4 years ago · Justin Becker · Comments Off on How to Keep a Mobile Home Warm During Winter

How to Keep a Mobile Home Warm During Winter

When the temperature starts going down during winter, there is a lot you can do to keep yourself warm in a mobile home. This includes drinking hot chocolate or having a delicious soup.

With that said, there are also several things that you can do specifically to your mobile home to keep warm during winter.

Below are things you can implement on your mobile home to keep it warm during the cold season.

How to Keep a Mobile Home Warm During Winter

There are different ways to keep your home warm, even when the ground freezes solid. Below are some of the approaches that we recommend:

Improve Your Insulation

You can keep your mobile home warm by either increasing warm air or preventing existing heat loss. Preventing the loss of existing heat is possible through proper insulation. Proper insulation can save you up to 25% in heating costs.

All the heating systems and appliances function effectively and efficiently when your mobile home is insulated well. Additionally, you should seal leaks in windows, doors, floors, and walls while winterizing your manufactured home.

If your manufactured home is located in a snowy zone, you should consider having a cleverly designed roof. For instance, green roofs improve the thermal insulation of your mobile home effectively, which helps retain heat.

For your flooring needs, consider using either vinyl or cork. Both are good at retaining heat for extended periods. There is also an option of considering in-floor radiant heating.

Weatherproof the Windows

There is no argument that windows play a critical role in losing heat from your manufactured home. It will, therefore, help if you weatherstrip your windows during winter. Some of the popular weather-proofing options include window films, foam tape, and rubber.

Consider parking your home in a direction that faces the sun during the day. You should also install additional window panes.

Good quality triple or double glazing can also reduce losses by at least 50%. Apart from reducing heat loss, it can also be more energy-efficient.

Use Thermal Curtains for Windows

After you’re through selecting and installing your window treatments, proceed to make the correct use of blinds, draperies, shades, and shutters to prevent or reduce heat loss through your windows.

Even though an extra layer of blinds and curtains can help, thermal curtains have proven to be the most effective approach.

Thermal curtains are reputable for blocking heat from the inside. They can also improve interior decor and create privacy in your mobile home.

Use a Central Heating System

Even though electric heaters are perfect for warming up your mobile home, central heating systems and appliances present several benefits.

If your manufactured home has a central heating system, you should have realized that having a constant low temperature for the whole day is a waste of energy. With that said, having a timer could help with the automation of your central heating system.

A timer allows your heating system to work at the time you specify. This will ensure that your home is warm when you want it to be and trims down your energy bills. Most people like to set their timer to heat the home once in the evening and once in the morning.

For instance, a boiler, which makes up the main component of a central heating system, is known for heating water at a constant speed and rate. If you employ a programmable thermostat, you can enable it to turn on at specific periods, thus preventing you from wasting both energy and money.

Include a Fireplace for Class and Warmth

If you have a small mobile home, it will help to have at least two heating sources to cope with the cold winter months. In such a case, you can include a wood stove, a small heater, or a fireplace in your home.

Even though wood stoves are effective, you should be aware of a possible fire hazard.

Apart from warming your entire manufactured home, a wood burner or fireplace will also provide a classy appearance to your living space.

Use Draft Stoppers

Gaps between the door and floor are a major source of heat loss. It, therefore, becomes essential to block such potential gaps on the side or entrance doors of your manufactured home.

You can use several draft stoppers to block such openings. There are several draft stoppers you can select from on the market.

You can also employ a draft stopper to fill gaps on windows that experience similar openings and gaps.

That being said, you should use draft stoppers effectively. If you don’t understand how to apply them, call a professional to help you out.

Use Area Rugs

Apart from area rugs serving as effective heat insulators, they also increase the aesthetic appeal of your mobile home.

Area rugs help to keep your feet warm and don’t allow cold to pass through them.

There are several rug sizes, shapes, and designs that you can select from. During winter, we recommend that you get a wooly and fuzzy area rug.

Place the Radiator in a Strategic Spot

If you have a radiator in your manufactured home, it will help to have them in a manner that offers the most effective results. The best option is to place the radiator in the coldest part of your home.

You can also place your radiator under the window, in a traditional way. Remember to keep your radiator away from curtains and furniture.

Placing the radiator above the shelf can also prevent hot air from rising, thus better heat channeling.

