During the winter months the cold can affect our vans greatly. We have a water barrel, water pump and a hose reel in the front section and these can all freeze in an ice cold van overnight when the temperature reaches -10c.
The water barrel is lagged with a hot water cylinder jacket to prevent it from freezing. We then wrap t-towels around the water pump to prevent this from freezing as does sometimes happen. When these freeze it means replacing the pressure switch on the pump which is an annoyance.
We put pipe insulation on the hose in the back of the van and wrap silver foil around it . The nozzle is then left on top of the dip tank overnight which keeps it warm.
During the day the cold weather can also cause the dip tank to cool down more than we would like. As the tank works much better when it’s hot we lag the tank with insulation boards and again finish off with silver foil around the outside and underneath. We then place a thick dustsheet on top of the tank during the day.
We have managed to get through the last few bitterly cold winters relatively unscathed. Of course it always helps when the snow does not fall, that we cannot do anything about.