Heated RV Water Hose, Build or Buy

As our time here in Florida quickly comes to an end. I'm trying to prepare us for the trip north to North Carolina. I'm mostly concerned with traveling from Atlanta to Cherokee. Not completely sure what to expect I'm trying to plan for the worst case scenario.

Will we be able to find a campground? If we can will the water spigot freeze or be frozen already. I'm not calling ahead because I'm not sure how far we'll go each day. But the preparations continue to boondock if needed.

I've checked out the generator, its good to go, I've got extra fuel for it. Filling the fresh water tank I'll do just before we leave. I'm looking at getting a couple of batteries and an inverter to run my Cpap machine if boondocking has to happen.

I've already made us a heated water hose just because I've looked at the weather trend for March in Cherokee. It calls for freezing temps for the entire month. Below are the steps I took to build it. The first one I've made so don't know if this is correct or not, all I can say is it works.

 

First I ordered a heat tape from amazon priced at $41.32.

Next I gathered all the materials I would need. 

This included a 25 foot water hose

5 5 foot pipe insulation tubes

1 roll of high heat electric tape

1 roll of aluminum foil

1 roll of duct tape

1 Frost King pipe heat cable

Total cost of these materials $16.13 from Home Depot.

I next wrapped the hose with the alum. foil and taped it about every 18" just to help hold the foil in place

After that I attached the heat tape to the hose again with the electric tape.

Now comes putting the whole thing inside the insulation tubes. Once that's done I sealed along the seam with the duct tape and also taped each joint.

Here's the finished project. I made this for a total of $57.45 in about one hour. Or you can buy one from amazon for $146.00.

         

Keep your fingers crossed for us. Maybe we won't need the hose after all, but I'm not counting on that.

Safe Travels, And I Hope To See You Down The Road.

New Year Update

It seems like its been a long time since I last blogged. I guess with Christmas, New Years and staying busy here at the Boy Scout camp it just feels that way. We just completed the Brooksville Raid Civil War Reenactment here at camp. What a job that was. No numbers on how many people came but I'll say this, Saturday was packed. Sunday not so much due to a big chance of rain that never happened and heavy winds. 

 There were over one thousand reenactors here and they put on quite a show. The Scouts Sertoma Club did a fantastic job again this year putting on this annual event.

Here at Sandhill Scout Reservation there's an abundance of wildlife around. Some of the critters I've seen here are Sand Cranes, Turtles, Swamp Hawks, Woodpeckers, Wild Turkeys, and Coyotes.

Another reason I've been busy is repairing all the water leaks and broken pipes we keep finding here. At least with the sandy soil the digging has been easy. Its pretty quiet here during the week, its on the weekends that scouts come camping. Main things to do is checking the latrines making sure all the important papers are there, water is on, and swept out.

The main reason we came here was to be close to the kids and grandkids for a few months, two of the kids came for the raid and brought all the grandkids. We got to go to church with them all Christmas Eve and spent Christmas day with all of them again.

Just a quick plug, I've read a lot of RV forums about reviews on the Nuwave cooktop. Barb and I decided to get one. It works great, heats up faster than any other electric cooktop, holds the heat you set it to. You can put your hand on the top and not get burned, its warm but not cool like the infomercial says, no big deal. Of course you can only cook one pot or pan at a time so you need to use another cooktop for any side dish. We have a small 2 burner electric cooker for that, might as well save your propane for when you need it. I highly recommend getting one, we use ours every day, unless Barb breaks out the crock pot which happens a lot.

Another major task that we got to put to bed was getting our health insurance concerns taken care of. Thanks Florida Blue. We can now travel and be covered without breaking the bank. And speaking of travel next month we get back on the road and head north stopping near Atlanta, Georgia so Barb can visit with her mom and brother before heading on to Cherokee North Carolina where we start workamping March 1^st.

This past week we went to the Florida RV Super Show at the Florida State Fairgrounds in Tampa. All kinds of RV's to see but nothing we would trade our 5^th. Wheel for. At least not in our price range. I did see a few Class A's I could live with but sorry to say I'm not one of the 3 powerball winners. That's about all we've been up to, so until next time.  

Safe Travels, And I Hope To See You Down The Road.