Dry Camping Advice

[meandmyprs]

I am a new Prevost owner and I am getting ready to take my first Dry Camping trip (Oshkosh). I have a couple of questions for the seasoned Prevost owners.

How much fuel will my Genset use?
How long will my tanks last given some parameters (fresh, grey, black)

Is there anything I should be thinking about (or taking)

I know these are simple questions that I should know but I just do not know my rig that well yet and I wanted to be prepared for this first trip out.

BTW, I have a 2004 CC.

Thanks in Advance

Brent

[Ray Davis]

Brent,

If you do a search through the forums for ("generator load fuel") you'l find some posts about this.

Basically, it seems that the generators use about 0.4 GPH unloaded, and up to 2.1 (some said 1.8) GPH when really loaded (A/C going etc)

As I remember one thread from people dry camping at a Nascar race, with A/C and generator going full-blast, they used about 12 gallon per day. Not enough to worry too much about. Much less if you're not running the A/C.


How long your tanks last is based upon how well you conserve when taking showers etc. I have camped with my wife, with both of us taking one shower per day, and lasted a full week, although the showers were around the 5 minute mark.

You can "sometimes" dump your grey in some places, which will help. Black water for me has rarely been an issue on a week camping.

Ray

[Kevin Erion]

Oh Ray, with 4 girls, we get about 4 days at best with the black tank. I do have the water level kinda high and we don't practice any type of don't flush stuff, I like to see nice clean water when I need to go!

[Ray Davis]

Hopefully Brent is not camping with 4 girls then!!

Of course, I was only speaking for a party of two in the coach!


Ray

[jello_jeep]

Kevin, were you not famous for some black tank issue?? Hmm,, can't remember

[Kevin Erion]

Jello, I was just checking what the max level in the tank was. It's a need to know, I just forgot to do it in private!

[mcirco]

Hi Brent

I have a 2004 Country Coach and I typically do a fair amount of dry camping usually from 3 to 7 days. My bus has the Lifeline AGM batteries. When I am dry camping I monitor my batteries very carefully. First - my Bus has a Crestron Control system that controls the generator Auto-Start feature. The voltage that was set by Country Coach to start the generator is way too low for AGM batteries. I NEVER use the Auto-Start feature because of this. For maximum life AGM batteries should never be discharged more than 50%. For my Lifeline Batteries the 50% discharge voltage is 12.2 volts. In addition, when dry camping I check the voltage on my Xantrex panel and never rely on the voltage as displayed by the Crestron System. Finally, it is important that when recharging the AGM battery for maximum life the battery must reach 100% charge. In other words, the 3 stage charger should be in the float mode when you turn off the generator. After dry camping a couple of times you will get an idea how long you must run your generator to fully charge your batteries. Since many campsites have quiet hours, knowing how long it takes to charge your batteries will help you determine what time to start your generator before quiet time to ensure you have a full charge for the night. I hope this helps.

Miles and Laura Circo
2004 Country Coach 45' XLII D/S

[truk4u]

Miles is right on the money on this one. I don't use my auto-start for the same reason. My Marathon had Genmate for the auto-start and I could change the dip switches to start at 12.2.

[Jon Wehrenberg]

What Miles said..........What Truk said..........

Living in the coach when hooked up to shore power, water and sewer you can live large and while you have some energy management concerns, dry camping is a whole different animal. With a little care you can minimize water and battery use and really stretch your capacities. Or you can throw caution to the wind with respect to the use of energy and run the generator as long and as much as you want so you are living in absolute comfort. (You do have a Prevost, and you did spend a lot of money for the creature comforts...)

You alone can decide through experience at what rate you wish to use the resources available to you on the coach. Others have posted excellent comments and the length of time your batteries, water and holding tank capacity have will be entirely up to you.

[hhoppe]

Be carful listening to Jon on dry camping. He dry camped for 43 days straight on the same tanks of water once. Di went home after the first week. Jon finally ran out of kerosene and white gas for the lights along with the baloney sanwiches and had to leave. Thats where he got his nick name Raunchy. Don't get too excited Jon I'm just yanking your chain.