Which is easier?

[Bluedogz]

Making a warm van cool? Or a cool van warm?

 

[INTJohn]

Making a warm van cool? Or a cool van warm?

Depends……
Do you want her to stay or leave?

Sayin…….

 

[maki2]

The old fashioned way for cooling, windows and roof vents that open, fans for an indoor breeze and to exhaust heat, plus using 90% shade cloth or awnings. My shade cloth setup is shown in photo below.bI added awning rails around the tops of the sides for hanging shade cloth as I have my solar on the roof so I park in the sun. I also use drops down from the sitting areas I create on the east side. On the south and west sides I angle the cloth down to the ground giving those sides full shade but allowing for air to move on through instead of trapping heat buildup. You can see in that photo that I have a popup roof section, the screened openings in it allow for heat to rise up and be removed by cross air breeze currents out the screened openings. Having one or more roof vents is pretty essential for cooling without using air conditioning.

For both heat and cold insulation including reflective window coverings.

The new way for adding heat, diesel heaters which I did install myself. This chilly but not freezing morning cooking breakfast will warm up my small, insulated space just enough until the sun takes over the job. Of course I also have warmer clothing layers on. I do have a diesel heater but won’t bother with it as making a hot breakfast will warm me inside and out. One of the benefits of not using a microwave or induction cooking in cool morning and evening weather is heating the space up.

 

[Bluedogz]

Some of my favorite memories from my racing days are of tent camping, early spring and late fall mornings at New Hampshire International Speedway, the smell of 2-stroke race gas in the air and snow flurries dusting across the asphalt. It only took two scrambled eggs and one coffee to go from "dammit it's chilly" to "hold my gloves and pass me that screwdriver." And that was with no heating devices at all, just a mummy bag.

I reckoned a van would be different, but from this input not so much.

How effective is just straight up Reflectix (sp?) on the windows?