You can even have a piece of plywood behind your radiator, but make sure it is wrapped in tin foil.

Inspect Your Furnace

Here, you should monitor the furnace closet closely, vacuum accumulated dirt, and inspect the blower motor. Check the dryer vent and the intake vent on the door, wall, or floor as well. Clear debris from your vent pipes and ensure that the roof exhaust vents don’t have any excess snow build up.

Since most manufactured home furnaces draw combustion air from under the home, you should keep four to six vents to enable free air passage.

Professionals recommend at least one square foot of vent for 120–square feet of the floor surface, and your furnace should have the right amount of blower intake.

Check Your Gutters

You must clean the gutters to prevent ice dams. Here, you can also ensure proper insulation of the attic floor and install gutter guards where possible.

The attic should be at least 10-degrees warmer than the outside temperature and be well-ventilated.

Protect Pipes

It would also help to protect against frozen pipes. This is possible by insulating all of the pipes that are susceptible to freezing.

Keep a stream of water flowing through a few faucets to prevent bursting and freezing.

Seal Cracks

You should fill openings and holes to prevent cold air from getting into your home.

As we have seen, you need to install weather stripping and heat tape around openings, such as interior & exterior doors, mail chutes, air conditioners, electrical outlets, and windows.

There are areas where you can apply a rubber sealed damper, and ensure that your home gets the right air supply required.

Stop the Slips

Here, you should keep the sidewalks and driveways clear of snow and ice. Repair any problems with handrails and steps.

Install an Emergency Release

You must install an emergency pressure release valve in the plumbing system. This protects against high pressure due to freezing pipes, and, therefore, prevents pipes from bursting.

It would help to understand how to shut off water and understand where your pipes are found.

Trim Trees

Inspect your home’s perimeter to see whether the branches have elongated towards the mobile home.

Ice and snow can weigh the branches down and force them to fall on your manufactured home. Trim branches to prevent such a situation from ever happening.

Checking the Roof

An important part of keeping your home warm is checking the integrity of the shingle or metal roof.

The roof presents the first line of defense of protecting the home’s interior from the outside. Your roof will be in trouble if it experiences the stress of ice or snow buildup, needs replacement or repair, or experiences the effects of winter storms.

Check the below areas for any trouble on your roof:

Missing Shingles: If there are broken or missing shingles, the integrity of your roof is at stake. You should inspect regularly and repair as soon as damage is noticed. Ensure that you also repair missing or damaged fasteners.
Mildew or Mold: If you notice that mildew or mold is growing on your roof, it might be enough of a sign that water isn’t draining properly. During winter, the buildup of water can damage and freeze your shingles. This is the time to inspect your roof and ensure that there are no underlying problems.
Water Leaks: Check for water leaks in the attic, as well as have a clear look at the ceiling and walls of your home. Any small leak could become dangerous, especially during winter.
Shingle Grit: Your shingles are getting to the end of their service if the coatings on the asphalt shingles are coming off and accumulating in your homes’ gutter. This may be the perfect time to purchase a new roof in preparation for winter.

Why Winterize Your Home

As we have seen above, keeping your home warm during the cold season isn’t as easy as you may think. However, it’s necessary, especially if you want to keep your family warm and healthy.

Proper winter preparation will protect you from harsh cold temperatures, sleet, snow, and rain.

Below are reasons why you need to winterize your home:

Saves Energy

A large part of keeping your home warm during the cold season involves insulating the home against any cold. By simply protecting and sealing your home, you’ll end up using less energy in the heating process.

It’ll, therefore, translate into a large saving on the utility bills.

Prevent Unnecessary Repairs

Regular maintenance is among the best ways of safeguarding your mobile home against unexpected problems.

Before winter kicks in, having a professional examine your HVAC system should ensure the furnace will run throughout the season.

Get a professional to inspect almost everything in your manufactured home that you might not have used during summer, including a fireplace and chimney. There could be hidden challenges that may translate into major problems later.

Secure Your Mobile Home

If you keep your manufactured home warm during winter, it’ll be protected against potential damage resulting from snow, ice, and freezing temperatures.

You should winterize the exterior of your manufactured home since it’s exposed to harsh weather elements.

Preparing your home can help you eliminate or minimize damages that your mobile home could experience during the harsh cold season. This protects your home, prevents high energy bills, and costly repairs.

