Dear Hodag,
Here are a couple of articles that we published in past issues of Cabin Life magazine, which will give you some helpful tips on winterizing your cabin.
Please check this article regarding winterinzing tips, as well.
Winterizing Tips
You mentioned that you get most of the water out of your toilet. Here is a tip, use a small shop vac and you can get it all out.
We often go up to our cabin just for weekends in the winter time. But arriving late Friday night and waiting hours for the cabin to warm up was never any fun, we've installed a Cottage Sitter alarm dialer that we can use to turn up the heat just by calling the cabin from our home. This way the cabin is usually already warmed up by the time we arrive. Plus it does a few other things like monitor the temperature for us and make sure the place doesn't freeze :).
We use our cabin in the winter too. I have a sandpoint well that is in a small dog house type shelter outside. I installed 2 lamp sockets where I put 100 watt lightbulbs in. I change one of them every 3 weeks or so. I found that they will burn continuously for about 30 days before they burn out. Changing one and then the other in 3 weeks usually keeps 1 burning at all times. They keep it about 60-70 degrees even on the coldest days.
As far as the water lines, we do have a blow out plug that I installed on the line going to the cabin. I just open each faucet and use an air compressor to blow the water out of the lines, then use RV antifreeze in the traps and toilet.
I bought a small plug in rodent deterer made by First Alert. It emits a high pitched noise every 30 seconds or so and I do not have any problems with mice. Seems to work nice. (I bought it at Wally World.)
When we go up during the winter, the whole process of blowing out the lines and adding the antifreeze takes about 10 minutes.
We don't cover anything, but do take food home with us that is in the cupboard. Also take stuff from the freezer as it gets cold in there, so the freezer compressor doesn't run like it normally would.
I really like the ColumbusLake 10 minute process and wonder how hard that would be to adapt to our cabin. My indoor fixtures include: 1 back flow preventor, 1 pressure tank, 1 hot water heater, 2 commodes, 3 sinks, 1 self adjusting temperature shower, and 1 cloths washer. Also have an outside hose bib.
Do you drain everything first? Do you have a pressure tank and hot water heater tank? Do you have any low spots in your pipes that water could stay? How would you winterize a cloths washer? How much air pressure do you use? Do you only use the one blow out plug in the water line? Do you open the closest faucet first?
Does anyone pump RV through all the pipes and drain in the spring?
Fred
tapone We use our cabin in the winter too. I have a sandpoint well that is in a small dog house type shelter outside. I installed 2 lamp sockets where I put 100 watt lightbulbs in. I change one of them every 3 weeks or so. I found that they will burn continuously for about 30 days before they burn out. Changing one and then the other in 3 weeks usually keeps 1 burning at all times. They keep it about 60-70 degrees even on the coldest days. As far as the water lines, we do have a blow out plug that I installed on the line going to the cabin. I just open each faucet and use an air compressor to blow the water out of the lines, then use RV antifreeze in the traps and toilet. I bought a small plug in rodent deterer made by First Alert. It emits a high pitched noise every 30 seconds or so and I do not have any problems with mice. Seems to work nice. (I bought it at Wally World.) When we go up during the winter, the whole process of blowing out the lines and adding the antifreeze takes about 10 minutes. We don't cover anything, but do take food home with us that is in the cupboard. Also take stuff from the freezer as it gets cold in there, so the freezer compressor doesn't run like it normally would.
My husband says to winterize the clothes washer, you will need a hydraulic fluid pump. You can get them at a home supply store. You will need a five-foot garden hose, a Y-hose, a bucket and some channel lock pliers. Pull the washer out, turn the main water supply off. Unhook the hot and cold water supply lines from the washing machine and the wall. Use magic marker and find which one is hot and which one is cold and write on the washer "hot' and "cold" so when you put it back you will have no problem. Have a towel ready, it might be a little wet.
Connect the 5-foot hose to the pump. Take the Y-hose and on the Y end connect one side to hot, one side to cold and the single end to the pump. Fill the bucket with RV anti-freeze, stick the 5-foot hose in it, also pour anti-freeze in washing machine. Turn on to rinse cycle. Turn pump on and let it suck the anti-freeze out of the bucket, thereby loading the water pump in the washer with anti-freeze. Let it run until bucket is drained. There will be some water in the drain hose; have towels handy. You should be good to go. Disconnect everything.
In the Spring you will have to run a wash cycle with soap to eliminate the anti-freeze. We read how to do this somewhere in Cabin Life Magazine a few years ago. Very helpful article.
I am wondering if you could disconnect the water supply lines and then use a shop vac to either suck or blow the water out of the input/output hoses on the washer's water pump?