!!!!its 7:40am
 This is the coldest we have been in a couple of years....BBBHHHHHHRRRRRR>>
 Watching the news and they are saying gas bills will be 40-60% higher because of cold and higher cost to them at the gas company..
 Central NC snow thursday only 2"  and now this....
 Randy

[tlhdoc]

 wssfetch
Was your PU OK?  We were below 0 last night.  OK I am ready for spring now.[]

[wssfetch]

 wssfetch
Pop-up was fine. It got down to about 17 degrees last night. Pretty darned cold for the Sunshine State!!!!!  The AC heat strip certainly didn t keep it toasty warm in there but it did keep temps inside the popup above freezing.  And that is all I wanted it to do.

[RamblingWreck]

 wssfetch
Sue and Terry,
 
 I was born about 36 miles to your north in Thomasville, GA.  Lived there until I was 12.  From Thomasville we moved to Waycross, GA.  My father still lives there.  Seventeen degrees F is pretty frosty for your area.  Glad your trailer didn t suffer as a result.
 
 A drop lamp with a 60 watt bulb or so placed in a cabinet can help prevent pipes from freezing.  Its a trick I picked up in Dallas, TX for when blue northers blow through.  Not all homes down that way were insulated well enough to protect the pipes under the kitchen sink (when its on an exterior wall).
 
 Here is some solace.  We had a coworker from our Montreal office in Friday (we are in Hartford, CT area).  She was complaining that she heading back to -30 degrees.   She didn t indicate if that was F or C.  Either way its darn cold!  The two temperature scales cross at -40 degrees.   That s just way too cold for my Geeorgia peach and I.
 
 Rambling Wreck

[Watchman]

 wssfetch
We are freezing in Gainesville Florida.  I am finally burning the firewood I cut two years ago! My family lives up north....   I prefer not to walk or drive on water 6 months a year!

[ThunderRock]

 wssfetch
Well, let s see....from what I remember on Friday, the temp here just north of Detroit when I got up for work was +5 degrees; same as when I came home from work [: (]; however, on Saturday, we got all the way up to a blistering 21 degrees w/25 m.p.h. winds. [:@]
 The ol  wind-chill took all the fun out of our " warmer"  temps.......Hmmmmmm the WeatherBug on the bottom of my screen right now says it s 12 degrees outside. Cold night in FL??  Come on up north, you re missing all the fun!! [8D][][][][]

[PopUpPeeps]

 wssfetch
DW just said last night when we went to bed that she is thinking about a quick trip to Florida in the next couple of weeks to get warm... I guess not with those temps!
 
 Oh ... did I mention that as I type this I have one of those indoor/outdoor thermometers above my computer... It says -2 right now!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
 
 New England is beautiful at certian times of the year. This isn t one of them...
 
 Sounds like you did enough to protect your camper. I agree about opening the cabinets with pipes in them. We do that in the house at night near where the pipes go outside at times like this...
 
 Joe

[tlhdoc]

 wssfetch
I m glad your trailer didn t have any problems.

[wssfetch]

 wssfetch
Thanks all.  Debated winterizing but figured based on comments from others down here that I wouldn t need to do it.  Besides the fact that we are using the camper through the winter anyway.  The sun is out, sky is beautiful blue and daytime highs are around 38-45.  A lot warmer than farther north, but certainly not tropical weather
 
 RamblingWreck--T ville is a beautiful place.  You know they call Tallahassee " way south Georgia"  and for good reason!  You re right, the houses down here are built more to keep cool in the summer than to stay warm in the winter!
 
 But guess what? The Canadians are swimming in the ocean down here.

[RamblingWreck]

 wssfetch
Looks like you are in for another bit of very cold weather for northern Floridia tonight.  Don t forget to run your heater strip in AC and open cabinet doors that have pipes runnng through them.  You may also want to put a drop light in the cabinets.
 
 Good luck,
 
 Rambing Wreck

[Viking99]

 wssfetch
I am ready for spring! It is supposed to get down to 0 tonight and the wind chill is supposed to make it feel like -12. Ugh!

[sandykayak]

 wssfetch
Last weekend we were scheduled to camp at Koreshan (nr. Ft. Myers, Fla).  I canceled it because everyone else was tent camping...and got my a** chewed out.  " You shouldn t cancel a trip,"  I was told.
 
 Hey, I was thinking of them.  I d be in the PU.  So I uncanceled the cancel.  The next day two of the ones who said they were definitely going wimped out.
 
 Since I had coordinated it and since 4 other women said they would go I set off.
 
 It was cold, but with lots of down and fleece we were ok.  (The tenters said they also were fine.)  It was 37 when I got up so it must have been a few degrees colder in the wee hours.
 
 Would someone please explain how the a/c heat strip works.  It certainly took the chill off the camper, but I left it on all night (was I supposed to do this?) and after a few hours it was starting to feel like cool a/c.  
 
 However, when I turned it off the first time I used it last year it got very cold and would not warm up when I turned it on in the middle of the night.
 
 On the second night at Koreshan I turned off the heat strip when I went to bed but I lowered the privacy " curtain"  and used an electric fan heater.  This was quite OK, though I spent most of the night turning it off and turning it on again because it was aimed mostly at my face (need to find a better place to put it next time).
 
 Comments ref the heating strip please.

[67_Skamper]

 wssfetch
What I wouldn t give for the teens right now, -10 with a wind chill of -40 to -50.  Cold enough to freeze the snot in your nose, before it drips, my poor PU is so cold you can t even touch it.  Thank God spring is only a few months away.