Conclusion

As we have seen, winter can be unbearable, especially with the cold weather.

Before winter kicks in, you should implement the tips we have recommended above for you and your family to stay warm. For instance, you can always leave your ceiling fans off.

Preparing your home during winter will save money, prevent unnecessary repairs, and secure your manufactured home. You can always call a professional to help you prepare your home during winter.

4 years ago · Justin Becker · Comments Off on How to Get Your Mobile Home Ready for Winter

How to Get Your Mobile Home Ready for Winter

Winter is made of cold weather that comes with frost and snow. Even when winter is far off, you should take the relevant measures and prepare for it.

You could be asking yourself, what are some of the budget-friendly ways to get ready for winter? Here, we’ll take you through approaches you can employ to winterize your mobile home.

How to Get Your Mobile Home Ready for Winter

There are at least three main objectives to achieve while winterizing your mobile home, which include:

To restrict hot air from escaping using proper insulation
To restrict cold air from coming into your manufactured home
To prevent water and plumbing pipes from freezing over

Below are some of the approaches you can employ to winterize your manufactured home:

Roof Insulation

We all know that hot air only travels upwards. You can imagine how disappointing it would be to run heaters during the winter in your mobile home only for the warm air to escape through your uninsulated roof.

Most of the roofs in mobile homes are either uninsulated or poorly insulated. In most cases, there is a cavity between the ceiling and the roof that is left empty.

Even before you insulate your roof, you should do the following:

Identify the amount of open space that you should insulate
Install insulation baffles in your roof for ventilation
Close gaps in your ceiling, especially near the water heater and furnace

Installing Roof Insulation

There are at least three manufactured home roof insulation methods:

Interior Blow: This points to the interior of your manufactured home. Here, you drill holes in the ceiling, at particular points, between the rafters. You can then pump insulation materials into the cavity.
Edge Blow: It’s also referred to as lifting the lid. This method involves loosening your roof from the manufactured unit and lifting it to pump in the insulation. You should implement it one truss bay at a time.
Ridge Blow: Here, work is done on top of the roof. The insulation is also implemented one truss at a time. The benefit here is that it doesn’t affect the interior of your ceiling.

When you’re insulating your roof, you should apply spray foam to seal off any seams in the roof, especially when it comes to metal roofs.

It would also be best if you caulk around any plumbing and gutters that go through it. Doing regular maintenance will make your roof durable through the harsh winter months.

Proper Plumbing Practices

Plumbing should be a top priority for anyone who wants to winterize their mobile home. Plumbing fixtures in mobile homes are likely to freeze during cold winters.

A freezing pipe can lead to permanent damage. It can also interrupt the supply of water to the mobile home. You might be forced to do a costly plumbing system replacement and repair.

Draining Water from the Plumbing

Follow the below steps, if you plan to leave your house for a while in winter, to drain the water:

Shut off the water pump, water heater, and main water valve.
Open every faucet and tap in your mobile home systematically. This will prevent air vacuum & air pockets.
Apply an air compressor to blow water from the pipes.
Check whether the water heater tank has a floor drain. If it doesn’t, you’ll have to attach a hosepipe to the valve. Please open it and leave it to run until it’s empty.
Head to the holding tank and drain the water completely.
Flush the toilet until the bowl becomes empty. You can apply antifreeze for extra precaution.

Prevent Freezing Pipes

This is a long-term solution and is perfect when you plan on occupying your home through the winter.

At this point, you should give your manufactured home’s underbelly more attention. Below are some of the things you need to do to prevent freezing pipes:

Replace Your Manufactured Home Pipes

Rubber and plastic pipes are cheaper to replace if damaged, and they are more resistant to freezing water. You can, therefore, replace all of your metal and copper pipes with rubber or plastic ones.

Insulate Pipes

Insulating pipes is one of the most straightforward exercises you can do. You should buy fiberglass or rubber insulation pipe wraps. Place them around your pipes and tie them using acrylic, aluminum foil wrap, duct tape, and cable ties.

Insulate the Crawl Space and Repair Your Skirting

If there is no skirting in your manufactured home, you should invest in it. Inspect the skirting vents, entry places around the manufactured home, and skirting to ensure that they’re undamaged and secure.

You can then fix or replace individual panels using metal sheets or vinyl-based on your skirting material. When winter approaches, ensure that you shovel snow and ice away from your skirting.

