‘Winterisation’: How to Prepare Your Caravan for Winter

The coldest season is upon us! It’s time to break out the blankets – and to do whatever else it takes to make sure you’re able to get through the winter comfortably. No doubt you’ll already have made the right preparations and done the necessaries at home, getting your house ready to cope with the drop in temperature and all of the other effects. But have you thought about what to do to ensure your caravan will be protected too, and ship-shape once the season turns and you’re ready to get back to travelling?

This is a process known as ‘winterisation’, and it involves taking a few steps to prepare your caravan for an extended period of off-road hibernation. In this blog we’ll run through the things you should do before caravan storage.

Winterising Your Caravan’s Exterior

1.   Tyres

Starting with the exterior of the caravan, you should ensure that the tyres aren’t left on the same piece of tread for the whole winter. Turn the wheels onto a different part of the tyres every few weeks, and make sure that you keep a check on the pressures of each one at the same time. Keep them ‘where they should be’ using your pump.

2.   Fittings (sockets etc)

The connectors which link up your caravan to your car should be checked over in case there is any damage or wear. Any mechanical links or moving parts (the corner steadies, the awning hinges etc) should be treated with an application of grease. A light finger-smear will also lower the chances of any deterioration in seals on windows and doors. Don’t use petroleum-based products (e.g. Vaseline) or engine oil. These will corrode rubber, and mean you will encounter further problems further down the line. This process can be repeated on interior seals and fittings. Exterior light fittings should also be cleaned (lens and seals) and electrical connections checked.

3.   Clean and cover

It’s worth cleaning your caravan in advance of winter storage. The exterior of your vehicle might have suffered deposits (okay, bird poo and other general dirt) which could harden or stain and damage paintwork. These can prove troublesome to deal with if you leave them until after the winter. So an essential part of winterisation is to give the exterior a good going over – this includes cleaning up the awnings, wheels, wheel wells, windows and window and door seals.

Using a breathable cover to completely shield your caravan over the winter or, if this is not a possibility for you, applying an exterior protection material (a waxy coating, say) will help provide reasonably robust protection for the paintwork and finish during cold snaps and poor weather. Any cover you used needs to be breathable material, and you must ensure it is soft enough not to scratch or damage the bodywork. Waxy coatings will wash off after winter.

Winterising Your Caravan’s Interior

1.   Clean and tidy

You spend plenty of time cleaning and tidying the rooms in your house, and you should lavish the same TLC on the interior of your caravan when you’re looking at new storage processes for the winter. It’s essential to clean and tidy when your mobile pride-and-joy is going to be off the road for a relatively lengthy period of time.

• For a start the walls and surfaces should be wiped down (including the kitchen and washroom). Make sure they’re as dry as possible afterwards. This process will also give you the chance to find any previously unnoticed trouble-spots.
• Your fridge should be completely emptied – remove all food. Similarly, remove all food from the storage cupboards in your caravan. Hoover up crumbs to deter insects or small rodents from making your space their home over winter. Any canned or bottled drinks in the fridge or cupboards should also be removed as these could freeze and split. Leave the fridge door slightly ajar, for airflow, and the same goes for cupboards, lockers and other doors.
• You should remove non-fixed items and put them into storage in your house (if there is room) or into your garage or other storage area. Anything in the caravan which could be damp-damaged or stolen. You won’t be able to remove everything as some items will be ‘fixed’ – but if you have a TV, DVD player or a stereo in there you should remove them as condensation on the interior circuit-boards may cause irreparable damage, leading to malfunctions.
• As a side note, here, just before you set off for the first time after winter, you should put electrical goods back into the caravan for about 24 hours so that they have a chance to acclimatise. Also remember that anything in the caravan which uses batteries (clocks, remote controls) could leak so should be removed.

2.   Sanitary

The caravan toilet should be drained and cleaned. You should flush as much water as possible through the system and into the cassette tank. Remove that tank, empty it (as per the usual method of doing so) and clean it out.

You should also drain down the water system so that it is protected against the possibility of being damaged from frost. Open all of the caravan’s drain valves and remove plugs (including external). Remove filters and run the on-board pump (if the caravans has one) to clear water. Drain any portable water containers.

3.   Electricals

Isolate the battery unit in your caravan from all 12V equipment using the isolation switch - or disconnect it (and take it home to charge). Alternatively, make sure electrical items you have left in the caravan are disconnected at the plug sockets. If you can, you should periodically power up the caravan’s heating system (if it has one). This will keep your battery ‘ticking over’, and will also help prevent damp and mould.

4.   Gas

Close off the valves on your gas cylinders or disconnect the regulators from the cylinders and fit secure caps over the ends of any open pipework. Cylinders should be stored in the open air rather than in a shed or garage. Wherever you store them, they should be kept away from heat and ignitable, corrosive, toxic or oxidant materials.

Although it’s quite a list of things to do (so write down a checklist and tick them off one by one as you go through it) all of the steps here are worth taking to give your caravan the very best chance of getting through the winter and emerging into the spring in great condition! Whether you bought from new or have invested in a used caravan, Wandahome recommends winterising thoroughly, as it also provides peace of mind…