You can also block open spaces using cardboard or wood and insulate the area with an insulating material.

Run Water Regularly

Since the winter still has a high chance of causing freezing pipes, running water is the solution. You should, therefore, run a faucet on every part of your home regularly.

Hose Bibs

Hose bibs are often ignored, but could burst. Make sure you insulate them and run them dry.

Heat Tape

Using heat tape is a very effective way of insulating pipes. However, in most cases, using heat tape may cause a fire. You should, therefore, understand the safety of using heat tape before installing it.

Service Your Manufactured Home Furnace

During winter, you must have a functional furnace in place. However, the furnace should also not combust from overuse.

Servicing the furnace involves doing furnace maintenance tasks that include replacing exhaust vents and furnace filters, along with servicing permanent filters.

Most modern furnaces contain systems that show when something is wrong, and the exact place where an error is.

Additionally, if you clean your roof vent regularly, the furnace won’t clog up with snow.

Make You Manufactured Home Doors and Windows Energy-Efficient

There are several ways of making the doors and windows energy-efficient, including weather stripping. These options keep hot air in your home and the cold air outside:

Storm Windows: Replace the windows with storm windows since they have increased heat-efficiency and durability. They prevent heat loss.
Double–Pane Windows: They are two windows with air in between. Try implementing them.
Energy–Efficient Window Frames: Use windows that have WERS labels since they prevent air from entering or escaping your home. Such window frames are energy-efficient.
Window Film: This solution is among the best you can implement.
Identify Gaps: Identify visible leaks and seal them off by using weather strips or caulk.
Employ Energy–Efficient Doors: These doors are fully or half-glazed with argon or glass.
Storm Doors: They come in different sizes and materials. Go for steel, fiberglass, or aluminum types since they require low maintenance.

Add Insulation in the Floor

This process is straightforward and will help you keep the interior of your home warm during winter. It also helps in preventing your pipes from freezing.

You need the following things to achieve the insulation process:

Duct tape
Some silicone sealant
Tools for pipework
An insulation material having a decent R-value
Staple gun

Follow through the steps below to complete the process:

Buy enough insulation
If necessary, remove pipes from your manufactured home
Use the staple gun to fix the insulation under your floor
Put back your pipes
Finish the process by applying silicone sealant

Block Holes

At this time, you should have taken care of the doors, windows, and roof. However, there might be tiny holes in your mobile home that might let in or out the air.

Look for holes in your home and block them. Places to look for these holes include:

Electrical outlets
Plumbing entry points
Wall strips or seams
Doors and Windows
Corners of the ceiling or floor

Relax the Tie Downs

It is a fact that there are ground freezes during winter, as a result of it’s contraction. The ground experiences a ground heave, which involves it shifting as much as three inches during the winter.

Contractors take such effects into account while installing foundations in mobile homes.

If there is no slack in your mobile home’s tie-downs, the ground could cause problems when it contracts.

You should, therefore, relax the tie downs to offer your home some breathing space.

Fireplaces and Chimneys

If you have either a fireplace or chimney in your home, you can buy and install a glass door or rubber-sealed damper that keeps cold air away.

Always keep fire safety in mind.

Ceiling Fans

As we have seen before, hot air always rises. You should, therefore, keep your ceiling fan rotating clockwise to force the hot air back down. This will always keep the mobile home warm during winter.

Clean Your Mobile Home Gutters

Dirty gutters can be overburdened if trapped ice, snow, or water gets into the mix. They get trapped either in the water heater roof caps, gutters, or furnace.

To solve this problem, you should clean the gutters before the winter weather begins to prevent the snowball effect.

Clear Water from Sprinklers and Hose

You should also clean sprinklers and hoses to remove any water. This will prevent them from spreading the freezing water to internal plumbing and, thus, preventing any possible damage.

Conclusion

As we have seen above, winterizing your mobile home in preparation for the winter weather is a very straightforward process that you can achieve by yourself.

The main aim should be preventing hot air from escaping your manufactured home and restricting cold air from entering the home.

When winter approaches, ensure that you shovel snow and ice away from your skirting. Weather stripping is also an important practice.

This means you must insulate the roof, perform proper plumbing practices, service the furnace, block holes, and more.

If you can’t do the above things, contact a professional plumber to help you out.

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